As I’ve mentioned before, I manage a Facebook group with over 1800+ people in it that discusses the DC tech & startup community. It’s been fascinating to watch the dynamics of the group change as it adds more members to its ranks.
Now that its bigger, it’s much harder to get real in-depth conversation about any one topic. There’s so many people from different backgrounds with different personalities. Everyone wants to take it in their own direction. The group becomes more about broadcast.
Well if you want that in-depth conversation, the key is that you have to divide & conquer. You want to find a subset of that bigger group that has the people who can talk in-depth about the issue you care about and keep that group focuses on that topic.
The bigger group is important. Everyone needs to know what’s going on across all the sub groups but you need the smaller groups so that people can have more intimate interactions. For the DC Tech community, we have sub groups for everything from community leaders to user experience pros to people looking for co-working space.
Oatmeal Stout - Justin Thorp's blog 