Project Gallery 2011
Learn more about pre-selected competition projects. We will make them public gradually in the upcoming days remaining to the festival. The public award ceremony will take place in Archa Theatre in Prague, March 10, 6:30pm, during the Media Revolutions Evening.
1. Crowdvoice, Bahrain, www.crowdvoice.org
There has been a constant stream of horrifying accounts of events surrounding a succession of uprisings in Arab countries in recent days and months. Quickly changing situations, which often alter from minute to minute, place demands on traditional news reporting in many respects, i.e. how does one cope with the massive influx of reports and strident declarations, which can only be verified with great difficulty, and how does one keep pace with the rapid development of events. How does one maintain the interest of viewers, who are already tired of what’s happening, and how does one avoid slipping back into simply reporting whether the given country is safe for tourists or not? Thanks to the new media, social networks and mobile communications, we ourselves now also have the possibility of tapping into the flow of information directly from the centre of events, e.g. via Twitter and an appropriate “hashtag” such as #lybia, #bahrain, #egypt, etc. By the same token, however, we are also more likely by ourselves to unavoidably denounce something that resembles an attempt to drink from fire engines. We are presenting the competition project Crowdvoice, which originated in Bahrain. This comprises an open platform for gathering information from a whole range of sources, sorting it and arranging for its basic verification via an international community of volunteers. Crowdvoice helps bring at least a semblance of order to the phenomenon of citizen journalists reporting from the protests, which once and for all prevents us from using the excuse: “We didn’t know it was happening.”
2. Out of Sight, Serbia, www.outofsight.tv
The displacement of minority and socially excluded communities by local authorities is a phenomenon that is also very familiar and typical in the Czech Republic. Very local cases often have a short media lifespan, if they generate any appropriate interest at all. People and communities become anonymous groups of “misfits” and individual displacements merge to become a loose collection of cases set adrift in space and time. In Serbia, the Bankwatch organisation used modern media to focus on an investment plan sponsored by the World Bank. It put the game of chess that was being played with inconvenient communities onto a virtual map and substantiated it with the specific stories of people affected by transfers to areas beyond the reach of basic services. People who could only have drawn attention to their plight with great difficulty in the past now have with an unprecedented opportunity to be seen and heard thanks to visual representations supported by video testimonies. It gives those who aren’t indifferent to the fate of these communities an opportunity to monitor the situation and obtain a better overview of what’s happening. The Out of Sight project is an inspirational concept, which could point to previously unseen trends and contexts if it were extended geographically and implemented over a longer period of time.
3. Open Local Government 2010, Slovakia, samosprava.transparency.sk
Corruption and a lack of transparency in the administration of public affairs, particularly in the management of public funds, is a sad phenomenon that has been accompanying the emergence of democracy in our region. This often involves local representatives, who abuse the fact that hardly anybody keeps tabs on them. Regardless of whether the absence of intensive public scrutiny is down to the apathy of local citizens, who have no confidence in their own power to change something, or due to the failings of official inspection bodies or the media, it is difficult to reconcile oneself to the fact that this situation should be accepted as a necessary evil. But what if new technologies allowed for the better collation and analysis of data and information, which facilitated seeing individual cases in their given context and also ensured their publication so that citizens had an opportunity to comment on this material and add their own insights and experiences? The Slovak chapter of Transparency International attempted to do this through their project Open Local Government 2010, and their efforts provoked a massive response at a local level. This response was positive among the citizenry and often negative among the local authorities that were affected. For the time being, we certainly don’t expect to achieve the widespread and definitive elimination of corruption thanks to similar projects, but at least it has now been proven that people today have a much better opportunity to oversee the behaviour of their public representatives as well as to share information and link up for more effective action. Individuals and institutions who don’t have a clean conscience can be less and less sure that nobody is watching their conduct. Likewise, they can no longer rely on the fact that the relevant witnesses have no chance of getting media coverage or sharing this information with others who have been similarly affected. As one anonymous Twitter user put it – “people always tend to play nicer if they know someone is watching”.
4. Kloop, Kyrgyzstan, kloop.kg
A platform for the citizen journalism of young reporters in Kyrgyzstan. Citizen journalism, which has precipitated a massive upsurge in the development of information and communication technologies as well as their accessibility, is often viewed with a certain suspicion or lack of trust. To a certain extent, this is due to the fact that the work of this specific type of journalist or “blogger”, if you will, is not produced under the auspices of media institutions in the traditional sense of the word, as successful or unsuccessful guarantors of independence and objectivity. For several years now, a team of people from the blog platform Kloop have been successfully developing a blogger community in Kyrgyzstan, which has become the producer of one of the most popular internet news outlets in the country, despite the fact that its reporters are not experienced journalists, but young people, who are often secondary school students. The Kloop team ensures the quality of the journalism with intensive journalistic training for the upcoming generation of citizen reporters. The example of Kloop not only demonstrates that the concept of citizen journalism is possible, but that it is also a viable way of addressing the younger generation and motivating them to be creative whilst developing specific skills and abilities in particular individuals.
