Buy nothing this Christmas ?

With Christmas just days away you are being given permission to ‘Buy nothing this Christmas’. In doing so you are not just relieving yourself from hours of shopping mayhem, you are also joining a political movement. 

The 'Buy Nothing this Christmas' campaign is an example of a digital activist campaign by Adbusters. Adbusters is one of many online groups that are trying to forge a major shift in the way we live. Whether it is a campaign to stop people consuming or citizens trying be heard. One of the positives from social media is the ability to connect those who are disconnected either by location or circumstance. Media guru Clay Shirky explains civic life as.. 

 

… not just created by the actions of individuals, but by the actions of groups, the spread of mobile phones and internet connectivity will reshape that civic life, changing the ways members of the public interact with one another.

 

 

  Digital activism empowers individuals to easily act on the beliefs and causes they are passionate about. Campaigns such as Kony,   Obamas campaign and the recent uprising in Egypt are examples campaigns in which their cause was driven to the world via social media. The main driver of each of these campaigns was organised online communication, better known as DIGITAL ACTIVISM.  

  

 Getup is an Australian organisation that helps give everyday Australians the opportunity to get involved by holding Politicians accountable on important issues. Why sit at home fuming over a recent ludicrous political decision made by government monkeys when you can Getup and do something about it.

Whether it is sending an email to a member of parliament, engaging with the media, attending an event or helping to get a television ad on the air, GetUp members take targeted, coordinated and strategic action to effect real change. 

GetUp drives digital activism by providing a step-by-step guide to setting up your own campaign online whether it is for a local cause or of national relevance.  I have often ‘joined the cause’ simply by clicking a vote button. It makes change possible and brings it to our desktop. Campaigns such as;

-       ban live export

-       save the Barrier Reef

-       save the  Tassie forest

 

I don’t consider myself an activist but on the 'value of Digital Activism Scale' (Sivitanides 2011) which incorporates; optimist, pessimist and persistent 

I consider myself an optimist. 

We can do more than just like a page on Facebook  (I mean is there anyone out there who does 'like' cancer – really!)  I like the ability of digital activism to easily empower citizens to be able to alter political power. 

 

Activism is not new but the digital age has revolutionised the accessibility of being able to make change happen. The future sees a world which we will become one by the ability to out rule corruption and unfairness at the touch of a button.

 

Have a Merry Christmas whether you choose shop or not.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Adbusters 2013, Buy nothing xmas, Adbusters blog,  https://www.adbusters.org/blogs/bnd-xmas-2014.html, viewed 21 December 2013

 

Shirkey, C 2009. The Net Advantage, Prospect <http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/the-net-advantage/#.UrZkk40j75k> , viewed 20 December 2013

 

Sivitanides, M 2011, The Era of Digital Activism, McCoy College of Business, Texas State University. Accessed via Swinburne Blackboard 10 December 2013

 

 

Do only Twits Twitter?

Numbers speak volumes; on Twitter today there are more than 554 million active users, which equates to 58 million Tweets per day. Twitter is projected to generate $399 million in 2013, so the Twits are onto something, but why is it so popular?

It was originally created to answer the simple question of “what are you doing?” and grew from there. Twitter differs from other networking sites because of its low bandwidth requirements and the strength of its collective audience.

If we looked at the top ten most popular people on Twitter we would see an uninspiring list of American musicians or celebrities such as Justin Bieber #1 or Kim Kardashian #9. I wonder (and worry) why so many people want to know what these celebrities are doing?

Nicole Scherzinger wearing a Twitter dress at the launch of the EE 4G network where fans could Tweet their comments directly onto the dress bringing new meaning to real time.

 

I turn to the wise scholar and social media stalwart Henry Jenkins who explains that we now live in a world with a high level of participatory culture where everyone can participate and learn from each other. Like the days of old quilting groups that harnessed the power of the collective audience. With Twitter we can choose who we want to learn from, who we want to follow. More from Jenkins.

In times of crisis Twitter has proved to be the first point of contact for many who are cut off from regular points of communication. 
 

-       Haitians 2010 and Japanese 2012 major earthquakes

-       Victorian 2009 Black Saturday fires

-       Mumbai 2011 terrorist attacks

-       Movements such as;

o    China avoiding Government Censorship in response to Google pulling out of China

o   The Obama campaign

Twitter is no longer a trivial media fad, it has made its mark as a grass roots communication tool. It provides profitable product reviews, company messages, advertising, universities are using it to relay class information and media are using it for short news updates.

Nelson Mandela sadly passed away this week, so I checked the Twitter feeds to see the reaction of the world. I was met with some inspirational tributes and also some jaw dropping statements. Here are a few in order from amazing to atrocious.

“He took history in his hands and bent the arc of the moral universe towards justice” Barack Obama@BarackObama

“The world mourns Nelson Mandela but will the same world follow his example of forgiving, restorative justice?” FatherBog@FatherBob

 “Former Vice President believed Nelson Mandela a terrorist” Chis@chrisharrisBC

“I loved his movies” a number of Tweeters getting very confused with Morgan Freeman

“Wow! Bout time!” jay@sho4short

This event shows Twitter is faster than news services or blogs and exhibits a lack of censorship (much to a few governments discomfort). It allows true freedom of speech. It enables us to see the unedited opinions from within the cultural melting pot of society. So why do you Tweet?

