[Air-l] myspace and race

[elw at stderr.org]

>> Sorry - i should clarify - i don't mean that there isn't diversity in 
>> users.  MySpace has more traction with youth from diverse backgrounds 
>> than any site on the web.  In the schools that i'm tracking, there's no 
>> racial differentiation in MySpace participation.  That said, of the 
>> kids who i've talked to who refuse to use the site, 100% are white 
>> (most come from wealthy backgrounds too... a handful view it as a 
>> political stance against Murdoch... but the number of intentional 
>> non-participants is relatively small).  Urban and suburban kids are 
>> more likely to participate than rural kids, but that's the only 
>> segmentation i've really seen. But when it comes to race and class, 
>> this is not stopping participation.  Working class kids are all on 
>> there - they log in at school mostly.  (Interestingly, the poorer 
>> schools are less likely to have the blocking devices on their 
>> technology so underprivileged kids can log in at school while rich kids 
>> can't.)  [All this said, i have no official numbers - only what i see 
>> on a daily basis... PEW is working on getting some formal numbers 
>> though.]


In reading this, I fall back to some of the same old tired saws...

1) where's the *data*, danah?
2) what size is N?  what sampling methodology?
3) what are your classification criteria for "black", "urban", "suburban",
    "hispanic", etc?  "working class"?  [want a flamewar?  here's the place
    to start..]
4) what's your cite on "poorer schools" vs. "richer schools"?  What
    evidence for the proliferation of blocking mechanisms in one vs the
    other?

If there's no data, what you have is not research - it is a set of guesses 
and observations that you may or may not be able to substantiate and make 
a strong argument out of.  You might want to modulate your presentation a 
bit to take that into account...

--e