Power of an audience

Although there are laws for each society, quite often, they are being broken every day despite the consequences which lie ahead. As large groups form through following the same trail of thought, it becomes more of a problem to deal with them whether it being large scale riots or simple work strikes.
 The creation of a strike usually starts from face to face communication and meetings about the same problem, if they can gather enough people, they then usually advertise their proposal through the means of telling friends and family, this happens through normal communication or electronically devices such as mobile phones. Quite often these days, they also advertise through social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter, this way they can set up an online base to attract people beyond their normal reach, it also allows for instant updates on the situation.

After all the planning is done and the events are ready, online petitions can also be formed to use as proof of support to help convince someone of a higher power to support the original request.

In some cases, some of the events start on thing like Facebook groups or official websites and heavily rely on the internet to be able to achieve its purpose, without it, the campaign wouldn't be half as effective.  

When we all work together a lot can be achieved not matter where we are, we just need to make sure people know about its importance and to gain the support of more people.

A good example of this is the campaign called KONY 2012. by creating a very good video and setting up a campaign to allow everyday people to help, it now has over millions of supporters worldwide which originally started from 3 people. In the video they stated that the government originally didn't support their campaign due to it being non beneficial to their own country, after millions of people came along and supported their case the government changed their views and also helped them.

However having the potential to freely alert and gather people may also cause problems, such as organised riots. For example, the BBC stated that several teenagers have been arrested due to different cases of planned riots on the social networking site Facebook, despite being caught and the riots didn't actually take place, the group pages that made were active with different users to the point where they had to be closed and the police had to get involved.

It all depends on the type of user, but the power of a large audience is a scary thing.

Bibliography


Social Media Powers Nigerian Fuel Protests . 2012. Social Media Powers Nigerian Fuel Protests . [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.gakadigital.com/IndustryNews2/IndustryNewsDetails/tabid/85/ArticleId/37/Social-Media-Powers-Nigerian-Fuel-Protests.aspx. [Accessed 12 March 2012].


BBC News - Facebook riot page: Danny Cook jailed for 30 months. 2012. BBC News - Facebook riot page: Danny Cook jailed for 30 months. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hereford-worcester-16185152. [Accessed 12 March 2012].

BBC News - Man jailed for Facebook incitement to riot to appeal. 2012. BBC News - Man jailed for Facebook incitement to riot to appeal. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-14557772. [Accessed 12 March 2012].

BBC News - Dundee teenagers locked up for Facebook riot threats. 2012. BBC News - Dundee teenagers locked up for Facebook riot threats. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-16144640. [Accessed 12 March 2012].