Director Lee Rainie discusses the Pew Internet Project's latest research findings on people’s use of social media (social networking sites, blogs, Twitter, YouTube, and, yes, even email) and how technology has affected some of the ways people learn, make decisions, and seek and offer social support to others. He and sociologist Barry Wellman describe this as a “new social operating system,” and Lee highlights the ways in which those who use participatory media are changing how communities of all kinds form and perform. More information about the event is available at the University of Minnesota's website, and you can watch the talk online at https://umconnect.umn.edu/lee_rainie-sem.

The Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project is a non-profit, non–partisan "fact tank" that studies the social impact of the internet. The Project has issued more than 200 reports based on its surveys that examine people's online activities and the internet's role in their lives. Lee is a co-author of Up for Grabs, Hopes and Fears, and Ubiquity, Mobility, Security, a series of books about the future of the internet published by Cambria Press and based on Pew Internet surveys. He is also co-authoring a book for MIT Press about the social impact of technology with sociologist Barry Wellman that will be published in late 2010. The working title is Networked: The New Social Network Operating System.