In "Trust and Internet Activism: From Gmail to Social Networks" Laura Gurak examines three separate cases, each tied together by their relation to social internet media and each varying in degree to this relation. The first case, from 1992, focuses on the Lotus Marketplace, which was planning to release a product but was later cancelled due to internet protests. Gurak identifies that this protest took place in the very early stages of the internet, and therefore the internet community was a small, closely linked group of users. The next case, explored a Facebook page set up in response to a destructive tornado that touched down in Minneapolis in 2010. Gurak points out that this page bridged the gap between the community and the bureaucrats, and focused on the level of trust. Trust was high between the community and this page because the man who created it had been a resident of that area, and some of the people new him personally. However, not everyone new who he was, and yet there was a high trust level that exceeded governmental support, which Gurak explains was due to the personal connectedness that community members felt towards the page because of how they could relate to him/members on the page. Gurak identifies relatability as a key factor in building trust. The final case examines the fight against a constitutional bill in Minnesota from 2012, which was proposed to ban same-sex marriage. In this segment, Gurak again focuses on trust, but explains the different methods that the campaign against the bill used, such as personal letters.
"Being Together versus Working Together: Copresence in Participation" by Earl and Kimpert explores how copresence and collective identity factor into activism, especially in relation to online activism. Their goal is to show that meaningful collective action can be undertaken online. This claim is in response to many social movement theorists who argue that 'real' change can only happen through face to face communication/action. The basis of Earl and Kimpert's argument rests in claims such as on page 128, "Collective action can exist when people are engaged in the same expressive act", which they want to use in order to show that online petitions are a form of collective action, and also create a collective identity. They focus primarily on how different sites disclose participation statistics, and how this plays a role in maintaining or creating a group identity. They conclude by pointing in the direction for future research, claiming that 1. Future research must examine participation levels, and 2. Future research must examine how collective identity is affected by representation.
I actually agree with the conclusions of both articles, however the only real strong claim comes from Earl and Kimpert. I enjoyed Gurak's examination of how high trust can be maintained in different scenarios, and especially her focus on personal connectedness and how that factors into levels of trust, and she cites Sztompka(no idea who this is) "Trust is often established through social proximity", which I think is exactly spot on. I think trust is, at the very least, created through social proximity both physically and on a relational level. It can be maintained outside of social proximity, but I think it is grounded in such a condition. Translating this to digital activism, I think this works right into Earl and Kimpert's examination of collective identity. As pointed out in the tornado Facebook page example, trust can be created through an online medium. While we might argue that a full regress into the nature of the man's relationships was the real origin of the trust, I would respond that those who never knew the man maintained high levels of trust in the page. Building off of trust, Earl and Kimpert show how trust and collective identity can motivate a cause in meaningful ways. While it is not without its drawbacks, disclosing participation numbers and names can be prudential to a movement, particularly an online organization. This disclosure helps creates a "culture of trust", to quote Gurak, and encourages a sense of collective identity, by assuring potential participants that they are not alone, and that they are with others that they can relate to.
