Pius Maundu
@piusmaundu
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Dominic Mutua Maweu addresses MCSF members. He went
into Facebook to run away from loneliness. Photo: Pius Maundu
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Facebook,
Twitter find expanding use in cities and beyond
Saturday
afternoon. A trail of four SUVs, three Probox, and 5 NZEs conspicuously snakes
into the greenery that is the laid back Acacia Resort in Wote, Makueni County.
Piaggio Ape three-wheelers, on this day, register good business dropping
passengers, seemingly strange to one another, to the country side inn.
Yet dozens throng
the dusty section of the 100-metre stretch off Wote-Machakos Road, past Hotel
le Panda, into the sprawling compound. This afternoon, Acacia is hosting
Makueni County Sharing Forum (MCSF) members.
Inside the parking lot is littered with
sassy women, the young flaunting clutch bags, the miniature version of the
sizeable carry-alls, popular with the young at heart. Clad in jeans, t-shirts
and sandals debonair men complement the women so that, at 2 pm, the in-crowd of
MCSF, a Facebook group premised on sharing information on county and national
development, is seated.
If their numbers fail to equalize the two
groups, the internet enabled devices they are carrying with them don’t.
Incidentally, everyone is religiously tucked to their smart phone or
laptop. Peter Mbilo has with him a
Samsung Galaxy Tab.
In one corner, Chris Nzioki chats amiably
with Nancy Kyalo, Peter Mutua stretches for his second bottle of Dasani,
effectively interrupting a tete a tete
between Lawrence Kamwenzwa and Zipporah Wavinya, and from far, Domitila Katila
confides with Mbeneka Musyoka. Occasionally, Stephen Malai high-fives Samuel
Mativo.
Their mission is two-fold: to meet Dominic
Maweu, the founder of MCSF, and to get acquainted to one another.
As Stephen Mumo Wambua sets the event
rolling, wheelchair-bound Maweu expresses his amazement on how MCSF has grown
in leaps and bounds bringing good tidings in every new spin off. “I started
this group for selfish reasons. I’ve always been passionate about meeting
people, listening to people.
But when I became bed ridden, I could not
take myself to the people: I needed something to bring the people to me.” At
this point, it is not hard to imagine that Maweu cut his teeth in photography
and penning articles for Baobab, a Muthingiini
Secondary School magazine, in his hey days.
Today, MCSF has burst its seams in
activity.
Every day, it hosts over 20 member generated posts, triggering over
1200 reactions. The group boasts of over 22000 active members predominantly
drawn from Makueni County, Machakos County, Kitui County, Kajiado County,
Nairobi County. But it’s the vibrancy in the conversations hosted on this group
that makes it stand out. Its essence is succinctly stated on its profile:
“We can chat, discuss, give advices, and joke together as friends.”
Maweu’s is an interesting case. It deviates
from studies, like a recent one by
University of Michigan psychologist Ethan Kross, that joining Facebook makes one lonely and sad. Instead, Maweu confirms what Matthew Lieberman
says in his book, “Social: Why our brains are wired to connect.”
Lieberman writes that social networks are
excellent platforms for interaction. They increase social interaction and trust
among participants. Importantly, these networks create new platforms of sharing
content, and experiences. This awareness that a social media user will end up
sharing with others is rewarding.
And as Sebastián Valenzuela and his
colleagues discovered in a study on popular media culture, this makes users
happy.
But there is more in Maweu’s story: the
expanding use of social networks in the society.
Facebook, Twitter, and social media are
changing the way people interact. Studies rebuking earlier ones that social
media is less capable of facilitating meaningful relationships are gaining
preeminence.
Hence the springing up of communities such
as MCSF in recent times. That
notwithstanding, conversations on the impact on development triggers schisms.
At one side, there are those who contend
that causes propagated on Facebook, popularized as Hashtagactivism,
translate to nothing on the ground. Yet
those borrowing from recent events in Syria exude confidence that causes on
social media are revolutionary.
In 2011, youths in Syria and the Middle
East at large relied heavily on social media. Twitter and Facebook were handy
in shaping how the Middle East crisis was portrayed and this influenced its
ultimate perception.
By and large, social media platforms have
continued to handle a plethora of topics ranging from art, politics, business,
socialization, and even education. This list has been shifting north.
Mainstreaming of social media by governments,
politicians and corporations as formidable communication platforms is
responsible for this great milestone. It is not uncommon for journalists to
fish for stories from blogs, Tweets, Facebook posts.
“Journalists are no longer the gatekeepers. Everyone is about of the news and storytelling business these days. So they are no-longer looking out for the news, they are participating in telling the news. This is a hard concept for traditional media to not only grapple with but to also understand and adapt to.”
“Quotable tweets from key personalities and
the mainstream media houses provide enough hay to keep MCSF kicking,” owns
Maweu, a onetime radio producer with Radio Mang’elete, a community radio
operating in Mtito-a-Ndei.
Besides journalism, public relations thrives
on social media. Not so long ago, a survey by the Kenya Bankers Association
showed how social media is the preferred means of customer care in banking. It
read:
“Nine out of 10 respondents would rather
communicate with their bank through social media sites such as Facebook,
Twitter and WhatsApp.”
Twitter has continued to find expanding
usage as a communication tool of choice in politics and diplomatic networking.
