Report from DigiActive’s Bangalore Meet-up

We had a great meet-up yesterday at the offices of the Centre for Internet and Society in Bangalore (thanks so much to Sunil, Pranesh,  Sanchia, and Deepika for making it possible!)  It was a very diverse group, with participants from Indian and international NGOs, techies from Yahoo!, and even a radio producer and film-maker.

We started out by dissecting this Pink Chaddis campaign, a very popular women’s rights campaign organized through Facebook that had just organized a big action on Valentines’ Day.  (I’ll be posting on the campaign a little later - it’s a great one.)

However, when we went about creating a definition for digital activism, the discussion became more theoretical.  Although DigiActive is optimistic about the possibility of digital tools to empower those fighting injustice, this meet-up group decided that digital activism was value neutral and that it simply mapped onto the existing goals and motives within a society.  It is a technique that can be used for constructive or destructive ends.

At the end of the event, some participants came up to me to make sure my feelings weren’t hurt by the disagreement, but I assured them I was really happy with the result.  Only if digital activism is debated and dissected will we be able to understand and use it well.