 REFERENCES

Jenkins, H 2011, Participatory Culture, You Tube,  <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgZ4ph3dSmY > , viewed 5 December 2013

Murthy, Dhiraj 2013, Twitter : Social Communication in the Twitter Age, e-book, p 70, accessed 5 December 2013, <http://SWIN.eblib.com.au/patron/FullRecord.aspx?p=1166845>.

  

Statistic Brain, July 2013 “Twitter Statistics”,  http://www.statisticbrain.com/twitter-statistics/ viewed 4 December 2013

Mobile Devices 24/7?

Mobile Devices have revolutionised the way with live, work and interact with one another. Like any new romance we are in the honeymoon stage where we are in love with our devices, we check in with them numerous times a day. Although some cracks are showing in terms of the social costs of being switched on 24/7.

 Some of this weeks learning’s are based on a book by Sherry Turkle called ‘Alone Together’ the title explains a lot. The pressure to be on 24/7 are turning our everyday movements into social media stage performances where our friends our becoming our fans. We are sadly starting to expect more from technology than we do from each other.

Another huge crack that is showing is with our children; the current generation that doesn’t know a life without devices. They unwittingly look at us for guidance yet like any pioneers we don’t really know what we are doing ourselves.

At the breakfast table parents are busy checking their emails via their mobile devices whilst ostracising their kids. But I ask the question how is this different to a parent reading the morning paper?

Jenelle Burley Hoffman  (a clever mum) drew up this  CONTRACT to give to her son when she bought him his first mobile phone. She wants him to ‘coeexist with technology and not be ruled by it’. 

 This contract should be rolled out to the general populous, bringing some rules into the social etiquette around using mobile devices in public.   Here are 3 of my favourite from the list; 

Turn it off, silence it, put it away in public. Especially in a restaurant, at the movies or while speaking with another human being.

Don’t take a zillion pictures and videos. There is no need to document everything. Live your experiences.

Leave your phone home sometimes…It is not alive or an extension of you. Learn to live without it.

I would like to see a movement, wherein if these rules aren’t followed you can run the risk of being seen as a social outcast. In an article titled ‘Digital Divide’ by Hans Geser, he can see a future where the mobile phone becomes a negative status symbol building an affinity with lower class culture therefore a conspicuous absence would be an indicator of positive social distinction.

So like any good and healthy relationship we need to know the boundaries and how to behave in order to show respect and grow in the right way. At the risk of becoming a disconnected society we need to still get excited and embrace the plethora of technological opportunities whilst not forgetting those around us.

Burley Hoffman, J 2013, ‘Gregorys IPhone Contract’ http://www.janellburleyhofmann.com/postjournal/gregorys-iphone-contract/#.UpchmL8qRV4, viewed 27 November 2013

Geser, H 2006, 'Is the Cell Phone Undermining the Social Order?: Understanding Mobile Technology from a Sociological Perspective', Knowledge, Technology & Policy, 19, 1, p. 8, MasterFILE Premier, EBSCOhost, viewed 29 November 2013.

Turkle, S 2012, ‘Alone Together’, Basic Books, EBSChost, viewed 27 November 2013

Blog about Blogging

I am a child of the 70s who endured the 80s. As I wandered the streets with my friends I always felt that there must be more to life. I knew there was a big wide world out there, but how could I reach it? The Encyclopaedias and National Geographic’s just didn’t cut it with me.  In the late 90s I was introduced to ‘the net’ and have been ‘turned on’ ever since.  So much so, that I have decided to study Communications in Media Studies.

My current assessment is to write a Blog each week that is engaging and meaningful. I have never written a blog and find it quite confronting and self obsessed (who is interested in my inner thoughts?). Yet that’s the way of the world now. 

So after a week of researching and learning about blogs I have created my first weblog on blogging.  In essence a blog is a diary arranged in chronological order. If it is successful it will generate a micro community of commentary around my entries, so feel free to go crazy with comments.

Blogs are more than just banter though. The 2011 Social Media Marketing Report researched that as soon as businesses realised there was a buck to made they became 68% more likely to use Blogs than any other social media tool - especially in B2B situations. 

 And blogs are on the rise, from the chart you can see that 75% of social media marketers indicated that they will start to increase their blogging activities.

 In the current post GFC climate, businesses are looking more to social media solutions to interact with their customers and suppliers. It is cheaper than face-to-face contact and as Arron Barlow states it is “re-establishing the public sphere” and in turn businesses can downsize their workforce – but that is a whole other Blog. Have a look at the worlds most popular blogs and let me know how mine measure up. TOP 100

Stelzner M.A. 2011 ‘Social Media Marketing Report’. Social Media Examiner pp. 21 & 25 <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/>

Barolw A. ‘Bloggerati, Twitterati, Cross 2011. pp.37–50. Swinburne EBL Library