The ethical dilemmas and challenges of ethnographic research in electronic communities
Neil HairRochester Institute of Technology, US
Moira ClarkHenley Management College, UK
INTRODUCTION
Research into the phenomenon of electronic communities is a rapidly emerging field. Coupled with the ferocity of viral marketing and the substantial take-up of social networking sites online, newly found electronic communities of consumers are in abundance (Hagel & Armstrong 1997; Anderson 1999; Kozinets 1999, 2002; Wachter et al.2000; Johnson 2001; Siu 2002). Marketers are quickly realising the importance of these communities by studying consumer interactions with one another as a...