Online communities -- Web sites specifically built to put people in touch with one another -- are booming in terms of participation and new services. Whether you are looking for social chatter, dating, gaming, or networking with other professionals, the Internet has the forum for it, and it has become both easy and fast to acquaint yourself with like-minded people.

The communities are becoming so popular that some wonder whether they could fundamentally alter the way humans interact with each other.

Online communities create worlds where one's persona can be manipulated easily and participants can remain anonymous. The malleability of identity, and the widespread understanding that someone might not be as he or she appears, has proven to be liberating for some and a danger to others.

What is clear is that online communities are changing the way people define themselves -- and that could affect communication in every realm, virtual or real.

Community Center

As anyone who has spent more than five minutes online knows, the Internet is a storehouse of resources, catering best to quirky tastes and niche audiences. There are shopping sites that sell only shoes, and activist groups that focus exclusively on saving one type of frog, for example.

Although some online communities target small groups, many are large, digital meeting spaces where people can congregate, all under a general banner such as friendship or matchmaking.

In addition to the networking behemoth MySpace, which currently has 47.3 million members, there's Friendster, The Well, Tribe Networks, and Bebo. Smaller sites that specialize in just a few topics are springing up, too, like Yelp, an online community devoted to chat about local watering holes and entertainment.

Dating online seems even easier than meeting friends, thanks to aggressive recruitment efforts by sites like eHarmony and Match.com. Both of these sites claim more than eight million users as well as credit for thousands of marriages.

Online games, too, foster their own communities. These digital warriors might not chat as much as their Friendster brethren, but they engage in just as much camaraderie as they would at any offline Dungeons & Dragons session. Games like World of Warcraft and Everquest have been especially popular. According to Jason Della Rocca, program director for the International Game Developers Association, the experience is as social as it is competitive. (continued...)

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