[Air-l] we need a better word than lurking

[jerichob at juno.com]

A "lurker" exposes herself...

I've subscribed to this list for a while, and I even did contribute 
once, so I guess I'm not an utter lurker, but this thread has gotten 
me thinking about a number of things (which often happens with this 
list). 

First, by way of introduction, I am a Ph.D. candidate at UC San Diego 
Communication Department, in my 7th year, and desperately trying to 
finish my dissertation (so I really, really should not be writing this 
email, especially since I'm nearly done with a chapter).  One of the 
reasons I "lurk" is that I don't have very much time (I'm also a 
single mom - but that's truly invisible work in the academic world), 
and composing emails takes time.  Another reason is that my main 
research is only tangentially related to topics I've seen on this 
list - my dissertation is on famine early warning systems, and I did 
my fieldwork in Ethiopia, and while the Internet plays an increasing 
role in these systems, most of my research had to do with the face-to-
face interactions of early warning experts in Addis Ababa, and other-
than-electronic communications. I'm not up on things like blogs, but 
I'd like to be, which is one of the reasons I subscribed to this list. 
I also value the CFPs and conference announcements. Once I finish the 
Ph.D., I am planning to do more work in the area of information 
technology (including the Internet) in humanitarian planning and 
response, and this list may become more immediately relevant for me 
then. For me, subscribing to lists is one way of finding out what 
conversations are going on in a particular field or area of research, 
and deciding if I want to move into them.  This may seem 
opportunistic, but I suspect it's how a lot of people learn about 
fields other than the one they are immediately participating in.

So now you know who I am (partly).  Anyway, I've been thinking about 
the "lurker" discussion, and the idea of intent and assuming intent, 
and perhaps the reason "lurker" doesn't seem to fit right to me is 
because the initial definition of it is to remain hidden with evil 
intent, or to lie in wait. I don't feel that not contributing to lists 
is particularly evil (though I do feel that not replying to personal 
emails is). Perhaps this connotation can't help but carry over into 
the Internet usage of the term because the word did exist before and 
many people initially became familiar with it in its traditional 
context (as in criminals lurking in the darkness and that sort of 
thing).  Just a thought. At any rate, for those who are worried about 
presuming anything about list readers' intentions or expressing 
unwarranted aspirations for them, "lurker" would seem to be a 
particularly bad choice of label.  (For me, the term conjures up 
images not of passivity but of waiting for the right moment to attack.)

There are a number of reasons why I haven't posted much to this 
particular list (yet) - most of the time it's because I don't have 
much to contribute about a topic.  If there is a more general topic 
about which I have a strong opinion (such as academic publishing), I 
feel that since I haven't contributed to the list otherwise, my 
participation in these discussions would be less than legitimate (my 
own personal hang-up). If someone asked about something I knew 
something about, I would respond.  And if I had a question that I felt 
people on the list could help me with, I'd certainly ask it (and in 
fact probably will when I revise a paper to submit for publication 
this summer). Sometimes I will talk with a colleague about something 
I've read on the list, but I've never felt compelled to report these 
conversations to the list as a marker of my participation in the 
exchange of ideas related to the list (no doubt to many subscribers' 
benefit).  Perhaps I am a free rider or dead weight in this particular 
arena, but that fortunately is not true of others.

Best regards,

Jericho Burg

Ph.D. Candidate
Department of Communication
University of California, San Diego
http://www.communication.ucsd.edu/people/g_burg.html