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16 / Periscope
port of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, the Florence often browses LIHKG to check out
anti-Article 23 protest in 2003 and the Umbrella details of protest activities. She says social media
Movement in 2014. But she was never a core player enables her to learn more information about the
in any of these movements. movement.
“This time it’s different. It is a leaderless move-
ment. Everyone can start up something,” Florence From online to offline
says. Some other LIHKG users are thinking about
She initiated a HK$10 million “Sue the Abuser” how to transform an online brainwave into of-
crowdfunding campaign together with her friends fline political energy in the communities. Yoyo
to help victims sue police officers over their alleged is one of the convenors of “Hi! Freedom”, a plat-
mistreatment. They talk in small groups on Tel- form providing assistance and support for po-
egram, coordinating logistics and publicity of the litical amateurs who will run in the upcoming
project. District Council elections as first-time candi-
As a beginner at Telegram and LIHKG, Florence dates. Along with some of his friends, he wrote
says learning how to use these applications is not a post on LIHKG this June, appealing to netizens
difficult for her because their design is simple. “The to stand for the November election and replace
first thing I do after waking up is to check Telegram pro-establishment district councillors who were
on my phone,” she says. She reads Telegram mes- elected uncontested four years ago.
sages as daily news because the public channels will “I was once in despair about Hong Kong soci-
sum up what happened the night before. ety, but this time I see hope in the movement,”
As for LIHKG, this app allows its community says Yoyo.
members to vote up and down on all the threads, After millions of people flooded the streets
making the most popular posts appear on the fo- on June 16, mounting resistance to the Chief
rum’s front page. Florence says the function helps Executive’s governance, an idea popped up into
her save time by screening out useless topics. Yoyo’s mind: “There are two million people on
Set up in late 2016, this online forum was once
widely used by university students where they dis-
cussed everything from gaming to dating. After the I was once in despair about
large-scale anti-government movement broke out,
this forum has become a major discussion space for Hong Kong society, but this time I
protesters to campaign protest ideas and strategies, see hope in the movement.
in which freedom of speech is emphasised and the
practice of anonymity gives users a sense of secu- 160 3 5
rity.
Yoyo, co-founder of
Hi! Freedom, stands
against a wall spray-
painted with “Liberate
Hong Kong”.
