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Friday Feb 13, 2009
Volunteering Hinterland
There's a volunteering hinterland coming into view. Much discussion and buzz has been created about the social impacts that the latest developments and changes on the 'interweb' are having as they seem to almost take place in front of your eyes (see Beth Kanter for a great example). Yesterday's Twestival, a Twitter-inspired fundraiser that knows no national frontiers, has been just the latest in this growing trend.
Volunteering and other social action just got easier to paraphrase Clay Shirky, author of the brilliant "Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations". It might have got easier to form groups and take action, but it's also true that with the web playing a greater role, the totality of smaller scale social action is more and more visible like never before.
Before the web, small scale local social action was only really visible on a local level. Now, this local action is visible globally, thanks to the web and the advance of social media. Twestival demonstrated the power of volunteering and inspired social action- in particular local and more informal volunteering.
The question is: whether more specialised web platforms develop with an eye to social action and volunteering, or whether it will continue to be the most widely adopted social media that sets the pace in tomorrow's social action and volunteering.
