It's an inevitable side-effect of having more people, the community gets too big for everyone to know everyone any more and so a lot of community feeling gets lost.
I've probably posted it before, but it seems like a good time to reference Richard Bartle's analysis of social dynamics in MUD communities again: http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm
I've probably posted it before, but it seems like a good time to reference Richard Bartle's analysis of social dynamics in MUD communities again: http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm
I think this is as good an overview of online community dynamics as any other I've seen in the last ~20 years online. By accident or design (more the former than the latter, I think), this yields quite similar insights to grid-group cultural theory, as discussed in the following: http://changingminds.org/explanations/culture/grid-group_cul... http://www.soa.org/files/pdf/2009-chicago-erm-ingram-02.pdf and http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0955768144
I have not got around to reading the book in the last link, but I like his other work that I've seen.