I work in a small city of just under 30,000 people. In a lot of senses, it’s a bedroom community, as most people that live there commute to work in one of the much larger cities nearby. The city and residents pride themselves on a very strong sense of community, a vibrant downtown and excellent engagement in causes both local and global. As an example, within my workplace, we have nearly 300 active volunteers per year, which calculates out to an equivalent of approximately 1% of the city’s residents being active in the library, a rather impressive quantity, given that many other causes in town are also well-supported.
I have frequently observed the impact of social media on various causes and information-sharing in the city. I am aware of a minimum of three Facebook groups moderated by local citizens used to disseminate information, share opinions, publicize events, and elicit support for various causes. Various colleagues have joined them as an additional avenue to spread information about library offerings and have an eye on topics of local interest. I subscribe to one of the groups and can think of many times that I have seen its role in shaping public sentiment or garnering attendance for rallies, vigils, or City Council meetings. It can be a dumping ground for people’s negative attitudes, complaints about traffic, bad manners, or local policies. However, it has also been used to get word out about local candidates and why they’re running, as well as campaign events for folks to learn more about them. I’ve seen organizers use it to get carpool arrangements started for more distant marches and rallies, and to share suggestions on how people can comment on upcoming legislation or potential City policies before they are voted on or enacted. Local hot topics include fracking, intergovernmental relations, and some of the local festivals. All of these have plenty of posts by people sharing their opinions with various levels of civility, and also give like-minded folks a place to hear about meetings or other gatherings where they can learn more about or further advance their causes.
We frequently think of social media being used to organize people that are geographically spread, and that is clearly a major impact it can have to unite people that may never meet. It’s interesting to see it also used to streamline communication for people that live in the same place and want to connect in person but may not know about their joint interests or local manifestations of those causes without the medium of these community stream-of-consciousness style conversations.