The document discusses how rural Catalan communities in La Conca de Barberà are adapting to new technologies and the information society. It explores how online and virtual communities are emerging and both strengthening and replacing some offline rural interactions and socializing. Several authors' perspectives on these changes are presented. Case study findings on ICT use in La Conca de Barberà show adoption of email, websites and social media is widespread but still developing, with opportunities for small producers.

1. The rural Catalan communities facing the
Information and Knowledge Society new
scenario, the case of ‘La
Conca de Barberà’.
ICT4RD
@ricardespelt

2. ICT4RD | Ricard Espelt
From rural life to virtual community?

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From rural life to virtual community
Rheingold
+ strength
+ expansion
Rheingold, R. (1993) “Virtual communities”, Reading MA: Addison-Wesley (p.5)

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From rural life to virtual community
Bateman & Lyon
resilience

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From rural life to virtual community
Feenberg&Bakardjieva
Socializing forms
+
Quick and direct interaction spaces
Feenberg,A.&Bakardjieva,M. (2004). Virtual Community: No'Killer Implication.
New Media&Society

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From rural life to virtual community
Woolgar
New socializing forms
+
Specifying reality and virtuality
Woolgar, S. (2002) Sociedad virtual? Tecnología, "cibérbole", realidad. UOC Ed., Barcelona.

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From rural life to virtual community
Preece
Interaction among community members
thanks to technology platforms
Preece, J. (2000) Online Communities: Designing Usability, Supporting Sociability

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From rural life to virtual community
Porter
Integration between
online and offline activity
Porter, M. (2001) Strategy and the Internet Harvard Business Review, Vol.79.

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From rural life to virtual community
Wellman
Getting over traditional geographic gaps
Wellman, B.; Qaun-Haase, A.; Boase, J.; Chen, W. ;Hampton, K.; Isla de Díaz,I. & Miyata, K.(2003)
The Social Affordances of the Internet for Networked Individualism. Journal of computer
Mediated Comunication , Vol. 8 (3).

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From rural life to virtual community
Hine
ICT significance: Before its use vs.
the moment of application
Hine, C. (2002) Etnografía virtual (2000) Traducció Ed. UOC, 2004.

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Relation between producer and community consumers through launched product

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Product relations around offline and online consumer community

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Possible values in the relation between ITC and product

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(1) (2)
TIC scheme to structure a producer community to be launched online (1)
TIC scheme to structure an online consumer community (2)

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Conca de Barberà
ICT4RD Results
3 out of 4 Using ICT
ICT - Scale of Use
Email (94%)
Website (77%)
Social Networks (46%)
E-Commerce (20%)

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Conca de Barberà
ICT4RD Results
Website Languages
Catalan (96%)
Spanish (78%)
English (63%)
French (7%)

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Conca de Barberà
ICT4RD Results
E-Commerce Use
before 2010 (43%) | after 2010 (57%)
Reasons for E-commerce
More Information about Product (70%)
Enlarging Sales (45%)
Increasing Reputation (35%)
Customer Satisfaction (25%)

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Conca de Barberà
ICT4RD Results
ICT can increase consumers
Yes (63%) | No (11%) | Don’t know (26%)
ICT and consumer collaboration help to explore
new product lines or markets
Yes (37%) | No (32%) | Don’t know (31%)

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Conca de Barberà
ICT4RD Results
ICT reduces marketing costs
Yes (40%) | No (34%) | NS (26%)
ICT changes marketing process
Yes (34%) | No (34%) | NS (32%)
ICT improves innovation around the product
Yes (43%) | No (26%) | NS (31%)

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Conca de Barberà
ICT4RD Results
Website improves product information
Yes (85%) | No (8%) | NS (7%)
Social networks improve product information
Yes (75%) | No (25%)
Presence on Social Networks
Yes (49%) | No (51%)
Social networks based on usage
Facebook (40%) | Twitter (11%) | YouTube (6%)
Interaction on Social Networks
Yes (44%) | No (56%)

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Conca de Barberà
Findings Summary: ICT4RD Results
• Horizontal participation processes.
• Transition from email to social networking.
• Embryonic stage.
• Faster use by individual farmers than rural communities.
• Intermediary role Leadership still on.
• Competitive advantages for small producers in particular. (Flexibility
and low cost).
• Best examples - Adding producer family members.
• More economic efforts in new media than traditional in ones.
• New conception between rural and urban world: more proximity.
• Beating geographical gaps.
• Non Indicator Use.

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4 lines to explore:
Health + Learning + Disintermediation + Cooperation

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Increasing people interest for the products they consume.
(My Farm)
+ info

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Linking production and learning
(Fresh Roots Urban Farm Society)
+ info

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Linking consumers and selers
(Farmbook)
+ info

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Controling Business
(The People’s Supermarket)
+ info

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More interesting concepts to evaluate:
•Social farming (l’Olivera / La Fageda)
•More dialogue and less seduction (Outlook 2012 - Creafutur)
•Crowdmarketing / Crowdcreation – La Catània
•Crowdcuration
•Crowdbuying
•Transition Towns Network
•Open Source Ecology
•JAK Medlemsbank / Coop57

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ICT4RD – La Conca de Barberà
ICT4RD Blog
@ricardespelt
Ricard Espelt
ICT4RD Researcher IN3-UOC