Social networking sites are now the medium of choice for many social justice groups and individuals who want to harness the tides of social change. Capitalizing on the networks around us is an effective way to get things done, whether it be recruiting volunteers or raising awareness on an important cause. Yet the relationship between social networking online and social change in the real world deserves to be more closely observed.

The popularity of social networking apparatuses such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and blogs simply reflects a need in modern society. Within our often fractured, disparate society we retain a need for connection and community. But just how well do social networking sites work as vehicles for social change?

In many ways, social networking sites are very well designed tools to help social justice organizations achieve their goals on the Internet. These sites can be a great platform in which to connect people, exchange ideas and share resources. What’s more, they are constantly evolving and adapting to their users. It comes as no surprise that social networking is already very popular among organizations trying to raise money, increase membership or promote their activities.

Yet for all that social networking can do to help bring about social change, it may be less a science and more an art. Although anybody can start a social networking site, it’s only as effective as how he/she uses it. The most successful websites have a distinct identity that distinguishes them from the pack and a clear set of principles behind their operations.

Controlling their brand and message can be a challenge, as websites can’t always control how people may appropriate their content, or if user-generated material runs counter to the site’s policies. Managing its message and image is crucial for any networking site because building a well-defined identity is the key to attracting a wide membership base.

On the security end, social networking sites are often inadequately defended against cyber attacks by individuals and groups with their own agendas. Twitter and Facebook were both disrupted in early August after a hacker targeted the accounts of a Georgian blogger who posted criticism of Russia’s conduct during its conflict with Georgia over South Ossetia in 2008.

Ironically, even though social justice groups can use networking sites to advance human rights causes and international ideals, the Internet is not a domain where many of those principles (such as freedom of expression) can be enforced. Servers can shut down a social networking site if they feel its content damages their ability to attract revenue from advertisers.

Users of social networking sites should also remember that these sites are not neutral platforms, but businesses with vested interests in the transfer of information. Just this July, Facebook was found by Canada’s Privacy Commissioner to have violated privacy laws in collecting users’ information for advertising purposes and disclosing that information to third parties.

“We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.” – Carl Sagan

“I’ll Google my Twitter all over your Facebook.”– Anonymous

We live in an age of hybridity.  Hybrid cars, mobile devices and communication practices all represent the fusion of existing processes or things.  Whether we’re 15 or 50, we acquire knowledge in different ways.  Noticeably, experience is now extensively mediated by technology.  Johannes Gutenberg ushered in the publishing revolution with his printing press, forever changing literacy.  John Logie Baird similarly designed the first working television, and Charles Babbage, Bill Gates, and Steve Jobs are often thought of as important forerunners of modern computing.  Language, too, was a technical invention.  As these examples suggest, technology is not something we can choose to ignore, not in the context of a hyper-modern civilization.  ‘Globalized’ is one description of the world, although if you think about it, the world has always been ‘global’; it’s not as if the Internet suddenly made all borders obsolete.  However, globalization does represent a radical convergence of perspectives and technologies mirrored in an equally radical collaboration of perceptions about space and time.  Perhaps the most relevant example is our current fascination with digital technology.

Digital Life

Digital technology offers the promise of exciting and empowering advantages, particularly in communication.  And with space and time now more manageable than ever, opportunities for participating, as both Canadians and global citizens, emerge.  For instance, we can get on a plane and travel across the world in a matter of hours, retrieve vast quantities of information from search engines like Google and Yahoo, or instantly have a text message sent across continents.  However, choosing to routinely use technology may come at the expense of a subtle adaptation to it.  Adaptation is often beneficial, except that there are so many technologies geared at augmenting our experience of the world that it’s easy to take them for granted.  Isn’t it difficult to put down a cell phone when it’s buzzing excitedly, trying to tell us that someone wants our attention?  Or to stop checking Facebook when we should be studying? Or simply not using a computer for a week?

