Today I will be discussing on 2 terms, digital “visitors” and “residents”. As well as to classify myself as a digital visitor or resident.
This term digital “visitors” and “residents” by White and Le Cornu(2011) was used to replace the Prensky’s digital “native” and “immigrates”.
Based on the research I have done and my understanding of digital visitors they only go online for a specific goal or outcome using specific tools (computer, tablet or mobile). Examples of tasks includes researching for certain materials, performing transactions and checking for pricing. After completing these task, they will logoff. They are careful not to leave any social footprint online or develop a “Digital Identity”. As they value their privacy fiercely and they are afraid of issues such as identity theft. They feel that social media is egoistic they dislike the “broadcasting” nature. But that does not mean that they do not use technology (email or Skype), they still use it as a tool to maintain relationship. Lastly they do their thinking and development of ideas offline, and do not belong to any online community. To conclude they see themselves as a user of the web and do not have high priority of belonging online.
On the other hand, digital residences are the complete opposites of digital visitors. They live parts of their lives online sharing information about their life and interest with people they might or might not know. They view internet as a place to express their views and create new relationship. They do have profiles on social media and is comfortable with developing and maintaining their online identity. Even after logging off they have left social presence, such as status update, blog post and blog comments. They also belong to several online communities in which they actively contribute to. In conclusion they see themselves as a member of the web and the web as a network.
Based on the following information I have gathered and understand, I personally feel that on different occasions I am both a visitor and a residence. For instances I am a visitor when sourcing for information to use for an academic essay. But I am a resident on social networking site such as Facebook and Tumblr. On Facebook, I share videos which are interesting with close friends and voice my opinion and comments on posts; on Tumblr I create and reblog content.
References
Tallblog.conted.ox.ac.uk. (2016). TALL blog » Blog Archive » Not ‘Natives’ & ‘Immigrants’ but ‘Visitors’ & ‘Residents’. [online] Available at: http://tallblog.conted.ox.ac.uk/index.php/2008/07/23/not-natives-immigrants-but-visitors-residents/ [Accessed 3 Nov. 2016].
Uoc.edu. (2016). Digital visitor or digital resident, how do you browse?. [online] Available at: https://www.uoc.edu/portal/en/uoc-news/actualitat/2016/086-visitant-resident-digital.html [Accessed 3 Nov. 2016].
White, D. and Le Cornu, A. (2011). Visitors and Residents: A new typology for online engagement. First Monday, 16(9).
Zin Cheong - jyzc1e16 
Hello, Zin! I love how informative & straightforward your post is.
A point I would like to bring up: It seems that many people, including you, situate themselves in-between Resident and Visitor. Do you find it peculiar that there is a need to categorise these Internet users to either Resident/Visitor in the first place? I think human behaviours are way too variant to be simply classified to either of 2 things. While it may provide a basic framework for us to get the rough view of a person’s way of interaction, I believe it is too shallow to use it to understand them completely. What do you think?
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Hi Adelene,
Thanks for reading my post and sharing your question with me. From my understanding of your question, you are referring to the Visitor and Resident mapping.
First and foremost, Resident and Visitors are not type of people. And you need not particular classify yourself either a resident or visitor. Instead you should see resident and visitors as a horizontal axis and personal and institution as a vertical axis. This will create a graph which you can plot your various activities online. The position of each task is relative or different varies across individuals. For example a task such as checking your school email, for me it falls in the quadrant visitors and institutional. Whereas an activity such as checking my Facebook newsfeed falls under the personal and resident quadrant.
For more clarification you can watch this video to understand the visitor and resident mapping process by David White. (https://youtu.be/MSK1Iw1XtwQ)
I hope my reply answers your question!
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