Virtual communities and society: Toward an integrative three phase model

Virtual communities are groups of people who communicate with each other via electronic media and are a relatively new phenomenon. Despite the short time that virtual communities have been in existence, they have been attracting much attention by researchers. The purpose of this paper is to review the theoretical and empirical work that has been conducted in relation to virtual communities in society, using it as a basis for an integrative three phase Virtual Communities in Society model