There is something encouraging coming out of the past three days of rioting and looting, even if it is a remote silver lining: the online mobilization of volunteer clean-up operations, mostly organized via Twitter and Facebook. By this time yesterday, #riotcleanup, was the second-highest trending topic worldwide.

#riotcleanup was started by some guy called Dan Thompson, an “artist, writer, photographer and explorer.” Thompson started the hashtag late Sunday night, and spent the rest of the evening co-ordinating clear-up operations, letting people know where there help is needed by relaying requests from business owners in need of support. A Facebook group to collate information was set up shortly afterwards, which is sitting with just under 20,000 members at time of writing.

Said Thompson:

“There are now people on the ground all across London. Even just putting on some gloves, picking up a dustpan and brush, and clearing one broken window on the way into work. People are saying, ‘We’re Londoners, we’re resilient and getting on with it.'”

There’s now an official Riot Cleanup site, with a list of scheduled cleanup events.

[riotcleanup]
[guardian]