Malcolm Gladwell recently wrote a fascinating article on social networking and social change. Have you read it yet? If not, I think you ought to.
Twitter, Face and Social Activism
It follows Mr. Gladwell’s signature style and is a classic piece from him. He posits an interesting observation, and uses a series of compelling anecdotes to weave together a convincing argument as to why “the revolution will not be tweeted.” The problem is that while he is fun to read as per usual, his evidence is purely circumstantial. This argument is particularly ripe for being punctured.
In many cases, I think Mr. Gladwell is right in showing how little things can make a big difference, yet in this instance he is all too dismissive of a powerful force. Humans are social beings. It’s in our nature to connect, and form complex webs with others. Our ability to come together and organize as a group is what truly sets us apart from the rest of the animal kingdom. This has been true for thousands of years, be it one hunter-gather telling another that a particular plant is poisonous, to pastors in black churches forming the backbone of the civil rights movement, as Malcolm Gladwell points out. The central point is that anyone with a fundamental understanding of the way humans come together in social networks is essential to anyone seeking to bring about real, tangible change. The power of suggestion is incredibly influential as to the way that each of us acts, and no single factor can more effectively send people into action than someone within our individual social web. Take a simple example, what is more likely to get you to go and see a movie, an exciting trailer, or a rave review from a close friend?
Facebook and Twitter don’t change this central truth, but rather give us new tools to organize around. Mr. Gladwell is probably right in saying that having these technologies available during the civil rights movement would not have made a difference. But that was then. This is now. We are a different generation. Then, 98% of blacks attended church, and there was no better way to get the word out. Let’s now take the modern gay rights movement as an example. I’m not sure that churches are a vehicle for change in this community. In fact, if you wanted to reach close to 98% of it, the quickest way to pass information to interested parties is probably through the internet.
Tonight there is going to be a vigil in New York’s Washington Square Park to remember those bullied teenagers who committed suicide recently. It was organized originally by just a few NYU students, but picked up by varying organizations and elected officials whose pages I subscribe to. In just three days, it’s gone viral with over 35,000 people having been invited. Without Facebook, I probably would not have even heard about it. Now I can tell who amongst my friends is going on their own, and link up with them. I can also share this information with my social network, to see if I can find other interested people to join me. Based on who I saw was involved, I was convinced to join in on a cause I already support. Facebook was simply the organizing tool and the messenger, but not the persuader.
To say that online activism promotes weak ties – getting more people to do less because they are lazy and unmotivated – entirely misunderstands the capability to Web 2.0. Before there was Google, which my most accounts is the climax of 1.0. In the vast world of the internet, someone needed to come through and sort through the maze of information with a complex algorithm that made it all easy to find with just a few movements of your fingers. Blogging, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other technologies have taken this beyond, by incorporation information sharing with the social aspects that make traditional networking so influential. Now I can find someone I lost touch with years ago and invite them out for dinner, allowing me to have more “friends” than was previously possible. Or I can share this very post with my friends on Facebook, followers on Twitter and readers of this blog. By dismissing where this technology is now, Malcolm Gladwell shuts out the logical next step, Web 3.0. Visions for what the next generation of internet operability will look like vary greatly. I think the focus will be on finding ways to take existing social networks and information on the internet and leveraging them to help people make decisions, to drive them to take certain actions. Think of the popular game, Farmville. I don’t play it myself, but millions of people will log onto the internet at certain times of the day to water their imaginary crops, to gain a reward. Think about the endless applications of this simple contact when the next Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Sergey Brin & Larry Page or Mark Zuckerberg comes around. The possibilities are endless.
The internet has become increasingly integrated into our lives. We are no longer bound by our bulky fixed desktop computer. Now we have 3G and even 4G smart phones, tablets and ultra-portable laptops that can access the web wherever we go. The internet has become our church, in a strange way. Think about that for a second and the way that your activities on the internet shape your life like religion once did to past generations. Maybe the Twitter Revolution is a slight stretch right now, but to dismiss it would be a mistake. With a little imagination, it’s easy to see that we’re closer to it than one closed-minded individual might have you think.
