Toward collective intelligence of online communities: A primitive conceptual model

Abstract

Inspired by the ideas of the “global brain” and Swarm Intelligence, a concept of “community intelligence” is suggested in the present paper, reflecting that some “intelligent” features may emerge in a Web-mediated community or virtual community from interactions and knowledge-transmissions between community members. A conceptual model of community intelligence is developed from two views. From the structural view, the community intelligent system is modeled as a knowledge supernetwork that is comprised of triple interwoven networks of the media network (the Web), the human network, and the knowledge networks. Furthermore, based on a dyad of knowledge in two forms of “knowing” and “knoware,” the dynamic view describes the basic mechanics of the formation and evolution of “community intelligence.” Two categories of relevant research issues are shortly discussed on the basis of the proposed conceptual model.