Communities: Reddit versus LinkedIn

 Hi everyone! So, I actually have a little story to share that I think really relates to this class and what we've been learning! For a different class, one of our assignments was to find an instructional designer (or someone in the field) to interview. Essentially, we were supposed to learn more about their roles, backgrounds, experiences, and get an inside scoop on what it's really like to be an instructional designer. Unfortunately, the person I was originally supposed to interview had to cancel on me. I was STRESSED. The project related to the interview is due this upcoming week, and my interview was scheduled on Friday, so I was really running out of time. Especially not having any experience in the field, I don't know many instructional designers myself.

So, I had to scramble. I thought back to this class and thought about what we learned about communities. Then, I remembered that there were instructional designer groups on both Reddit and LinkedIn. So, I joined both groups and wrote out a little post about my assignment and HOPED that someone would be willing to help out. What I didn't know before, was that both Reddit and LinkedIn have analytics. Both posts were gaining a lot of traction, getting over hundreds of views each. For my Reddit post, I had two people reply offering to help within the first 10 minutes, and another three people offering to help in the next few hours. On LinkedIn, however, despite still getting a lot of views, no one had commented on my post! I even ended up deleting it because I was embarrassed.

This actually felt a lot like the community full version assignment we did. I felt like I was able to interact with two communities and see the differences between how members of the community interact. Overall, I think they're both great platforms, just used for different reasons and purposes. 

In the end, I was able to interview two people (more than I needed to) and get all the information I needed for my class project! Shoutout Reddit for all the help!