This paper explores the use of gift-giving as a theoretical and conceptual framework for analyzing social behavior in online networks and communities. Not only has gift-giving the potential to frame and explain much social media behavior, but reversely, and perhaps more Importantly, mediated social behavior also has the potential to develop gift-giving theory. Information and communication technologies form joint sociotechnical systems where new practices emerge. The paper focuses on describing the academic background of the gifting framework to help develop a deeper, theory-based, understanding of these sociotechnical phenomena. Three themes are prevalent In the gifting literature: other- orientation, social bonding and generalized reciprocity. The paper gives examples of how these themes are enacted by end-users via the use of Information and communication technologies. Finally, sociotechnically embedded economies, called gifting technologies, are Identified and discussed.
BordieuP. (1984). Distinction: A social critique of the judgment of taste, (R. Nice, Trans.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
9.
CamererC. (1988). Gifts as Economic Signals and Social Symbols, American Journal of Sociology94: 180–214.
10.
CarrierJ. (1991). Gifts, Commodities and Social Relations: A Maussian view of exchange, Sociological Forum6(1): 119–136.
11.
CeniteM., WangM.W., PeiwenC., and ChanG.S. (2009). More Than Just Free Content, Journal of Communication Inquiry33(3): 206–221.
12.
ChealD. (1986). The Social Dimensions of Gift Behavior, Journal of Social and Personal Relationships3(4): 423–439.
13.
ChealD. (1987). Showing Them You Love Them: Gift giving and the dialectic of intimacy, Sociological Review35(1): 150–169.
14.
ConnorR.C. (2007). Invested, extracted and byproduct benefits: A modified scheme for the evolution of cooperation, Behavioural Processes76(2): 109–113.
15.
DamonF.H. (1980). The Kula and Generalized Exchange: Considering some unconsidered aspects of the elementary structures of kinship, Man (new series)15(2): 267–293.
16.
GieslerM. (2006). Consumer Gift Systems, Journal of Consumer Research33(September): 283–290.
17.
GodboutJ., and CailléA. (1992). The World of the Gift, (D. Winkler, Trans.). Quebec: McGill-Queen's University Press.
18.
GoffmanE. (1971). Relations in Public: Microstudies of the public order, London: Allen Lane.
19.
GuptaK.R., SvendsenG.L.H., and MaitiP. (eds.) (2008). Social Capital, Vol. 1. New Delhi: Atlantic Publishers & Distributors.
20.
HåkanssonM., RostM., and HolmquistL.E. (2007). Gifts from Friends and Strangers: A study of mobile music sharing, in ECSCW'07 (Limerick, Ireland, 2007); London: Springer, 311–330.
HoffmanB.J., BlairC.A., MeriacJ.P., and WoehrD.J. (2007). Expanding the Criterion Domain? A quantitative review of the OCB literature, Journal of Applied Psychology92(2): 555–566.
23.
IhdeD. (1993). Postphenomenology – Essays in the Postmodern Context, Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Publishers.
KlamerA. (2003). Gift Economy, in TowseR. (ed.) A Handbook of Cultural Economics, Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, pp. 241–247.
28.
KolmS.-C. (2000). Introduction: The economics of reciprocity, giving and altruism, in Gérard-VaretL.-A., KolmS.-C., and YthierJ.M. (eds.) The Economics of Reciprocity, Giving and Altruism, London: MacMillan Press Ltd, pp. 1–44.
29.
KomterA.E. (1996). Reciprocity as a Principle of Exclusion, Sociology30(2): 299–316.
30.
KomterA.E. (2007). Gifts and Social Relations: The mechanisms of reciprocity, International Sociology22(1): 93–107.
31.
MalinowskiB. (1920). Kula; the Circulating Exchange of Valuables in the Archipelagoes of Eastern New Guinea, Man20(July): 97–105.
OfferA. (1997). Between the Gift and the Market: The economy of regard, Economic History Review3: 450–476.
36.
OrganD.W., PodsakoffP.M., and MackenzieS.B. (2006). Organizational Citizenship Behavior: Its nature, antecedents, and consequences, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
37.
OsteenM. (2003). Questions of the Gift, in OsteenM. (ed.) The Question of the Gift, London: Routledge, pp. 1–42.
38.
PearsonE. (2006). Digital Gifts: Participation and gift exchange in LiveJournal communities, First Monday12(5).
39.
PiatekM., IsdalT., AndersonT., KrishnamurthyA., and VenkataramaniA. (2007). Do Incentives Build Robustness in BitTorrent? in NSDI'07 (Cambridge, MA, USA, 2007); Berkeley: USENIX, 1–14.
40.
PutnamR.D. (1993). The Prosperous Community – Social capital and public life, The American Prospect4(13): 35–42, 21st March.
41.
PutnamR.D. (2000). Bowling Alone: The collapse and revival of American community, New York: Simon and Schuster.
42.
RipeanuM., MowbrayM., AndradeN., and LimaA. (2006). Gifting Technologies: A BitTorrent case study, First Monday11(11).
43.
RoushW. (2005, Nov 18). Social Networking 3.0 – The third generation of social-networking technology has hit the Web, and it's about content as much as contacts, Technology Review [www document] http://www.technologyreview.com/InfoTech-Networks/wtr_15908,258,pl.html (accessed 1st November 2009).
44.
RuthJ.A., OtnesC.C., and BruneiF.F. (1999). Gift Receipt and the Reformulation of Interpersonal Relationships, Journal of Consumer Research25(4): 385–402.
45.
SahlinsM. (1972). Stone Age Economics, Chicago: Alding-Atherton.
46.
SherryJ.F. (1983). Gift-giving in Anthropological Perspective, Journal of Consumer Research10(2): 157–168.
SkågebyJ. (2008). Semi-Public End-user Content Contributions: A case study of concerns and intentions in online photo-sharing, International Journal of Human-Computer Studies66(4): 287–300.
49.
SkågebyJ. (2009). Exploring Qualitative Sharing Practices of Social Metadata: Expanding the attention economy, The Information Society25(1): 60–72.
50.
SkågebyJ., and PargmanD. (2005). File-sharing Relationships – Conflicts of interest in online gift-giving, in Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Communities and Technologies (Milano, Italy, 2005); London: Springer, 111–128.
51.
SproullL., ConleyC., and MoonJ.Y. (2005). Prosocial Behavior on the Net, in Amichai-HamburgerY. (ed.) The Social Net: Understanding Human Behavior in Cyberspace, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 139–162.
52.
WegnerD.M., EberR., and RaymondP. (1991). Transactive Memory in Close Relationships, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology61(6): 923–929.
53.
WellmanB., and WortleyS. (1990). Different Strokes from Different Folks: Community ties and social support, American Journal of Sociology96(3): 558–588.
54.
WilliamsL.J., and AndersonS.E. (1991). Job Satisfaction and Organizational Commitment as Predictors of Organizational Citizenship and in-role behaviors, Journal of Management17(3): 601–617.
55.
WuH., ZubairM., and MalyK. (2006). Harvesting Social Knowledge from Folksonomies, in the Proceedings of the 17th Conference on Hypertext and Hypermedia (Odense, Denmark, 2006); NewYork: ACM, 111–114.
