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#SocialMediaBlackout? What social media blackout

South Africans are protesting the high cost of data as well as the fact that data has an expiry date by staying off of social media today. Or at least that was the plan.

As of 07:15, the hashtag #SocialMediaBlackout is trending and it appears if people just aren’t willing to logout.

This is despite poet Ntsiki Mazwai’s calls for people to not buy data and not to log in to their social profiles. The poet even called for folks to stop using WiFi.

As we’ve mentioned already though, the hashtag used to rally supporters is being used en masse forcing us to ask the question, are people logging off today?

The short answer is we don’t know but there sure is a lot of activity on Twitter this morning.

As many users have pointed out, logging out is the equivalent of drinking poison and expecting your enemy to fall to the ground. Beyond that, in an era where many of us rely on the internet to do our jobs logging out of social media is the equivalent of calling for maintenance 12 hours before the Mullholland Dam collapsed. That is to say not effective at all.

Make no mistake, we want the price of data to come down as much as the next person but telling folks to stay off of the platforms that – in the past – have been used to rally folks and protest the cost of data, might not be the best solution.

Update – An original version of this story contained the incorrect spelling of Ntsiki Mazwai’s name, this has been amended. We apologise for any confusion caused.

[Image – CC 0 Public Domain Animated Heaven]

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