Dana Boyd claims that:
Social network sites do not help most youth see beyond their social walls. Because most youth do not engage in “networking,” they do not meet new people or see the world from a different perspective. Social network sites reinforce everyday networks, providing a gathering space when none previously existed.
I can’t see how this statement stacks up? How can Boyd say that “most youth don’t engage in “networking””? If someone adds a friends friend as a friend, does that not amount to “networking”? Or is that something else? What if you started seeing that person offline? Still not networking? I guess a rigourous definition of “networking” might say no, but instinctively I’d say it was networking.
Then there’s the bit about social networks reinforcing everyday networks, but then she says that it’s a gathering space where none previously existed. That just doesn’t make much sense to me. If they reinforced everyday networks surely the networks existed before.