Campaign: A Protest Movement Against Scientology

Written by Mary on February 25, 2008 – 1:24 am -

Description of Campaign: An online community called Anonymous draws other online users into a global campaign against the controversial religion Scientology. (Note: This post is not a criticism of Scientology, merely a study of the digital means used by its critics,)

Digital Activism Tools: Youtube, Digg (social bookmarking), wikis, online forums

How These Tools are Being Used: After announcing their campaign against Scientology via an ominous YouTube video on January 21st (see below), a group of nameless hackers used open forums like the alternative news site Digg to spread their message of protest against what they see as the exploitive and untruthful practices of Scientology. Their movement is very interactive. As it is based on a wiki, new members were able to leave feedback for the original founders and the founders listened. (In particular, they cut back on the illegal harassment of Scientologists, which many would-be supporters felt was illegitimate “cyber-terrorism.”) Anonymous, whose leaders and members are unknown, experienced a great success on February 10, when 6,000 supporters participated in anti-Scientology rallies in more than 70 cities around the world.

After the break I’ll quote a long passage of excellent background and analysis from Carnegie Mellon student Dan Schultz, originally published on MediaShift Idea Lab under the title “Anonymous vs. Scientology: A Case of Digital Media.”
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Posted in Campaigns, Social Bookmarking, Video, Wikis | 4 Comments »

Tool: Wikis

Written by Mary on January 17, 2008 – 4:28 am -

Tool Description: A wiki is a web page which users can easily edit and add content to by clicking an “edit” tab on the page.
Activist Application: Following the tumultuous elections in Kenya, a Lithuanian activist, Andrius Kulikauskas, is using his community wiki to offer help and provide information about the situation.
Ease of Use: Fairly easy. You can create a wiki for free at sites like Wikispaces.com. This page explains the basics of wiki syntax (the codes for italics, bold, links, etc.). Here is a video which explains the basics of using a wiki:


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Posted in Europe, Sub-Saharan Africa, Tools, Wikis | No Comments »