SWN Trainer Mark Rendeiro in Georgia

While some may have already been heavily using social networking platforms for communicating their messages, others were still developing a strategy about which platform to make use of and, of course, how best to do so. So with my years of experience in this field, a curiosity to learn first-hand about the Georgian context, and with the support of an enthusiastic crew at IREX Georgia, I set out to address their needs.

Our sessions were centered on, though not limited to, three particular tools:

1 ” Blogs, the orgin and inspiration for so many of today’s social media applications.

2 ” Facebook, the rapidly expanding, regularly used social networking tool which happens to be very important in Georgia.

3 ” Twitter, how best to use twitter to communicate your message as well as engage others even in a context where it is not the dominant application.

Beyond using these three as the pillars of the workshop sessions, we spent alot of time talking about specific cases, and what could be learned from them. There was also ample time set aside for individual consultations with those who wanted help with their projects or organizational web strategies for advocacy and outreach.

Structuring the work this way gave me plenty of time to first get to know participants concerns. I got a feel for what was old news and what was new and interesting to them. When I finally did get to sit one-on-one with some participants, it was a chance to make an immediate impact as well as watch them use the things they had just learned in the sessions. Yes.. a bit of satisfaction on the trainer’s part.

Previously we’ve written here about how citizen media – the stories of those on the ground – can be used to provide much-needed context for journalists, analysts, and policy makers. Knowing the specifics of what’s happening, and learning it from the locals themselves, ensures better intelligence and therefore better decision making.

But what does citizen media offer the general public – consumers, voters, and interested parties? The short answer is Accountability.

In the relationship between ordinary citizens and policy-makers, the value of citizen media goes both ways. The same data provided to decision makers can be turned around and used by citizens to hold the authorities accountable.

To see this in action, let’s look at a recent editorial written by US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman. In it, he tells a “tale of two cities” – pre-revolution Tripoli and post-revolution Benghazi – and offers what it is he thinks the US’ interests and priorities in Libya should be.

My visit to Tripoli in December was full of dark threats and ominous portents. The fear was palpable. One Libyan official told me that if you so much as dared to speak of Qadhafi’s paranoia and quirks you would be killed. Qadhafi’s thugs had taken to harassing our embassy personnel. It was a harbinger of worse things to come…

Last week in Benghazi, though, I saw what Libya could become — and it was clear as day why it is in the U.S. interest to see the Benghazi vision for Libya succeed over Qadhafi’s. The collective sense of joy and opportunity was unlike anything I have experienced in my diplomatic career…

He also makes a few claims that might be surprising – or questionable – to the average reader.

Everyone, from rights activists, to businessmen, to members of the Transitional National Council (TNC), projected a sense of exhilaration. Civil society organizations of every stripe seemed to pop up almost before my eyes. Citizens seemed astonished and delighted that they can at last speak their minds, and plan for a different Libya than the one they have endured for the past 40-plus years.

In the many years I have worked in the Middle East, I’ve never been to an Arab city so grateful to the United States. Libyans in Benghazi know how brutal their former ruler is. They are profoundly appreciative to have been spared what would have undoubtedly been a massacre of enormous proportions in mid-March, had NATO not intervened. Imagine walking in the main square of a teeming Arab city and having people wave the American flag, clamor for photographs with a visiting American official, and celebrate the United States as both savior and model.

So if you’re a US citizen reading this in Politico, how do you know if what Feltman is saying about Libya is true?

Simple. Ask a Libyan.

In this case, that means citizen media produced by Libyans – Alive in Libya.

Are there civil society organizations of every stripe popping up seemingly overnight? Yes.

The Libya Red Crescent has stepped up and is working to seek out missing persons, those “disappeared” by the Gaddafi regime. Benghazi police have, of their own volition, gone back to work to restore order and civility to the city. And the Youth for Change (YoC), a wholly new organization, has emerged to better connect the restive youth of Libya to the leaders of their government ministries.

Are Libyans planning for a new society, different from the tyranny and inequality they’ve previously experienced? Yes.

Volunteers have set up media assistance centers where journalists can access partners and resources to better tell their story – a far cry from the strictly controlled propaganda of the previous regime. Even the TNC, the rebel council only in existence for a few short months, is deliberate in its attempts to meet the egalitarian standards of a new, pluralist society.

And what about the most questionable piece, the scenes of Libyans waving American and other flags in the streets? Also true.

