What is slacktivism and how was the term derived?

The term was coined by Dwight Ozard and Fred Clark in 1995 at the Cornerstone Festival. The term was meant to shorten the phrase slacker activism, which refers to bottom-up activities by young people to affect society on a small, personal scale (such as planting a tree, as opposed to participating in a protest). The term originally had a positive connotation.