D2.2: Set of use cases and scenarios

Title: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Executive Summary

This document, which aims at contributing to the understanding of the concept of identity in the context of digital social environments, starts by pointing out the rising importance of the social aspect in the use of the Internet, and digital social environments as a valuable field for investigation and research for the identity concept. It analyses in general the different identity issues that can occur in an online social context and in particular it indicates the importance of social identity (an abstract and informal identity) in this context. It then provides an overview of the different categories of digital social environments (which include the email, forums, blogs, wikis, MMORPG, electronic marketplaces supporting reputation, etc), and for each of them illustrates the identity issue by a short example, case or a scenario. 

This paper then concludes by indicating some research directions on identity in online environments, and in particular how to articulate the more traditional formal approach of identity with the more informal one (abstracted identity).