See for yourself:

Just as the policy-makers don’t need to blindly trust their bureaucracies, the general public doesn’t have to simply take the words of policy-makers at face value. Citizen media allows you to verify official statements, and to hold those officials accountable.

Citizen media is a powerful tool, not only for those producing it, but for everyone. Remember this the next time an editorial like Feltman’s comes along. You don’t have to trust it. Check it against the stories of those who aren’t official policy makers, those who live and work on the ground every day.

Mark Rendeiro is in Georgia this week training locals to use new media tools for public campaigns, specifically related to advocacy. He’s blogging about his trip on his website Citizen Reporter.

While some nations in the EU curse their governments for not representing them in what is financially a very troubled union, here we find those outside wishing to get in. With what seems like very different goals, at least when it comes to the symbolic desire to be EU¦ maybe Georgians would find more happiness in being a member state, even if the economy looks pretty bad.

In the coming days here in Tbilisi, I’ll of course hear more about this bid to be part of the EU and the primary reasons for it. I’ll report back with what I learn.

Check out his website, follow him on Twitter, and stay tuned for more updates. When he returns, we’ll have a full report on what he experienced and what we were able to accomplish.

Image by Renesys

Syria shut down most of its Internet and mobile data connections early Friday, adopting a strategy used by other governments in the Middle East during critical points of the uprisings.

But the attempt to gain an advantage over the opposition groups by unplugging or partially blocking the Internet, which has played a key role in the protests, could backfire. In some cases, most notably in Egypt, the move appeared to prompt more angry protesters into the streets.

Following in the footsteps of repressive governments in Egypt and Libya, the Syrian government has dramatically escalated its conflict with protestors and opposition movements by effectively cutting them off from both each other and the international community.

This tactic has been tried before by authoritarian regimes. Some have been successful – China, for example – but most of the time it fails spectacularly.

In January of this year, the Egyptian government severed all internet and mobile communications in the country, with some surprising results.

Google created Speak2Tweet, a service that allowed Egyptians to call a special international number and record a message for the outside world. Small World News then stepped in and began aggregating and translating those messages, resulting in our project Alive in Egypt.

Even without readily available internet access, networks can be constructed to allow the free flow of information. The policy of suppression fails; not only by re-invigorating the opposition to push back against the government, but by failing to truly silence the voices of the citizenry.

Speak2Tweet has again attempted to re-open communication by promoting a number for Syrians to use. Here’s a few examples of what’s come out in the last 24 hours:

The full impact of the Syrian government’s internet shut-down is not yet known. The suppression technique’s only real achievement is provocative headlines, thus increasing international awareness of the conflict in Syria. More than that though, it has instigated yet another leap forward in the evolution of countering such suppression tactics.

When Egypt shut down its internet, the work-arounds like Speak2Tweet were themselves revolutionary. With Syria, these tools are the norm, rapidly deployed and utilized by Syrians and the international community.

The question left for journalists, technologists, and civil society organizations is “what’s next?” How do we take these tools and build on them, enhancing their effectiveness against attacks like those of the Syrian regime? Quite simply, these oppressive techniques are nothing more than opportunities for improvement, and these opportunities must be seized.

Given that, the question raised for the Syrian regime might as well be “what have you done?” Rather than silencing the voice of opposition, the government may have, in fact, catalyzed the next wave of innovation in ensuring those voices are heard.

On April 8th, 2011 I had the opportunity to give a TEDx Talk as part of TEDxUofM at the historic Michigan Theater in front of a 1700 member audience. I was very lucky to be able to speak as a part of such an inspiring group of people, and that I had the chance to share my story.

Donia Jarrar is one of the many volunteer translators who worked with us during the early days of the Arab Spring. In this video she shares her personal story of how she came to Egypt, how she became involved in translating Speak2Tweet messages, and eventually, how she partnered with Small World News’ Alive in Egypt project.

Donia’s story is very important to us at Small World News, not only as a display of the motivation and dedication of our translation team, but because her experience exposes one of the many ways citizen journalists “self-select.” That is, how the daily lives and experiences of people all over the world lead them to telling stories, their own as well as their fellow citizens.

Why you choose to report is often just as important as what you choose to report. Donia’s personal history, from her family’s upheaval at the age of 4 to her life as an Arab student in the United States, culminated perfectly in a special drive to make the voices of Egypt’s revolution heard – across media and across borders.

Donia’s experience stands as a powerful example of the unique experiences – both extraordinary and ordinary – that lead one to creating and sharing citizen media with the world.