5. Supporting women in Haiti, USA, www.digital-democracy.org/category/haiti
Relaying the stories of Haitian women to raise awareness in the international community and using modern technologies to prevent violence against women
The consequences of the terrible Haiti earthquake of January 2010 knocked a country that had been on its knees with chronic poverty and ground it into the dust. Two hundred and fifty thousand dead, even more injured, cholera, and political instability all had a devastating impact on the inhabitants of this Caribbean state. Some groups of the population, however, were also hard hit by a secondary outcome of this earthquake. Like hundreds of thousands of others, Haitian girls and women are condemned to live for many years in refugee camps that have been established as the only possible form of shelter. In this chaotic environment, without any protection from security forces, they are exposed to rape and violence on a daily basis. Their stories, however, are rarely heard beyond these temporary homes of makeshift canvas, either because a country afflicted by one misfortune after another has a whole range of other things that demand attention or simply because the victims have already lost any faith in the notion that anyone could be interested in their plight. A project implemented by the American organisation Digital Democracy uses modern technology to empower the voices of these women by improving their basic technological and media literacy. The global community has subsequently been given the opportunity to hear their stories directly via blogs, videos and Skype video calls straight from the camps. To improve the sharing of information on rape and violence at a local level, the organisation is constructing an SMS violence-reporting system to support the victims in cooperation with international organisations. This allows for anonymous notifications of violent attacks, which can be analysed to help identify crisis locations and possible building and organisational adjustments to the camps. Although the situation in Haiti continues to be extremely critical and the country’s range of problems still far exceeds the capacity of the local government and the international community to improve its prospects, at least vulnerable population groups are obtaining new channels through which they can draw attention to their situation.
6. Help Map, Russia, russian-fires.ru
Using mapping and communication technology to link requests for emergency assistance with citizens providing emergency aid.
The traditional response to crisis situations and humanitarian catastrophes looks at affected communities as victims who need help and assistance. In the past year, however, several cases have shown that mobile technologies and social networks can turn afflicted communities into an invaluable source of information as well as a partner in rescue and recovery operations. In a crisis situation, access to a device as common as a mobile telephone can change any individual into a reporter, who can assist rescuers in getting their bearings in a confused and frequently unknown setting. This is particularly true when there is access to a user friendly mapping application and online support from volunteers all over the world, which can help this local reporting create a map that is organic and responds rapidly to the changing situation on the ground. But what if the technology made even more things possible? Not just more effective link-ups with rescuers, who are often too far away, but also better links with those who are always first on the scene, and who are responsible for rescuing the most lives, particularly in the first moments after a catastrophe, i.e. neighbours, people in the next street, family members, etc.? Become acquainted with the Help Map project. This came into being as a response from the Russian blogging community, who no longer wanted to just sit and watch their government’s inaction in providing assistance to communities affected by extensive fires in the summer of 2010. Using Ushahidi mapping technology, they created a Help Map, which helped establish links between individuals as well as groups affected by the fires and citizens in the locality who offered help and assistance, but didn’t know where they should go to provide it in time or where to effectively target their efforts.
7. Metropolis TV, Netherlands, www.metropolistv.nl
Successful model of alternative journalism platform giving priority to intercultural dialogue.
Metropolis: a radically different approach towards reporting from around the world. All stories are produced by local journalists. More than 60 correspondents from across six continents are continuously exploring their surroundings, capturing remarkable stories of everyday life. Global topics are the starting point, and the reporters go looking for answers to shared questions: what’s it like to an outcast, to be 15, to be a protester or gay? With every topic, 10 short stories are added to the online database. The best reports are edited into weekly TV shows. Metropolis is an in-depth examination of the similarities and differences between cultures in our increasingly connected world. Project is produced by VPRO, one of the main public broadcasters in the Netherlands.
8. Praguewatch, Czech Republic, www. praguewatch.cz
Praguewatch is an internet guide through Prague’s causes, controversial cases of urban planning, endangered cultural spaces, parks or even garden collonies. It offers to all inhabitants of Prague an insight to recent past and present of the reverse side of Prague. A critical view of Prague’s development is based on collaboration of academicians, professionals and civil activists. Based on an interactive map, Praguewatch tries to provide Prague inhabitants basic information on contemporary, more or less known causes. Beta version of the website, launched in September 2010, uses a modified version of an open source programme Ushahidi. This programme facilitates the engagement of people to civil journalism .
9. Našipolitici.cz, Czech Republic, www.nasipolitici.cz
The website NasiPolitici.cz (Our Politicians) is a long-term „watchdog“ activity, which offers to public a desinterested information source following activities of Czech political elite. It tries to help to augment the transparency and politeness of Czech political world. The platform assembles and classifies information about Czech politicians and makes them accessible in a user-friendly way. So far, more than 900 profiles bringing detailed information about politician’s opinions, votings, professional activities, business etc have been created.
10. Campaign for Roma Rights, Hungary, jogtalanul.blog.hu
This campaign opened a very sensitive issue of rights violations of marginalised communities. It brings attention to situation of Roma people in Hungary and helps them advocate for themselves using contemporary tools.
During the aftermath of murders of Romani people in Hungary in 2009, the team visited the Romani communities to provide support. As an outcome of this work, a documentary film was produced to document the team’s work and reveal the reality the Romani communities are facing. As a followup, a dedicated blog site was created and brings video stories of the Roma people in order to help to shape the public opinion through creating new narratives.