When Protests go Virtual: How Organizing Social Protest in Virtual Worlds Changes the Nature of Organizing.
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2010
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Blodgett, B., Tapia, A. (2010). “When Protests go Virtual: How Organizing Social Protest in Virtual Worlds Changes the Nature of Organizing” 16th Americas Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS), Lima, Peru, August 14-17, 2010.
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Abstract
In this paper, we introduce a case study of social protest that has occurred in the virtual world Second Life. This case is a labor strike that occurred against IBM by Italian employees and a large European labor union. We begin with identifying the four key elements in the protest organizing process: Identifying Supporters, Organizing and Establishing Hierarchy, Getting the Word Out, and Building Solidarity/Establishing Social Networks. Next, we briefly examine how non-virtual technologies have changed the protest organizing process. Finally, we present our case data and illustrate how moving a protest to a fully virtual environment changes the organizing process. We conclude by asserting that three aspects fundamentally change protest organizing: entertainment, costs, and culture.