Coordinating Online Resources for the Wisconsin Protests

Seattle.
OK, sadly I missed part of the Wisconsin protests AoIR 2011 panel, but I’m here at least to cover Matt Gaydos’s presentation. The history of Wisconsin’s protest and activist movements is strong, and the recent grassroots movement against the virtual outlawing of unions is an important new step in this; Matt recounts the story of himself and his fellow students becoming outraged enough to be persuaded to act.

Some of the organising took place through community-organised Defend Wisconsin Websites and Twitter accounts; these were useful, but only to people who were involved right from the start – they didn’t provide enough material for latecomers to begin to understand the issues, and to learn about how they might be able to help.

So, Matt and his friends set to redeveloping the Defend Wisconsin site on 20 February; the morning of the next day, they launched a redesigned site, which significantly boosted the number of visitors to the site. This success was also highlighted by a local newspaper (which noted that the site was unavailable from Capitol computers); this, in turn, was picked up by Huffington Post, Anonymous, and other interested groups.

Over the following days, more extensions of the site, and connections with other platforms (Flickr, YouTube, etc.), were developed; FAQs were added, and other forms of organising were pursued (such as random phonecalls to encourage more people to participate). Some of this was hampered by the supporting organisation (the Teaching Assistants’ Association, TAA) having cumbersome organisational decision-making processes, which required long meeting discussions before any further steps were approved – and personal responsibilities were not always clear, and sometimes decided on the fly.

It was never entirely clear, either, whether the work of the volunteer developers was creating any significant results. Today, the site has some 3,000 visitors a week, which is less than it should have; Facebook and Twitter accounts are also still active. Digital literacy is necessary, then, but organising also relies on the human interface; the Net is a potential site for resistance, but only effectively so if Websites are also being used – and there are costs as well as benefits of working with individuals and organisations. What’s necessary is to make the movement a vehicle for individuals to transform both themselves and their communities.