Susannah Vila
Liberationtech: How the Next Generation Diaspora* Should Be Built to Help High-Risk Activists
After leaving Diaspora*, Liberation Technology’s Yosem Companys discusses what would be necessary to create an alternative social network for human rights defenders, issue advocates and other who must be concerned with security. The huge challenge that any new online space has to overcome, of course, is competing with Facebook’s network effect. Here’s liberationtech:
An online privacy activist recently asked me: Suppose you were to build the next-generation Diaspora* — i.e., a secure, private, and decentralized social network — how would you go about it?
The question is an important one, especially considering that many projects preceded Diaspora*…
How Can Tech-Enhanced Social Movements Keep Going?
As someone who looks closely at the role of new technologies in movement building, it’s been interesting, and often disheartening, to see how youth movements that are harnessing technology more than ever also face challenges in reconstituting themselves after initial big successes. The characteristics of a networked social movement are as advantageous for mobilization as they are hurdles for building capacity on top of those initial crowds.
So that’s what I’ve been talking about these past two weeks - first in Miami at a conference organized by Ashoka, the global network of social entrepreneurs, and then in New Jersey at Seton Hall Law School and in Philadelphia at WHHY Radio and the National Constitution Center. Here are the slides. If you have any thoughts on the topic please get in touch!
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Lessons Learned from the Arab Spring
At the South by Southwest conference in Austin, TX last week, I spoke about lessons learned for activists from the uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa. Here’s an excerpt from my write up of the talk, posted at Movements.org:
SXSW Interactive is over, and I’m happy to report that while the topic of technology’s role in social movements was was a popular one, I never once heard the question “Was it a Twitter/Facebook Revolution?” asked in earnest.
One of the benefits of events, like this one, which bring together different organizations in the same field is that it allows everyone talking and writing about similar topics to come to consensus. That consensus was the final takedown of the cyber-optimist versus cyber-pessimist debate in favor of a more practical and nuanced understanding.
In another great recap at the National Democratic Institute’s technology blog, my co-panelist Katherine Maher notes that:
…Jen Preston and Brian Stelter of the NY Times leading the #socialfuel conversation to a full house as a continuation and expansion of the discussion of our panel - addressing the role of the press, risk to journalists and sources, and the creeping spectre of bias.
Indeed it was great to see the discussion continue beyond our talk on the first day, culminating in a panel on human rights within online platforms. Some other cool blog coverage of the panel can be found here and here.
Susannah works at the intersection of social change and new technologies.
