Digital Natives with a Cause? Thinkathon: Position Papers

Digital Natives from Asia and Africa have provided us with their take on social change and political participation. They look at issues such as: what does it mean to be a Digital Native? What is the relationship of people growing up with new technologies and change? What are the processes by which change is produced? Can you institutionalize Digital Natives with a Cause Activities? How do you make it sustainable in each context?

Seminar 8th December: Why activism 2.0 will win the streets

In the mashed-up world of Web 2.0, there is power in a Click! In one click you can connect to strangers, make new friends, create new universes and transform existing worlds. There has been much euphoria about the power of “the Click”. But what does it all mean? How can we unleash this potential of the world that is just a click away? There are just as many questions as there are opinions regarding activism 2.0 and new forms of mobilization. However, no one can deny that these new forms of mo...

Taking It to the Streets

The previous posts in the Beyond the Digital series have discussed the distinct ways in which young people today are thinking about their activism. The fourth post elaborates further on how this is translated into practice by sharing the experience of a Blank Noise street intervention: Y ARE U LOOKING AT ME?

Talking Back without "Talking Back"

The activism of digital natives is often considered different from previous generations because of the methods and tools they use. However, reflecting on my conversations with The Blank Noise Project and my experience in the ‘Digital Natives Talking Back’ workshop in Taipei, the difference goes beyond the method and can be spotted at the analytical level – how young people today are thinking about their activism.

Digital Natives with a Cause? Thinkathon

The emergence of digital and internet technologies have changed the world as we know it. Processes of interpersonal relationships, social communication, economic expansion, political protocols and governmental mediation are all undergoing a significant translation, across the world, in developed and emerging Information and Knowledge societies. These processes also affect the ways in which social transformation, political participation and interventions for development take place. This Thinka...

First Thing First

Studies often focus on how digital natives do their activism in identifying the characteristics of youth digital activism and dedicate little attention to what the activism is about. The second blog post in the Beyond the Digital series reverses this trend and explores how the Blank Noise Project articulates the issue it addresses: street sexual harassment.

Interview with Nishant Shah

 Bio: Nishant Shah is the Research Director at the Centre for Internet & Society (CIS), Bangalore. Prior to CIS Nishant worked as an information architect with Yahoo, Partecs and Khoj Studios, was a Research Analyst for Comat Technologies and designed and taught several courses and workshops on the aesthetics and Politics of New Digital Media, for undergraduate and graduate level students in different universities around the world.Nishant has done his Ph.D. doctoral work from the Cen...

You Are Here

As somebody who thinks he is quite “with it” when it comes to digital technologies, my universe was slightly shaken by a bunch of screen-agers. I asked them if they blogged. There were 10 seconds of awkward silence, in which they exchanged looks, cleared throats and fidgeted. I thought I had perhaps crossed a line and they might be uncomfortable sharing their personal blogs with me. The universe of blogs is often restricted to close friends. I was just about to reassure them that they did not...

The Internet and social change; will it be Tweeted?

Where Malcom Gladwell in his article ‘Small Change: Why the revolution will not be Tweeted’ got it wrong. In his article M. Gladwell states that unlike many optimists he believes that social media will not lead to any significant change. One the one hand as it builds on a network of weakly-connected links and lack of infrastructure and on the other hand because people behind their computers will never have enough incentive to become a high-risk activist. Gladwell’s scepticism is not new, but...

Digital Natives Workshop in South Africa - Call for Participation

The African Commons Project, Hivos and the Centre for Internet and Society have joined hands for organising the second international workshop "My Bubble, My Space, My Voice" in Johannesburg from 07 to 09 November 2010. Send in your applications now!

Twitter #digitalnative and Blog

Want to follow and contribute to our Twitter conversation going on in the Taipei workshop. Follow #digitalnative!Read our blog here.

Talking Back Workshop

‘Talking Back’ is the first workshop for the Digital Natives with a Cause? knowledge programme, for which 20 digital natives from 16 Asian countries have been selected to come to Taipei and discus, document and reflect on their online activities. This workshop is organised by the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), Hivos, the Frontier Foundation and Academia Sinica and will take place from the 16th till the 18th of August.

Beyond the Digital: Understanding Digital Natives with a Cause

Digital natives with a cause: the future of activism or slacktivism? Maesy Angelina argues that the debate is premature given the obscured understanding on youth digital activism and contends that an effort to understand this from the contextualized perspectives of the digital natives themselves is a crucial first step to make. This is the first out of a series of posts on her journey to explore new insights to understand youth digital activism through a research with The Blank Noise Project...

Talking Back Workshop

The Digital Natives with a Cause Knowledge programme aims to build a knowledge network of young people, practitioners and academia. The Talking Back workshop is the first of three international workshops in 2010 that aim to give visibility and a voice to the Digital Natives and to document and reflect upon their online initiatives for change. This first workshop will take place in Taipei from the 16th till the 18th of August.

Meet the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine

In the new year, 2010, one of the most startling stories was of mass suicides. About 50,000 people were affected. Legal cases were filed. The interwebz were abuzz with the tale of how they did it. There was talk about a website that was responsible for this. The blogosphere went into a frenzy discussing the ‘new lease of life’ that these suicides provided. Videos of people caught in the act found their way onto popular video distributing spaces. And for everybody who talked about it, it was p...

Meet the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine

In the new year, 2010, one of the most startling stories was of mass suicides. About 50,000 people were affected. Legal cases were filed. The interwebz were abuzz with the tale of how they did it. There was talk about a website that was responsible for this. The blogosphere went into a frenzy discussing the ‘new lease of life’ that these suicides provided. Videos of people caught in the act found their way onto popular video distributing spaces. And for everybody who talked about it, it was p...

Fill the Gap Report

In 2009 Hivos and the Centre for Internet and Society started a mapping study Digital Natives with a Cause? What we found was that many people see the potential of Youth, ICT and development, but nobody knows exactly who the Digital Natives are and how you can unleash this potential. At Fill the Gap we invited youth in the Netherlands to discuss and respond online (via Twitter) to six statements. Read the summary.

Join our discussion on ICT, Youth and Engagement

In 2009 Hivos and the Centre for Internet and Society started a mapping study Digital Natives with a Cause? What we found was that many people see the potential of Youth, ICT and development, but nowbody knows exactly who the Digital Natives are and how you can unleash this potential. Today we are starting at Fill the Gap an online and offline discussion. Join us!

Fill the Gap! - 7

The seventh edition of Fill the Gap! is all about the power of youth and IT in developing countries. How can their skills be strengthened and put to use for a better world? Hivos, apart from cohosting the event, will be involving digital natives to hear their stories about ICT and engagement.

Publication: Digital Natives with a Cause?

This new publication shows that young people are sensitive and thoughtful and more then willing to contribute to change in their societies. It proves that the common complaint that young people are not interested in politics, is mainly a result of insufficient understanding of the world of youngsters. Digital Natives - youths thriving on digital technologies - are sensitive and thoughtful; it is time to listen to them.