When Narendra Modi, India’s Prime Minister
assumed office in May 2014, his position on social media was clear. “I am a firm believer in the
power of technology and social media to communicate with people across the
world.”
President Barack Obama commands 43.7
followers on Twitter, topping the world-leader list, according to
Twiplomacy. Second in that list is Pope
Francis whose 14 million followers are spread on his nine different language
accounts. Indonesia’s President Susilo
Bambang Yudhoyono comes a distant third with an upwards of five million
followers, a heartbeat from Narendra Modi.
Twiplomacy monitors the use of Twitter by
politicians and what this means on policy and development.
President Uhuru Kenyatta is the greatest Twitter
user in Africa, with 457,307 followers as at June 2014.
But it is not the level of followership
that matters. But the level of interactivity. In this light, the most
influential world leader is Pope Francis, whose English and Spanish accounts
attract over 16000 retweets, according to a study by Twiplomacy.
Twitter enables interactions. Successful
users find Twitter an important tool for conversing with their followers. Amina
Mbabazi, Ugandan Prime Minister, is the most conversational world leader. 95% of his tweets are to other Twitter users.
Social media influences public policy.
World leaders have thrown their weights on matters using their social media
accounts. Notably, BringBackourGirls has
seen Michelle Obama express her sentiments on the need for the Boko Haram to
release the 200-plus Nigeria girls it abducted.
Neutering an attempted globetrotting by
Members of the County Assembly, and influencing a facelift Yikisemei, a
hitherto neglected school in Kibwezi West, are some of the achievements MSF can
write home about.
Although controversy surrounds the
appropriate metric for the efficacy of campaigns on social media, there is a
general concurrence from pundits that social media presence for individuals,
corporations and causes is rewarding.
Except for the exceptional case of Chief
Francis Kariuki of Lanet, Nakuru County, whose broadcasts touch on his
locality, Twitter usage in Kenya is largely perceived as elitist, and given a
wide berth.
Perhaps the ease of interfacing on Facebook
provides an easier alternative.
In 2013, theguardian.com reported that Facebook boasted of an upwards of
1.23 billion users worldwide, with over half of the users having over 200
friends. Individual accounts burgeon to vibrant communities like MCSF.
What keeps certain online communities
growing while others stagnating?
Diversity of topics handled in one, and the
success in the balancing act on level of freedom of expression and the perceived
decorum in the conversations hosted therein are essential ingredients in online
communities.
Whereas scores could mill around online communities
premised on banality, other turfs could register minimal followership. This
explains the variance in followership in the sarcasm-laced conversations of
Edwin Buhere, as compared to accounts whose fodder is politics.
To remain relevant, social media account
holders have to find ways of keeping the influences coming for more.
Kis Mbondo, one of the administrators at
MCSF, owns that keeping the group alive is a tall order. “One of the greatest challenges is to ensure
that members interact in a respectable manner.”
For Mbondo to make this happen, he
identifies and weeds out members using vulgar language and trading vitriol, as
well as those determined to broadcast indecent photos. Administration entails
keeping vigil on members hell-bent on hosting advertisements on the page, and
blocking them, for they risk having Facebook Inc. disable the account. This funnels to the freedom of expression on
social media.
At the engine of social networking sites is
Web 2.0, a combination of web tools enabling unidirectional user interaction.
Touted as being highly dynamic, these tools have revolutionized the online
experience.
Popularity of Web 2.0 rides on its ability
to make both parties to a communication situation creators and consumers of
content. Elimination of gate keeping on social media is highly celebrated and
dreaded in equal measures.
While elimination of editors in information
processing allows a variety of perspective to a phenomenon, critics point at
its being an enabling environment for the perpetration of falsehoods,
propaganda, hate speech, alarming and unethical photos, text and video.
Nevertheless, this technology is acclaimed
for its capacity to promote democracy in the world. And Maweu, 45, is wary of
this essence of social media.
“In MCSF, we occasionally differ on one or
two issues,” Maweu says, scanning the now murmuring Acacia Resort audience,
“but that does not mean we cannot find common ground on the other matters.
Democracy is founded on accommodating diversity.”
In addition, MCSF serves as a one-stop shop
for information on public health by the medical fraternity in the group. But all this does not come without
challenges.
Growing popularity of social media has led
institutions into a kneejerk.
Attempts to crack the whip on irresponsible
use of social media has seen blogger Robber Alai, and political activists Moses
Kuria and DiKembe Disembe walk through the criminal justice system for
utterances they made on Twitter and Facebook.
While it is the mandate of the individual
running a personal account to check on libel and hate speech, for instance, on
online communities, administrators have a role to play. This eats into the
perceived freedom of expression that should characterize online interactions on
groups of MCSF ilk
.
Allowing libelous conversations is not only
unethical but it can cost the community followership. A conversations is libelous if dames the
reputation of another person at the eyes of right thinking members of the
society, by exposing them to hatred, malice and contempt.
“Can you imagine a society where everyone
is allowed to hang placards insulting the local leader on the tallest tree?” quips
Mbondo, wittily justifying the inevitability of using an upper hand in
administering MCSF.
Before the sun dips, MCSF members embark on
taking selfies. One can tell from the full smiles and chatter outside the
conference hall that these are no longer strangers. Obviously these moments of
happiness will end up in posts on Makueni County Social Forum.
Daily Nation version
