With this paper our goal is to formalize the main differences between the applications of ethnographic techniques when they are framed in Virtual or Digital Methods. To be more systematic in presenting these differences, a synoptic table is offered. This table examines the main breaking points between the methods and is used to organize a marked comparison between two tourism studies chosen as being representative; one for the ethnographic application of Virtual Methods, and one for the ethnographic application of Digital Methods. In addition to testing the effectiveness of the proposed classification scheme, the purpose of the comparison conducted between the two tourism studies is to highlight where the changes that have occurred can lead to advances in the method and where these changes have become new limits on which it is necessary to continue to reflect in order to develop the methods involved and place them clearly in line with the evolution of the digital scenario. Keywords: Virtual Methods, Digital Methods, Netnography, Digital Ethnography, Tourism Studies.

The scientist role has progressively gained an essential relevance during the 2020 pandemic. In fact, the virologists’ exposition turned out to be fundamental for the public opinion, both for the well-informed and people unaware about health, transmission, infection and, today, vaccination programs. This paper aims to first set an explorative investigation about the social communication practices during the first three months of the vaccine campaign addressed on social media by Italy’s most established virologists. The arising digital scenario and the resultant pervasive presence in our daily life of web platforms, such as social media, has revolutionized the nexus between science and society. More scholars argued about the disintermediated current shape of science communication that directly connects scientists and the larger public, driving the sociological debate towards the analysis of the current processes of sense-making construction. On this assumption, we aim to answer the research question about how Italian scientists communicate and approach the larger public on social media. Therefore, the empirical part of this paper consists of a data collection phase conducted on Facebook and Twitter. The collected data have been analyzed by a content analysis oriented to identify the contradictory or uniformity of disintermediated communication features of the observed social media profiles in order to push and follow, during the ongoing vaccine dosing program, a proactive reflection about the key role of scientific dissemination of information. Keywords: communication of science, scientists’ visibility, social media communication, content analysis, topic modelling

In this chapter, the goal is to formalize the main differences between the applications of ethnographic techniques when they are framed in virtual or digital methods. To be more systematic in presenting these differences, a synoptic table will be offered. This table will examine the main breaking points between the methods and will be used to organize a marked comparison between studies chosen from the most cited articles of the last 20 years. In addition to testing the effectiveness of the proposed classification scheme, the purpose of the comparison conducted between the most cited articles will be to highlight where the changes that have occurred can lead to advances in the method and where these changes have become new limits on which it is necessary to continue to reflect in order to develop the methods involved and place them clearly in line with the evolution of the digital scenario.

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The ethnographic method has been a feature of the social sciences since its inception, and for some disciplines, it is markedly characterized by a strong aptitude for physical field research over extended periods in circumscribed communities. However, with the advent of the digital age, this process has undergone further acceleration, upsetting and partly undermining the solid assumptions on which the ethnographic method had been formed, precisely because in the digital scenario, the assumptions of boundaries of contexts, the agency of scenario, and the need for a long-term field investigation change radically. This conceptual analysis aims at providing an overview of the trajectory of the evolution of ethnographic studies in social sciences by trying to trace the main pillars of change and the future direction of the method.