ABSTRACT
When I work at my computer, I may feel that my primary relationship is between myself and my machine. But whether I am writing an article, visiting an immersive world, or writing on a friend’s wall in Facebook, I have a sense that other people lurk behind my screen-and I want a relationship with those other people, even if it is mediated by the machine that is a physical manifestation of the virtual relationship. Because I sense that there are human relationships beyond my machine and because I can communicate with other people in a virtual environment, together we will form some kind of community and culture based on those relationships and communication. Together, we will create a common computer-mediated context for forming, valuing, sustaining, and ending relationships, and that will become a culture.