For more stories from the Egyptian revolution, visit Alive in Egypt

A Libyan watches a television broadcast of a speech by President Barack Obama in U.S., at a shop in Benghazi May 19, 2011. Credit: REUTERS/Mohammed Salem

From President Obama’s speech on the Middle East and North Africa, delivered this morning at the State Department:

We will continue to make good on the commitments that I made in Cairo ” to build networks of entrepreneurs, and expand exchanges in education; to foster cooperation in science and technology, and combat disease. Across the region, we intend to provide assistance to civil society, including those that may not be officially sanctioned, and who speak uncomfortable truths. And we will use the technology to connect with ” and listen to ” the voices of the people.

In fact, real reform will not come at the ballot box alone. Through our efforts we must support those basic rights to speak your mind and access information. We will support open access to the Internet, and the right of journalists to be heard ” whether it’s a big news organization or a blogger. In the 21st century, information is power; the truth cannot be hidden; and the legitimacy of governments will ultimately depend on active and informed citizens.

Small World News welcomes the US government’s commitment to the values of free speech and a free press. As we have witnessed through our work over the last five years, these values are more than abstract ideals; they are concrete goals sought universally by citizens around the world.

But these goals cannot be reached through words alone. As Small World News’ Brian Conley and Louis Abelman have written, supporting the aspiration of free expression is a lengthy and complex process:

Over 2010 we engaged in a broad expanse of projects: helping start a daily news program produced by Indian community activists; training Ethiopian journalists in exile to protect themselves online; supporting Rwandans with new media training; training Iraqi civil society organizations and technologists to develop a strategy and implement social media and mapping tools, teaching Afghan journalists to leverage the latest in mobile journalism tools; supporting an international monitoring organization and local humanitarian one to leverage mobile technology and mapping to monitor the Afghan parliamentary election; working with Bahraini human rights activists to develop tools to monitor their parliamentary election; and training Tibetan and Indian activists to leverage video as a tool to promote their work.

Today we hope to utilize the breadth of our work over the last five years to continue creating a space for voices go regularly unheard by the international community. This means centralizing the fragmented locations where dialogue is happening, and making sure those voices are curated and contextualized, as well as translated to English and other languages when necessary. It also means meeting with local contacts, providing training and equipment and infrastructure support as necessary. In a place like Afghanistan it may even involve coordinating with telecommunications companies as we’ve done previously, or developing methods that better prioritize the most accessible tools, such as voice and mobile platforms particularly in rural and low bandwidth communities.

While the value of free expression is universal, the solution is highly contextual. Each country presents unique challenges and opportunities for reaching our goals.

For instance, in Libya, citizens in eastern cities like Benghazi and Ajdabiya have considerable access to local media, through television and radio. But this media generally takes the form of revolutionary propaganda and opinion slanted in support of the rebellion. The opportunity existed for Alive in Libya to create a free and independent news source for Libyans as well as the international community.

This allowed Libyans access to news about their most pressing concerns not found in revolutionary media. For example, our teams of correspondents on the ground offer information on access to electricity in Ajdabiya…

…as well as information on organizations monitoring and seeking out persons who’ve gone missing in the conflict:

Small World News is excited to be a part of the global push for free expression, and we applaud the government’s stated goals of empowering journalists, bloggers, and civil society groups in support of that mission. We continue to build and train our networks of individuals and organizations, not only in Libya, but regionally and worldwide, so that these voices can be heard.

For more information on the Alive.In projects, visit Alive in Libya, or follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

Last weekend, the Small World News team attended Digital Journalism Camp 2011 in downtown Portland.

Digital Journalism Camp is about spending the day with the people who are actively changing journalism. You’re going to learn from ” and share with ” the people who have found solutions to the challenges you face, whether you’re a beat reporter, a blogger or a publisher.

We were lucky enough to be invited onto a panel called “Unheard Voices: Can digital tools give marginalized communities a voice?” From what we heard from the panelists, the short answer to that question is a resounding “yes!”

While Small World News focuses exclusively on overseas journalism, panelists Lisa Loving, Israel Bayer, and Craig Fondren showed us that the challenges of bringing unheard voices to the fore, be they training, funding, or building relationships, are the same no matter where you are.

Andrew Spittle blogged about the conference, and he had this to say about the panel:

Israel Bayer, direc­tor of Street­roots, talked about their efforts to bring the home­less into all aspects of jour­nal­ism. He also noted that, while some think a web pres­ence would under­cut street sales, their sis­ter paper in Seat­tle launched a web­site and saw their sales increase 40%. He pointed out that it’s the tech­ni­cal parts of a project that are the easy. It’s the rela­tion­ships and build­ing of a com­mu­nity that are difficult.

