It took me a while to think of a good topic for this assignment. There are a set of defined norms online just like in face to face communication. I decided to use eBay as my case again since it’s an extremely popular online space with many visitors daily. A frequent eBay user would normally want to achieve good feedback status in order to maintain good sales on the site. They would find it valuable to give their customers good service and in return expect more customers in the future, or recurring customers. This is a social norm in face to face business as well; a successful business has faithful customers and gives good customer service. This is how people know that this is a norm online too, specifically pointed out in the case of eBay.
The Leviathan is the power that enforces our adherence to society’s norms and standards. In this case the Leviathan enforces this norm simply through the scare factor of losing business. People who sell a lot of merchandise on eBay don’t want to get bad feedback comments because this will cause them to lose customers and block potential customers from wanting to commit to a purchase. There is no punishment for getting bad feedback; you don’t get fined or kicked off of the network. The defamation of your name and the online social implications are the punishment for bad feedback.
The social norm can be exhibited on the other side of the sale as well. The person writing the feedback will also feel pressures to conform to the social norm of being reasonable when giving feedback. In most cases, an eBay user who received good, reliable service from someone will give them good feedback because that is what they would expect in return.
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