Nodes - Galloway & Thacker

For the last decade or more, network discourse has proliferated with a kind of epidemic intensity.

People have always wanted to connect. It’s always been important to make yourself part of certain groups and distance yourself from certain groups. (A network being not just who is a node in it, but also who isn’t.) Connecting and networking is not a phenomenon of the digital age but a natural parts of what makes us functioning humans. There is something natural about forming groups (including some people and excluding others). Children do it.
But now, because we were in a digital age, the creation of networks means so much more. I remember hearing the term “social network” and not knowing what it meant. Now it is part of common vocabulary (in fact social network and social networking are entries in the OED: social networking n. the use or establishment of social networks or connections; (now esp.) the use of websites which enable users to interact with one another, find and contact people with common interests, etc.) Your “social network” is publicly available: who you are friends with, what businesses you support or like, your favourite bands, books, sports, foods are all for public consumption.

These structures are seen to have their own concomitant techniques for keeping things under control: bureaucracy, the chain of command, and so on.

A network is self-controlled (or uncontrolled) and self-governed (or ungoverned). Online forums and sites, reddit, 4chan, the Cheezburger Network (a collection of funny and meme-based websites), all have their own unique rules by which members, after a while, begin to naturally abide.
Recently, the Cheezburger Network changed. The layout and contents of the websites and the way the comments sections worked were ‘upgraded’. Many users of the Cheezburger Network, especially Memebase, didn’t like the new layout, and stopped visiting the site or commenting on posts. The self-governed commenting rules, which had always been adhered to by readers began to break down. The network broke down.
The interference with a network meant the culture of the network disappeared.