- The size of the community

- Degree of homogeneity of its members' interests

- Are their subgroups?

- Is membership recruited through existing social ties

Examples of community structure decisions in online communities

- Push model: uses push alerts, like emails, to tell members about group activities or information that may interest them
- Pull model: operates like Facebook, members visit the community themselves to see new activity

Internal organization models: activity sharing

The constituents of a community and how its formed

University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

Also referred to as "design alternatives" or "design options", they make up 8 categories that can be changed or influenced by managers, designers or members to help achieve a goal of the community.

1. Community structure

2. Content, tasks and activities

3. Selection, sorting, and  highlighting

4. External communication

5. Feedback and rewards

6. Roles, rules, policies, and procedures 

7. Access controls

8. Presentation and framing


Levers of change for online communities

Kraut, Robert E., and Paul Resnick. Building successful online communities: Evidence-based social design. MIT Press, 2012.

Building successful online communities: Evidence-based social design (Kraut and Resnick)

What a community does to engage its members and generate content 

Content, tasks and activities

How communities select, sort and highlight things so people find the best content and activity for themselves. 

Selection, sorting, and highlighting

How the community engages with content and members outside of the community

External communication

Feedback: tells people how other users feel about their participation in a community.

Rewards and sanctions: give or take away something that users find valuable based on their behavior.



Feedback and rewards (and sanctions)

What measures a community has taken to establish conventions that help regulate behavior 

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