Σύγκριση μεθόδων

	Ψηφιακή Εθνογραφία	Εθνογραφία	Εθνογραφική Έρευνα Μακράς Διάρκειας
Πεδίο	Ποιοτικές Μέθοδοι	Ποιοτικές Μέθοδοι	Ποιοτικές Μέθοδοι
Οικογένεια	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Έτος προέλευσης	Late 1990s – 2000s	c. 1922 (Malinowski's Argonauts of the Western Pacific)	1920s (classical origins); refined 1990s–2000s
Δημιουργός	Christine Hine (virtual ethnography); Robert V. Kozinets (netnography)	Bronisław Malinowski (modern ethnography); rooted in 19th-century anthropology	Rooted in classical anthropological fieldwork (Malinowski, 1922); systematised for sociological revisits by Michael Burawoy (2003)
Τύπος	Qualitative research method	Qualitative fieldwork tradition	Qualitative research design
Θεμελιώδης πηγή	Kozinets, R. V. (2010). Netnography: Doing Ethnographic Research Online. Sage. ISBN: 978-1847875228	Hammersley, M. & Atkinson, P. (2019). Ethnography: Principles in Practice (4th ed.). Routledge. ISBN: 978-1138504462	Burawoy, M. (2003). Revisits: An outline of a theory of reflexive ethnography. American Sociological Review, 68(5), 645–679.
Εναλλακτικές ονομασίες	online ethnography, virtual ethnography, internet ethnography, netnography	Etnografi, participant observation, fieldwork, ethnographic research	extended ethnography, long-term fieldwork, sustained ethnographic study, longitudinal field research
Συναφείς	6	5	5
Σύνοψη	Digital ethnography is a qualitative research method that adapts traditional ethnographic fieldwork to online and digitally mediated settings. Drawing on sustained participant observation, document collection, and sometimes interviews, the researcher immerses themselves in one or more digital communities — social media platforms, forums, gaming spaces, or messaging groups — to understand how culture, identity, and social practice are constructed through digital interaction. The approach recognises that online spaces are not merely reflections of offline life but distinctive sites of cultural production in their own right.	Ethnography is a qualitative research tradition in which a researcher immerses themselves in a social group or community over an extended period — typically three to six months or longer — to study its culture, values, and behaviours in their natural setting. Originating in social and cultural anthropology, and consolidated as a rigorous method by Bronisław Malinowski in the early twentieth century, ethnography produces rich, contextualised accounts of how people live, work, and make meaning together.	Longitudinal ethnography is a qualitative research design in which a researcher conducts sustained, repeated fieldwork with the same community, organisation, or group across an extended period — months to decades. By returning to the field at multiple time points, the researcher captures how social processes, meanings, and structures evolve, making it the only qualitative method capable of directly observing change and continuity in lived experience.