Cyberactivism, protest or crime?

Cyberactivism, also known as Internet activism, is the use of electronic communication technologies (www, e-mail, etc), to enable communications with large audiences, in an attempt to denounce and solve attacks to the Human Rights.




Being able to join thousands of people together for a cause was way more difficult before than it is now. What has made this change? Internet, of course.

An example is what happened with the so called "Anonymous" cyberactivists, in the USA, who planned and  convinced thousands of citizens through social networks and forums. What they did is that they blocked the web pages of organizations such as MPAA or RIAA (USA), which supported anti-piracy lobbies.


This attacks have lead to a lot of debate and critics. Moreover, two points of view have been distinguished: there are people who consider this attacks as vandalism, crime and delinquence, while others support the idea that they're just ways of protest and claim

So, should this cyberactivism actions be consider as many other demands or demonstrations, or are they definetly criminal actions (whichever way we look at it)?

Renew or die

Foto by: Woods Lonergan

A few days ago EL PAIS published an article about its director, José Moreno where, during the XII Congress of Digital Journalism in Huesca,  he exposed that "in a few years, the paper version of  newspapers will be over".

Well, he didn’t say anything new. In fact, we all have heard this kind of opinion or even thought about this sometime.  But this time it was José Moreno, director of one of the best newspapers in Spain,  an expert , who affirms this. So, we definetly should get used to this statement. And not only to the statement, but to the phenomenom in it. Yes, it is probable that newspapers really disappear.

 Of course, there's always the opposite version, like when television appeared and people said “the television is going to end up with other media...and it didn’t”. It us true, but this time is not only a prediction. Statistics do show that. As Moreno said during the conference, "even the assiduous consumers of press of some years ago, are giving it up". But attention, they are giving up press, "not information!". 

Now we have to face it. It's like renew or die. The future is no longer in the papers anymore, but in the web. 

Social networks? Yes, but still with confidence relationships

Do you know what does active networking mean? Or let's complicate the question: do you know what the difference between offline networking or online networking is? I DO
During a Social Networks conference in Burgos, Emilio Marquez (@emiliomarquez) cleared up this two concepts. 


The offline networking already existed before. It is the networking we are used to: talking, exchanging personal cards, seeing other person’s face, etc. Nothing new. On the other hand, the active networking (or online networking) refers to the abilities and social tools used to improve work and to increase everyone’s talent.

Emilio recalled that thanks to the social networks we can now get to a lot of people just by clicking in the keyboard.

Nevertheless, according to this specialist in social networks, those two kinds of networking (the offline and online) have to be combined. People should still be making confidence relationships. That’s the aim of networking, not just being connected through online networking, but also offline. As he said: “we have to sense the feeling in person”.