Blog post #4
Although we talked about it at length in our last class meeting, I am especially intrigued by danah boyd’s ideas about racial divides on SNS Facebook and MySpace. In her chapter, “White Flight in Networked Publics?”, boyd offers an argument that the exodus of teenagers from MySpace to Facebook mirrors the well-documented migration of American white and upper-middle class families from urban centers to the suburbs.
boyd positions MySpace as the abandoned city where the less fortunate of society are forced to stay and deal with the crime, graffiti and clutter that the city represents. As boyd points out, MySpace became overpopulated as more and more teenagers created profiles. Crime grew as security decreased and “graffiti” appeared as users took liberties with their profile design. In opposition to all of this was Facebook, which becomes a symbol of safety and cleanliness in the same way that the suburbs represented a more desirable space of existence than the city. Additionally, as two different networks, Facebook users become appropriately separated from MySpace users, as was inevitable in the move from urban centers to the suburban communities.
In boyd’s argument, this metaphor plays a pivotal role as her conclusion points out that the division between Facebook and MySpace users has racial underpinnings.
One of the most interesting points she brings up is the perception that Facebook users have of MySpace users. She notes that in 2009, mainstream media pronounced MySpace as “dead” because “white middle-class journalists didn’t know anyone who still used MySpace” (boyd 219). I find this interesting because it calls into question my own perception of MySpace and what it can be used for. I don’t use MySpace and as a late adopter of social media, I didn’t use MySpace for very long before the so-identified “white flight” occurred. Though I belonged to a racially diverse group of friends in high school I can safely say that learning in a private school, we had a similar socio-economic status. This fits into what boyd identifies as one of the reasons for teenagers moving on to facebook. boyd’s article, particularly this section, definitely makes me want to examine my identity as a Facebook user as opposed to a MySpace user.
I wonder what the demographics on MySpace and Facebook are like now. I would be interested to see if boyd’s argument still holds water in a time period with over 800 million Facebook users. If white flight actually occurred from MySpace to Facebook for Facebook’s suburban qualities, what is occurring now assuming that some of the users that remained on MySpace during boyd’s study have since transitioned to Facebook.
@roxyredstar