On Netnography: Initial Reflections on Consumer Research Investigations of Cyberculture

Abstract

One methodology recently introduced in the consumer research literature is that of netnography, an interpretive method devised specifically to investigate the consumer behavior of cultures and communities present on the Internet. Netnography can be defined as a written account resulting from fieldwork studying the cultures and communities that emerge from on-line, computer mediated, or Internet-based communications, where both the field work and the textual account are methodologically informed by the traditions and techniques of cultural anthropology. Judging from the wide-ranging interest in mainstream publications (e.g., Armstrong and Hagel 1996) from conference presentations and papers (e.g., Fischer, Bristor and Gainer 1995; Muniz 1997), and from the content of burgeoning electronic mailing lists, a wide number of the methodological tools that arm consumer and marketing researchers are currently in the process of being adapted and applied to understanding consumer behavior as it occurs over and is affected by the Internet. Netnography investigates the specific instance in which community is produced through computer-mediated communications (CMC). Groups of people numbering in the tens of millions –and rapidly growing—are now utilizing CMC mediated by electronic mail and specializednetworks, usually linked through Internet, Bitnet and Usenet connections, to build community