One of the co-founders of Wikipedia is urging people to go on a "social media strike" this week to protest myriad factors related to the platforms.
As The Hill noted, Larry Sanger wrote on his website last week that he plans to stay off social media July 4-5 — and he asked others to join him in the movement.
"On July 4 and 5 (at least one day), people with serious grievances against social media — including you? — will go on strike. You could, but obviously don't have to, announce that you are one of the signatories of the Declaration of Digital Independence," Sanger wrote.
"This means we will not use social media on those days, except to post notices that we are on strike. We're going to make a lot of noise. Nobody will be able to ignore what's happening. We're going to flex our collective muscles and demand that giant, manipulative corporations give us back control over our data, privacy, and user experience."
Sanger's post included a hashtag for users to post, #SocialMediaStrike.
Sanger, who co-founded online encyclopedia giant Wikipedia in 2001, noted that one of the goals of the strike is to flood other social media users' timelines with strike messages to the point that the national news media picks up the story.
"Similarly, Big Social Media will have to issue statements responding to the Declaration and to any public criticisms from many quarters," he wrote.
"By the end, everyone will have learned how much support there is for decentralizing social media, taking the control out of the hands of Big Social Media, and returning ownership, control, and privacy to the ordinary user."
Facebook and other social media companies have been plagued by privacy issues and data leaks in recent years, which has prompted some users to cancel their accounts.
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