What have all LinkedIn groups always had in common? What have they always provided their members?

1. Sharing of resources
2. Protection against outside dangers
3. Social needs – providing a sense of belonging and human contact
4. A purpose
5. An ability to grow, to do more or be stronger as part of the group

Many types of groups or ‘tribes’ have come and gone throughout history. Underpinning them all is the human desire and need to gather together. Put simply, humans are herd animals.

The earliest (and most enduring) ‘groups’ were of course the small and roaming tribes of early humans on the plains of Africa. Later, these developed into small settlements and villages when agriculture appeared. And soon after, villages and larger towns were established, with ‘sub-tribes’ living in different areas or suburbs.

Let’s look at an example of a major and important class of ‘tribe’ or group – religions in all their forms. In the beginning, religions were location-based – your religion was a function of where you lived (though the strength of people’s beliefs varied dramatically!).

The introduction and growth of transport and communications technology changed religion just as it changed the rest of our world. Religions needed to become more relevant and ‘exciting’ to engage with a bigger audience – one which now had a menu of religious ‘brands’ to choose from (An aside: is it offensive to call a religion a brand? It certainly offends me when my football team is called one! But hopefully not… this paper is not about challenging people’s religious beliefs).

And of course, the intense competition surrounding religion feeds the trend towards extremism and fundamentalist behaviors. This sad but seemingly inevitable gravitation towards extremes comes as a result of old certainties and the monopoly held by one religion just crumbling away. The certainties cannot survive as they were built on your local region- the only region you knew, a region that you never left.

So yes, most groups (including religions) have changed, but underneath, at their core, they are just ‘places’ or beliefs centred around where people cluster- where people wanted to be together and to belong.

Other categories of groups that appeared in the last 150 years are the industry associations and unions. These groups formed for the purposes of sharing knowledge and providing a collegiate or social function for the various members. The fact is that all of these services can now be provided significantly better and more effectively via social networking software.