The DigiActive Guide to Twitter for Activism

Written by DigiActive Team on April 13, 2009 – 1:56 pm -

We are very excited to announce the release of The DigiActive Guide to Twitter for Activism.  Following the recent protests in Moldova, the value of Twitter as a tool for digital activism is more prominent than ever.  Yet in addition to bringing greater awareness to that tool, the hype surrounding Moldova revealed misunderstanding of the value of of Twitter for activism and, even though the realists responded strongly, there was not a stand-alone resource which clearly defined how Twitter could be used by activists.  We hope this guide will fill that void.

click image to download guide

Click the cover image to download the guide (PDF format)

The guide provides a wealth of information on Twitter activism.  It  begins with an introduction to the platform (p. 5) and its terminology (p. 6) and then lays out five uses of Twitter for activists, each illustrated by a case study (p. 6-11).  The guide then presents a step-by-step strategy for using Twitter for political and social change (p. 12) along with a list of do’s and don’ts (p. 14) for campaigners.  The guide ends with additional resources for Twitterers, such as applications that help you use Twitter (p. 16), further reading (p. 20), and even alternatives to Twitter (p. 18).

The guide was written by Andreas Jungherr, a master’s candidate in political science at the University of Mainz in Germany, and was reviewed and improved by scholars, activists, and the DigiActive team, all for your reading enjoyment.  Please respond with your feedback in the comments section below.

A Note for Translators:  The guide is published under a Creative Commons Non-Commercial Attribution license and we welcome translation by individuals and organizations who will release their version under the same conditions. To receive a copy of the guide in an editable format, please e-mail Contact AT DigiActive DOT org.


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Posted in DigiActive News, Guides & Resources, Microblogging, Mobile Phones | 26 Comments »


26 Responses to “The DigiActive Guide to Twitter for Activism”

  1. By Beth Kanter on Apr 13, 2009 | Reply

    Great resource! I included it in a roundup of posts about the recent attention Twitter has gotten as an activism tool

    http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/2009/04/twitter-for-activism-tool-vs-strategy-debate-and-a-new-twitter-activism-guide.html

  2. By rob allen on Apr 13, 2009 | Reply

    1 innacuracy with respect to Jaiku – the Jaiku code base was released under the Apache License 2.0 on March 13th 2009. The code is available as JaikuEngine on Google Code Project Hosting as of now. Anyone can set up and run their own JaikuEngine instance on Google App Engine.

    The report also mentions indenti.ca (the site) rather than Laconi.ca (the App) which was the first Free and Open Source microblogging platform which is already used by a large number of sites – the biggest installation being at http://identi.ca/

  3. By j on Apr 15, 2009 | Reply

    Thanks for this great post!

  4. By minhaaj ur rehman on Apr 15, 2009 | Reply

    Ewan William’s TED Talk also explains the digiactivism aspect of microblogging.

  5. By John Tan on Apr 16, 2009 | Reply

    Unfortunately Twitter doesn’t work on sms in Singapore and many other countries. Twitter will be a lot more powerful if it has global coverage. Please suggest to Twitter to get back to that capability. I am sure many people, such as I, wouldn’t mind paying for the service.

  6. By Mary on Apr 17, 2009 | Reply

    Hi John, We were aware of this limited reach when we wrote the guide and even created a chapter with the subtitle “What to do with this guide if you don’t live in the USA, UK, Canada, or India.” In the end the question is the business model. Will Twitter offer a paid premium service that offers global coverage? If not, other companies will likely offer this Twitter “forwarding” service or customers will create work-arounds.

  7. By sulumits retsambew on Jun 3, 2009 | Reply

    thank you for sharing with us, your posting is great nice to read your blog

  8. By Erik Schoeff on Jun 10, 2009 | Reply

    Thanks for the guide since many of us frankly couldn’t find the value of Twitter as a tool for digital activism. It obviously is the resource which clearly defined how Twitter could be used by us.

  1. 18 Trackback(s)

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  3. Apr 14, 2009: Teeth Maestro: DigiActive Guide to Twitter Activism
  4. Apr 15, 2009: The Digiactive Guide to Twitter Activism « Majorityminority
  5. Apr 15, 2009: The DigiActive Guide to Twitter for Activism | Orbit City
  6. Apr 15, 2009: Haciendo activismo en Twitter. | Yankana - Tecnologías para la acción social.
  7. Apr 16, 2009: Twitter for Activists: New Guide | The Morningside Post
  8. Apr 16, 2009: Come usare Twitter nella tua organizzazione nonprofit? | Fundraising.it
  9. Apr 17, 2009: Digital Activism - Sky’s Blog
  10. Apr 17, 2009: Twitter Vocab Lesson
  11. Apr 24, 2009: A Twitter Revolution in Moldova? | Working Wikily
  12. Apr 24, 2009: Twitter as a tool for activism
  13. Apr 28, 2009: Recently linked (19-Apr-2009 to 28-Apr-2009) - zumio
  14. May 4, 2009: Jikomboe » Kenya Airways Kwenye Twitter + Matumizi ya Twitter Kwenye Harakati
  15. May 16, 2009: Weekly Newsletter » Blog Archive » Tutorials, Tips, and Guides
  16. May 18, 2009: The Human Web Part 2 – Twitter « Jax Rant [ wonderings on the web ]
  17. May 24, 2009: Una guía de Twitter para activistas | Stralunato
  18. Dec 1, 2009: Advice on Twitter use – based on what top US companies are NOT doing « Giving in a digital world
  19. Mar 1, 2010: Twitter Activism « Online Activism – Let your voice be heard!

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