Theorists’ views on the role of new media in stepping towards societal change are significantly divided. Starting from the optimists’ unmarked delight and hopes pinned on new medias’ importance, through relative skeptics, and finally declared critics. As we believe that theories are useless without comparing them to the reality, the main aims of this text are to measure and highlight the most meaningful features of last decade’s new social movements (like Occupy Wall Street, Indignados and the Arab Spring) and attempt at placing them in the frames of the most crucial theories on new and social media.
Keywords: new media, activism, protests, Manuel Castells, Evgeny Morozov, Paul Mason, Alain Tourane, Noam Chomsky, Occupy Wall Street, Indignados
