Abstract
Social Networking Sites (SNS) are one of the most popular business models on the Internet at the
moment. At the same time, Social Networking is increasingly interesting as a topic of research in
Information Systems. Drawing on existing research in the field, in this paper we propose to distinguish
ISN (Internet Social Networking) as a phenomenon from its concrete manifestations in the various
SNSs in the marketplace. On the basis of this distinction we take to the classification of SNSs grounded
in real-life marketplace variety. In doing so, we identify seven different classes of SNSs. We argue that
a typology of SNSs is useful for shaping our understanding of the diverse nature of ISN as existing in
concrete manifestations. Most importantly, our classification makes accessible existing research for
conceptually sound meta-analysis research. In order to fully grasp the phenomenon of ISN we also
propose to include in the definition web sites that feature only certain aspects of ISN, while
networking is not their core feature. Using our classification we discuss future research direction
Recommended Citation
Richter, Daniel; Riemer, Kai; Brocke, Jan vom; and Grobe, Bockmann, "Intention to learn in MMOG: Examining the roles of peer intrinsic and extrinsic motivations" (2009). ECIS 2009 Proceedings. 204.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/ecis2009/204