We often work symbiotically with digital technology.  Most of it is designed to help us perform at greater efficiencies through user-friendly interfaces.  Our relationship with technology is becoming more intimate as a result.  Consider the success of devices like the iPhone and iPod. They provide a way to create our own individual ‘bubbles’, to craft personalized, customizable spaces from which to navigate our environments.  A question arises of whether using these devices renders us more capable in, or more cut off from, the external world around us.  For example, cultural objects like iPods demand more serious thought – Sacha Baron-Cohen’s latest film, Bruno, shows his character swapping his iPod for an African baby orphan.  That scenario seems ridiculous, but novel technologies experience a type of devotion similar to what some religions practice.  In this sense they have a profound effect on the way we live.  Paying attention to how these digital technologies influence day-to-day activities is vital.  We are, after all, tomorrow’s workers, thinkers, voters and citizens.  Our decisions, or lack thereof, will form the next cultural paradigm with all of its privileges as well as problems.

Digital technology also allows us to multi-task in new and empowering ways, and increase our productivity.  However, as the American literary critic Walter Kirn describes, doing two things at once is really to do neither (though science explains women are usually better at multi-tasking than men).  He stresses that when the human brain isn’t focused, it concentrates on the act of concentrating rather than the activity it wants to be concentrating on.  From his perspective young minds are “being shaped to process information rather than understand or even remember it”, largely through dependence on hi-tech mediation.  Is he right?  Think about a social networking platform like Twitter.  It allows users to continuously create the medium in real time.  It can provide up-to-the-second information of things happening RIGHT NOW.  And we can react instantly to them.  This has never before been possible and presents myriad advantages.  Twitter also limits expression to 140 characters at a time.  How accurate does a 140-character limit allow users to be?  Who fact-checks all those tweets?  And in posing the two former questions, can we infer that digital technologies complicate the ability to communicate effectively?  The answer to this last question will depend on whether the user is active or passive.  Simply having an advantage is not the same as utilizing that opportunity.  Similarly, having the use of digital technology is not the same as making it work for you.  Rather, without critical engagement, technology can tailor users to suit its protocols.

There’s a revolution occurring right this very moment, and you could be a part of it without even knowing. In fact, this could be one of the most important revolutions ever initiated, but the implications have yet to show their true potential. This technological revolution is changing everything we thought we knew about information and communication. It’s taking established communication and media models and turning them completely upside down. It’s forcing governments and corporations to adapt to this new model, or forever be outdated. And it puts the power entirely in your hands. So what is it? What could possibly be this powerful, and how can you be a part of it? The answer lies in one simple word: Twitter.

Absurd, right? I must be crazy, off my rocker, way out of line to even suggest that a simple (and frequently useless) website such as Twitter could be the first step towards a revolution of such magnitude. I mean, come on, how can it even compare to other revolutions we’ve experienced in our short time on Earth? Where would we be without milestone advances like the agricultural or industrial revolutions? Why would I even propose that something like Twitter is as important as being able to efficiently feed the planet, or mass-produce countless items of importance for use around the world? Well, to put it simply, it can be- once we figure it out, that is.

In order to continue, we need an explanation on what constitutes a revolution. According to dictionary.com, a revolution (among other things) is a “sudden or momentous change in a situation.” From a sociology standpoint, a revolution is “a radical and pervasive change in society and the societal structure.” Given these definitions, a revolution can occur in different fields, such as government, agriculture, industry, media, culture, and even fashion. Simply put, a revolution is something that changes the norm, often drastically, and in effect becomes the norm until another revolution occurs. For example, the invention of the printing press was a revolution in literature, communication, and media. Before the printing press, books and letters had to be handwritten, and copies of books were very limited (as were the number of people who could even read). Those who had access to books were those who could afford it, and most people couldn’t. After the printing press was invented, however, literacy rates shot up around the world, and books could be copied a thousand times over and printed in many different languages. Without the printing press, literacy and education would still be extremely limited and many people would still be illiterate and uneducated. Keep in mind that this is a very general account, and there are obviously many factors at play concerning literacy and education (government, resources, etc.), but my point here is that societies changed when the printing press was invented, and this particular revolution caused an inevitable shift in the way the world worked.

And so it goes for most revolutions we’ve experienced in history. Some, like the printing press, can be peaceful and beneficial for everyone, while others can be violent and politically motivated, like the French Revolution, for example. In any case, if a revolution is successful, it creates a fundamental shift in how people live, usually for the better. And in the case of Twitter, we’re starting to see just how fundamentally it’s changing the world.

Let’s take a look at the history of global communication to get a better understanding of where we’re at currently, and then I’ll discuss how Twitter (and social media) is revolutionizing the current model, and making it better.