Sorry for the delay in responding, Susanne and Paul. I've been travelling back to Vancouver from Toronto, catching up on everything that happened in my absence...and hesitating because Susanne is looking for a "reasonable" comment from me on the topic of LPP. Ah, Susanne, my life is characterized by actions and comments that are usually considered unreasonable! But here are some thoughts...
Susanne, your article from 2002, referring to GEN is quite a treasure. I admire your filing system! Your comment: "Lurking is accepted, to read only without adding any content of your own, and the explicit welcoming is a strategy of including new members" seems to locate lurkers in the apprentice role, with the expectation that they will become master participants in due time. The position I'm leaning towards is that we shouldn't assume that lurkers will want to participate. Many, very very many, actually, are exerting their freedom of choice to stay in the margins. To ligitimize their situation only if they take the next step and contribute is problematic for me.
Paul, I've been staring at your matrix for a while and trying to come up with something intelligent (that all can pronounce - my daughter Vivienne Wallace is in Japan and responds happily to being called Bibienne Warrace!)
Forgive me for not coming up with more words. I'm going to fall back on the argument that meaning is socially constructed, so it's not so important to use different words, as to deconstruct the words already in play:-)
So to get back to Wenger and Lave's words, in their introductory comments on LPP on pp. 34-37 of the 1991 text state that peripherality is only a positive term if it is enabled or emplowered. It is only negative if the peripheral location is disempowered, they say -- and that's what I think we do when we use the label lurker to suggest that shadowy, unwelcome stranger. So perhaps I'm saying that it's up to each community to consider carefully the role of lurkers and reflect on whether they are respected (empowered) or dismissed (disempowered).