Craig Fon­dren of Sabin Com­mu­nity Devel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion talked a lot about how they edu­cate their com­mu­nity in the tools of jour­nal­ism. They focus heav­ily on bring­ing many gen­er­a­tions into their work­shops. As he put it, If you can get online we have a class for you. If I have your kid in one of our classes then I’m going to get you in a class and I’m going to get grandma too. They put a lot of work into senior instruction.

Lisa Loving also hit on a very important point, which is the impact this reporting can have on policy makers. Referring to Bayer’s project Streetroots, she noted that even a seemingly small project (say, distributing media-enabled cellphones to the homeless) will “percolate to the top.” As Small World News has noted in the past, the stories of local citizens on the ground add much needed context for journalists, analysts, and decision makers, as well as the general news consuming audience.

Special thanks to moderator Cornelius Swart for inviting us onto the panel, and to Jeff Bunch and Eitan Tsur who recorded the panels.

For more videos from Digital Journalism Camp 2011, head over to Doc Normal’s blog.

Photo by White House 2011

David Kenner wrote this week about President Obama’s news sources for Foreign Policy‘s Passportblog:

With one sentence, the New York Times raised dozens of Middle East pundits’ hopes that their words were reaching the most powerful man in the world. “At night in the family residence…Mr. Obama often surfs the blogs of experts on Arab affairs or regional news sites to get a local flavor for events,” read Mark Landler’s account of how the Obama administration will attempt to use the killing of Osama bin Laden to recast the U.S. relationship with the Arab world.

Well, Mr. President, we have some late-night reading suggestions for you.

Mr. Kenner generously suggested that the president read Small World News’ Alive in Libya as one of his late night sources, putting us in esteemed company alongside blogs like Joshua Landis’ Syria Comment and Reidar Visser’s Iraq & Gulf Analysis.

But counting decision makers in Washington among your readers is worth much more than flattery and bragging rights. Mr. Kenner has highlighted one of the most important functions of citizen media, that of providing the premiere source of context for the issues that affect us most.

Citizen media empowers and enables local citizens to tell their own story, report their own news, and communicate their own perspective to the outside world. Locals Alive In a country understand the context, the history, and the details of important news stories more thoroughly than reporters alive from the country. Local citizens are able to understand the news for what it is, and how it directly affects them. It is these voices that are under-represented, or not represented at all, in traditional, mainstream media.

Small World News in particular is concerned with allowing the viewer access to the daily lives, feelings, and opinions of citizens on the ground, the so-called “human element” of journalism. It is these seemingly ordinary experiences that truly allow the viewer to experience the extraordinary, the events that move and shape the world we all live in.

Combining both the understanding of and empathy with local citizens provides the viewer with the ultimate context for any news story. The importance of this context, for viewers, policy makers, and officials, cannot be overstated.

For more citizen media from Small World News, see some of the other projects in our Alive.In series:

Alive in Libya team in Benghazi, March 2011

In March 2011, Brian Conley and Louis Abelman journeyed to Benghazi to lay the foundation for Alive in Libya.

Entering Libya through the Egyptian border in the east, and arriving just three weeks after the revolution began, they set about making contact with local citizens at a media center set up by the opposition movement. They met with a fixer, Marwan, who became the first Libyan team member on the project. Soon after they were joined by Ahmed, a former music blogger turned citizen journalist, and Seraj, a translator and English teacher.

What followed was a 3-day crash course in citizen media, covering everything from journalistic ethics to editing and uploading digital video. The training was abruptly cut short by an imminent threat of attack on Benghazi by Gaddafi’s forces. Brian and Louis fled the city, along with the majority of the international press corps. The project appeared to be at an end.

Less than two days later, though, the local team in Benghazi recovered from the assault and began putting their training into action. A series of videos, including dramatic footage of air battles over Benghazi, interviews with rebels at the front in Ajdabiya, as well as the spring flower festival were uploaded to Small World News‘ producers in the United States, and kept Alive in Libya online.

In its first two weeks, the team produced over 25 video segments, with subjects ranging from footage of the executions of Gaddafi’s mercenaries to short documentaries on Red Crescent refugee camps. The content was then vetted, translated, and published on the Alive in Libya website.

Since then Alive in Libya has published over 400 videos and articles, both original content from our team in Benghazi, and curated and enhanced content from other local citizen journalists and producers inside Libya.