Tom, thanks for this post about the stress suffered by digital volunteers from bodies such as the Standby Task Force (SBTF). This organisation deploys networks of people from around the world to support on-the-ground disaster response efforts by creating online crisis maps and collecting and tagging crowd-sourced tweets and social media imagery. Since 2010, the SBTF has worked in conflict zones across Libya, Syria and the Sudan. It makes positive use of the ‘cognitive surplus’ generated by leisure time in the developed world, but it has a hidden cost in the burn-out, disorientation and mood swings experienced by volunteers. Digital activism cuts both ways and the internet is certainly no protection against the blow-back of post-traumatic stress disorder. For brave personal testimony, see http://advocacy.globalvoicesonline.org/2013/04/17/the-psychological-strains-of-digital-activism/