Supporting the (digital) climate strike

This Friday (September 20th), millions of people will join young climate strikers in a Global Climate Strike on the streets and demand an end to the age of fossil fuels. 

Tumblr, Atlassian, Kickstarter, WordPress, BoingBoing, Imgur, BitTorrent, are among the many companies to support the Global Climate Strike, along with over 1,000 websites joining the Digital Climate Strike, in response to the call-to-action from young people around the world.

Modelled after massive online protests like the SOPA strike and the Internet Slowdown for net neutrality, the Digital Climate Strike will raise visibility about the upcoming youth-led global climate strike.

If you’d like to show solidarity with the strike, there’s a few options:

Your employer: If you think you might be able to convince your employer to demonstrate their support, there’s helpful guidance here or get in touch and I’ll be happy to connect you with folks to figure out a plan. 

Join the protests: Attend one of the protests yourself. While not everyone will feel able to take direct ‘strike’ action if their employer is unsupportive, you could consider using your vacation or volunteering days to take part in the strike, or just use your lunch break. Over 1000 Amazon employees have chosen to take direct strike action [Update: Google, Facebook and Microsoft workers are joining them], whilst tech companies like Atlassian have come out in direct support of employees ‘striking’ on the day. 

Social media: Add an overlay to your social media profile pictures, and spread the word from a week before the strikes, and during.

Web: “Green Out” your website. There are lots of options for web and mobile; from a full website takeover, to a green background, persistent banner, or a simple popup.

Pledge: You can sign the ClimateAction.tech pledge sharing your concern about the climate crisis and your desire for your employer to support the global movement.

Join the community: Finally, if you’re generally interested in taking action in this space, you can the global community of tech professionals at ClimateAction.tech who hope to use our skills, expertise and platforms to support solutions to the climate crisis.