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"The movement that began on Sept. 17 in New York City was initiated in part by a Canadian magazine editor who refused to join Facebook. \nIronically, the Occupy movement is not only benefiting from digital tools, but also adding to and transforming the landscape of new media available to today's advocates. Instead of asking how digital technologies are transforming advocacy, is it more appropriate to ask how contemporary advocacy is transforming digital technologies?\n\nSEE ALSO: How Occupy Wall Street Is Building Its Own Internet [VIDEO]\nThis concept first became apparent in the U.K., with the \u201CUncut\u201D protests. There, student protesters developed a new tool called Sukey to help one another avoid police barricades. \u00A0\nThis fall, in New York\u2019s Zucotti Park, occupiers have developed new tools and appropriated existing ones. An early example of the latter was their use of the blogging platform Tumblr, which first gained popularity through New York\u2019s fashion and photography scene. But Occupy Wall Street's use of Tumblr has transformed the tool itself into one more amenable to advocacy. With every new tag, note and reblog that corresponds to activism, the platform becomes more valuable for organizers. \n\nOccupiers are also the most recent activists to take a stab at creating a \u201Cmesh network,\u201D or a localized, independent version of the Internet. (It doesn\u2019t use central hubs that can be shut down by governments.) During the Egyptian uprising in early 2011, mesh networks garnered interest as a viable workaround for future Internet blackouts, like the one instated by Hosni Mubarak. The Egyptian experience inspired projects called Open Mesh and Apps for the Apocalypse. And now Occupy has ignited The Free Network Foundation which, like its precursors, aims to harness the momentum of today's protests to create technological solutions that will serve actions of tomorrow.\nThe new tools that have emerged from Occupy protests are direct responses to user needs. For example, when it became clear that cellphone microphones were insufficient for disseminating information across Zucotti Park, technologists joined with activists to create a phone-powered tool for real-time information sharing. The People's Skype turns many phones into distributed PA systems, provided the devices have speakerphone capability and their users know the dial-in and pin number. The tool also allows for real-time voting using mobile keypads. \nA new application for Facebook called the Occupy Network provides a simple but important fix for online organizing. Rather than sifting through the various groups, pages and events related to occupations, anyone can use this app to search by location and see which of his Facebook friends are involved. \nTechnology and social networks haven't yet been able to accurately anticipate the needs of would-be users. Only enhanced communication between technology developers and users will foster advancement. Until then, major movements are taking the reins. \nImage courtesy of Flickr, sebastien.barre, joncandy"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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