On(line) Cliques
6 January 2006
Since today is the last day for Holidailies, I want to take a moment to thank everyone who has stopped by via Holidailies for their visit. I hope that you found my writing interesting enough to stop by again sometime! 
Otherwise… Until next year!
clique n. : A small exclusive group of friends or associates.
I have been online since 1993 in one form or another, but it wasn’t until the last year or so that I really developed an active presence within particular communities. I suppose the reason for this is directly related to blogging.
Prior to 2004 my online presence was static: I maintained a website, but didn’t update it regularly and it was not interactive. I rarely visited bulletin boards and when I did I always remained a lurker. I seldom went into chat rooms nor did I play online games. Simply put, I was just another faceless name among the millions of others on the World Wide Web.
Then in 2004 I started blogging and through the interactivity of blogs I found others online that shared my interests. At first we left each other comments, but in time we began emailing each other with invitations to online events that we were organizing. Though it was done without any intention of leaving anyone out, a core group of people formed and without realizing it, we had become a clique.
Clique: It is a word that I haven’t given much thought to since high school and yet within the space of a couple of months it surfaced nearly half a dozen times to describe my online group of acquaintances. Honestly, the first thing I thought when I read this description of the people that I interact online with was, “Is there such a thing as an online clique?” It seemed rather absurd, but when I pondered the definition I realized that a small exclusive group of friends or associates can just as easily form online as in real life.
I must also admit that I was hurt when I read this characterization of my group of friends. After all, the term “clique” has rather negative connotations and in my mind it implies that instead of including others, we want to exclude them and that is not the case at all.
However, I am sorry to say that I can also see how others might perceive that our group is a clique. As a general rule, we are generous with the comments that we leave one another. So generous in fact, that I can see how a visitor who comes across our blogs might think that comments from anyone else are unwelcome. We also use our blogs to sing the praises of our online events and once again, I can see how a visitor might interpret our enthusiasm for exclusivity.
And though I have never known any of my online friends to be mean to other bloggers, we have unfortunately had to deal with others that purposely try to make us seem to be snobby and unfriendly to those we don’t “know.” It has hurt some of us deeply and while I am angry that even in an online community that is supposedly filled with adults someone still has to act childish, I also pity the person(s) that is (are) only “brave” enough to hide behind anonymous comments.
Because if the person(s) would actually take the time to get to know us by following our blogs for a little while, he/she/they would find that we are actually a warm, welcoming community that simply enjoys sharing our interests with one another.
I have a few words to say on blinkies: They are cute and used in moderation can be a fun addition to a blog. However, blogs that have too many (i.e., more than 3) make me fear that I might at any moment slip into an epileptic fit. So, a word to the wise: Use blinkies sparingly.
