UK Online Protest Finds Success In Just 48 Hours
from the it's-a-bird,-it's-a-plane,-it's-a...-Facebook-protest? dept
Using social networking tools to organize political protests is nothing new or surprising, but online protests have been growing increasingly efficient, especially on Facebook. In Canada, for example, a group protesting copyright legislation caught the attention of federal parliament last summer, and another opposing strict restrictions on young drivers had the Ontario Premier considering Facebook consultations in the fall.The latest story comes from the UK where, in a mere 48 hours, a campaign run through Facebook and TheyWorkForYou.com by mysociety.org helped stop legislation that would have exempted MPs' expenses from the Freedom of Information Act (via the Search Engine). Thousands of emails were sent in the two day period, reaching 90% of MPs, before the opposition parties turned and the government backed down. It's not so much the scale that's worth noting, but the sheer speed at which the campaign was successful. The legislation was scrapped before most snail mail would have had time to arrive. Now, the online protest likely wasn't the only factor, but it played an important role in spreading the message. It seems to be getting a lot harder to sneak stuff through the legislature (though that doesn't stop people from trying) when it only takes a couple days to build an opposition.
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Filed Under: protest, social networks, uk
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reinforcing democracy
government of the people, by the people, for the people.
and i think with time the internet will reinforce that more and more.
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Facebook Toppled Icelandic Gov.
I'm proud to have taken part in a mostly nonviolent protest that actually accomplished something, rather than pursuing my usual wont of flaming and ranting online to no effect.
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Labour was the only (major) party which actually supported this proposal, and they were facing significant rebellion. They could have relied on Conservative (main opposition) support to force the motion through parliament, but the Conservative leader changed his mind at the last minute to embarrass Labour.
This was pure politics, it had nothing to do with "web protests". It didn't even have anything to do with the proposal, really.
I've noticed you're getting this a lot recently - CHECK YOUR SOURCES
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But, like I mentioned, it played a role, but I'd be surprised if it were the only factor.
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