Wednesday, September 28, 2011

On Tweeting the Revolution

As promised, here's a link to Malcolm Gladwell's Small Change (why the revolution will not be tweeted).

If you don't have time to read it, here's Clay Shirky's description of the article and response, in two sentences:
The critique of [social media's] ineffectiveness, most recently offered by Malcolm Gladwell in The New Yorker, concentrates on examples of what has been termed "slacktivism," whereby casual participants seek social change through low-cost activities, such as joining Facebook's "Save Darfur" group, that are long on bumper-sticker sentiment and short on any useful action. The critique is correct but not central to the question of social media's power; the fact that barely committed actors cannot click their way to a better world does not mean that committed actors cannot use social media effectively.

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