Awareness avatar

The awareness avatar is a method of creating rapid awareness in social media through avatar modification or a single icon's use. The awareness avatar may have first been used in the New Zealand Internet Blackout, to protest copyright law changes in New Zealand. Globally, protesters replaced their icons with black squares to show solidarity. The protest was successful and proved the method effective at both raising awareness and effecting change.

Green tinged avatars appeared on Twitter, Facebook and FriendFeed.

Since, other campaigns have used this protest method.

• Black avatar: February 16–23, 2009 New Zealand Internet Blackout protesting copyright law changes in New Zealand.[1]
• Yellow tint: Beginning June 17, 2009 to protest the increasing size and role of government.[2]
• Green tint: Beginning June 18, 2009 support for Iran election protests.[3]

Some non-protest uses:

• wearing a surgical mask or a respirator above faces of anthropomorphic characters during respiratory diseases pandemics, such as 2009 H1N1 and 2019 coronavirus.