How Green Is My Silicon Valley - Eco-radicals, labor agitators, anarchists: The '60s are definitely back. Blame it on the Internet. (use of the Internet by political and social activitists)(Internet/Web/Online Service Information) Kayte Van Scoy.

Full Text: COPYRIGHT 2000 ZDNet

It was the beginning or the end of something; everyone seems sure of that. The November 30 protests against the World Trade Organization in Seattle were heralded as many things: proof of corporate world domination, the rebirth of civil disobedience, and the beginning of an anarchist revolution, to name a few. However, absent from analyses of the "battle of Seattle" was the realization that the Internet may have kick-started the languishing tradition of social activism in the United States.

Before Seattle, social activists lagged far behind the corporate giants when it came to the Internet, offering dry, information-heavy Web sites that weren't particularly successful at raising money or drumming up membership. Enter sites like the Direct Ac tion Network, Protest .net, and Indymedia.org, working together through the sort of loose alliances typical of the Internet. Rallying against a common enemy-corporations- the activists surprised even themselves by using only word of mouse to gather the fiercest protest the United States had seen in years. Where did these rabble-rousers come from?

Well, it wasn't the online suburbs, where their activist parents have built some very cozy homes. The organizations these parents support- such as Greenpeace, the World Wildlife Fund, the Sierra Club, and the Environmental Defense Fund-boast usable, sometimes even attractive sites. But these sites offer little to stoke the burning fires of dissent.

"Your average 20-year-old is probably way ahead of where we are on thinking about how to use the Internet," says Tom Lippman, the World Wildlife Fund's vice president for program communication. For these organizations, the Internet's main attraction is that it cuts down on printing costs and the killing of trees. Their Web sites might also allow visitors to donate or join online. Despite 1999's e-Christmas boom, though, donations to such sites were sluggish at best.

Meanwhile, just under the radar, upstart activists were burning up the wires with plans for the overthrow of the Western corporate paradigm. The big-name Web sites, it turns out, are just the icing on the grassroots cake.

"It's amazing that the most effective tools have been some of the lowest tech," says Evan Henshaw-Plath, founder of Protest.net. For example, before November 30, networking was done by e-mail only. At the same time, this younger generation of protesters-Henshaw-Plath is 22- also developed the technically sophisticated Indymedia.org, which launched November 28, to broadcast live streaming video and reports via wireless laptops from the streets of Seattle. Indymedia.org went from 0 to more than 1 million visitors in just two weeks.

Peace of Mind

For Greenpeace, however, such sophisticated technology is still pie in the sky. David Barre, coordinator of creative services for the activist giant, hopes eventually to develop a more "Greenpeace-y" Web site, with live video of Greenpeace actions around the world. The Sierra Club claims 70,000 hits per day to its site, but a quick once-over shows little to engage anyone but the most devoted supporter.

Although both Greenpeace and the Sierra Club are household names, neither has taken advantage of the cross-marketing extravaganza on which practically every well-known Web site is built.

"This is a very touchy subject because we don't take any corporate funding, so to build those relationships we have to be very careful," says Greenpeace's Barre.

By contrast, lesser-known Web sites such as Eactivism, funded entirely by its founder, Tristan Zajonc, are spawning terms like "viral marketing" for their success at raising money through e-mail campaigns. Zajonc, whose mission is to get people interested and involved in any cause, currently hosts a "Click for the Cure" button through which advertisers are donating about $300 per month for cancer research by the click. Zajonc got the idea from The Hunger Site (www.thehungersite.com), which boasts that it is gathering a million cups of grain per day to feed starving people all over the world through corporate advertisers' per-click donations. After centuries of ill will, is it possible that corporate America and grassroots activists may find common ground in cyberspace?