Within the last year there have been an assortment of social movements that were associated with digital media. For example the Revolution in Egypt was considered to have been propelled by social networks like Facebook and Twitter. Many believed that these sites were responsible for gathering those who participated within the movement and ultimately the reason it succeeded. It's understandable that people would think this given the scope of online networks. However, they just served to spread the news around globally as opposed to physically gathering individuals to march the streets in protest.
Another example would be the disasters in Haiti where many forms of media came into use to help raise funds for victims. Thousands of people were reached through twitter, texts, and other forms of digital media to donate money. What resulted was the accumulation of 1.2 million dollars in funding, but the reason wasn't simply from all the online messaging. In fact the money took quite a bit of time to be collected and wasn't immediately used from the donations given through social media.
These two examples serve to illustrate a trend that whenever people contribute to digital activism, they feel that it yields more immediate results. The truth is that many unseen factors go into social change, but due to the nature of digital media many think these changes are instant. What happens is a person supports an online status along with thousands of others followed by news reports that the issue is resolving. They then come to the conclusion that digital media directly contributed and made a change. It's from this trend that people think of digital activism as a revolution.
In the case of text donation services like the ones used for Haiti relief, one must also consider the overhead of these organizations. Many donated without thinking twice about how the money was being processed, and whether the people who needed it most received it. In some cases, higher ranking officials in Haiti that generally distributed the donations hoarded the supplies for themselves. Had those that donated actually cared about the cause this would have happened less frequently.
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