The community I have chosen to observe and analyze is the music community that resides on twitter for the primary purpose of seeing how connected the people in this community are as well as analyze the toxic parts within it as well. From what I have analyzed, the community seems to be a double-edged sword with you meeting the nicest people to the most obnoxious/toxic people you will ever meet while also being hit with the worst opinions possible. Now when it comes to music, it is all subjective and some people give valid criticisms or reasons as to why they are not a fan of a certain song or album. This does not happen much on twitter, usually the people giving such proper criticisms or reasons why they do not like something is uncommon with a majority just not caring to give reasons why they believe an album is overrated or why a certain song sounds horrible for example, just look at this tweet by “@Tr3vor__m8” on October 20, 2023. this is the side effect of having a massive community without a filter of some sort but that does not mean there is no good, at some point you run into guys who just like posting anything they have been listening to throughout the week like “@keatonmerrell” on October 13, 2023. After a while of being well versed in mainstream music while also listening to the top guys in underground music you start to understand a bunch of the inside jokes that usually surrounds a certain artist like this tweet by “@xiu_shoegaze” on October 10, 2023. 

     The patterns I tend to see a lot is a circle of people talking about the albums they have been listening to, people mentioning their favorite album and talking about why it is good, random person who managed to accumulate a considerable following trashing an album that is regarded as one of the best albums of all time, and then there is Anthony Fantano asking his fans a question once in a while like “What is the most overrated album of 2022” or “Who made the best album of 2022”. 

     After analyzing the norms and rules of the community, there does not seem to be any rules or norms whatsoever, it is just anarchy. Of course, if a person gets annoyed by another person, they just end up blocking, but there are times the give in a start making fun of the person who is annoying them which happens a lot, take for example the tweet mentioned previously that trashed an album for no reason like “Tr3vor__m8” on October 20, 2023 , and if you look inside the thread you will see many people blatantly mad over this guy’s opinion. When I first tried to find out the norms/rules of this community it looked like there were some when taken at face value but the more you dive deeper, there are no rules. 

     Looking at the hierarchy of this community it is safe to say that Anthony Fantano is at the top with the biggest following on music twitter. Right below him tend to be more niche accounts with a considerable following that usually stick to their respective sub-groups of genres withing the music community. It is hard to gain influence within the community unless you yourself are a popular artist or someone who already has a following starts replying to you a lot then you start to be able to get a foothold of influence in the community. 

     Through the dynamics of inclusivity and exclusivity, the community is very inclusive with people sharing music listening patterns which do not require any knowledge any subject other than music, take for example of the tweet as mentioned before of this account sharing what they have been listening to throughout the week and if you look through the thread you will find people just complimenting an album that the original poster mentioned in what they have listened to throughout the week. The exclusive part of the community usually revolves around an inside joke or manner that revolves around a certain artist relating to their discography or funny actions that artist has displayed before as shown in this previous tweet. Exclusivity is one of the driving factors for a sense of belonging within the community since things like inside jokes create a bond between the people within the subparts of the community since it requires you to have extensive knowledge of a specific artist. 

     Conflicts that revolve around this community tend to be over an action that a popular figurehead or an artist has done. Usually, a fanbase gets for an artist falls apart once they have done something controversial for example Kanye West who has said many antisemitic things which has led to the talks of his works to die out a lot. Another conflict not relating to an artist, but a popular figure head, Anthony Fantano, after giving an album a negative review got his divorce papers leaked due to the toxic fandom that was associated with that artist tried their best to get their revenge on Anthony. Some conflicts just eventually fade away such as this incident with Anthony Fantano since there is not a single person to blame, while in Kanye’s situation, artists that act that same way in different manners end up fading out of relevancy within the community when it comes to talking about their music. 

     After a looking deeper into this community while also participating in it a little, I am surprised to say that it is not as toxic as I expected when taking the in the whole community with people who are toxic being a highly vocal minority of the community, with most people just being respectful or keep to themselves. This community is healthy with how people interact with each other on twitter especially in retrospective to the entirety of twitter which tends to be a toxic breeding ground that creates echo chamber which to my surprise the music community that resides within the same place do not take on many of these attributes. 

APA REFERENCES 

@keatonmerrell”. (2023, October 13). Happy Friday Y’all!Been listening to tons of Aesop Rock, Sufjan, Charli XCX, Samia, Tierra Whack and some of the new releases today. Loving the new WSG album and am pleasantly surprised by this offset album.What are y’all listening to? What should I check out? [Tweet]. Twitter. https://twitter.com/keatonmerrell/status/1712880210939728133?s=46 

@xiu_shoegaze. (2023, October 10). [Image of a joke]. Twitter. https://twitter.com/xiu_shoegaze/status/1711825072741368272?s=46 

@Tr3vor__m8. (2023, October 20). Most overrated album of all time: [Tweet]. Twitter. https://twitter.com/tr3vor__m8/status/1715467618881011767?s=46