In February 2010, the FCC will put forward a national plan for broadband deployment and adoption. On everyone’s mind is the question of whether that plan will achieve President Obama’s stated vision to stimulate the economy, increase jobs, and address social problems. The Internet has become an increasingly vital tool in our society. More U.S. residents are going online to conduct day-to-day activities such as education, business, personal correspondence, research and information gathering, job searches or communicating with medical providers. Each year, being digitally connected becomes more critical to economic and educational advancement and democratic participation. While the Pew Research Center reports (June, 09) that 63% of U.S. adults have broadband Internet connections in their homes–a big jump from a year earlier, a comparable survey found that only 55% of U.S. adults had broadband access at home—indicating that despite the intention of the internet as a democratizing force we still have a substantial digital divide. Further, according to the most recent statistics (December 2008) available from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the United States ranks just 15th among developed nations in broadband penetration.

As adopted in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 19: “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.” Article 19 makes it clear that freedom of expression is the basis of individual and societal development. Communication enables the way we find, create and share knowledge. It should be a participatory and collaborative process, open to everyone.

The Media Action Grassroots Network (MAG-Net) is an advocacy network of more than 100 grassroots social justice, media, and cultural organizations. Together, these groups are developing advocacy strategies to improve media conditions for communities of color and poor people- with universal broadband and digital justice as our goal.

The Campaign for Connected Communities-is structured around three principles: the belief that communication is an essential human need and fundamental human right, that our communities deserve to be politically, culturally and technologically connected, and that people living in the United States need community-based, people-centered communications technologies and policies to fully engage in the democratic and economic process. The campaign will seek to ensure that broadband stimulus money and the broadband national plan authorized by the FCC and Congress advances racial justice as well brings our communities jobs, increased access, increased digital literacy and quality education, as well community-journalism and content that is relevant and useful to our lives and life plans.

Today, the Media Action Grassroots Network joins with OneWebDay to broaden the public’s awareness of Internet and Web issues while deepening a culture of participation in building a Web that works for everyone. Join us in celebrating the theme of “One Web. For All.” We know that the impact of access to affordable and fast broadband cannot be understated. Today is an important reminder of the impact of broadband in our lives, and the need to connect communities to the critical information and communications network of our time. Using a communication rights platform, coupled with grassroots organizing is critical step in achieving this goal. Broadband can help ensure that communities maintain the right to freedom of opinion and expression, as well as address democratic media governance, and media ownership and control. Raising the level of digital inclusion by increasing the number of U.S. residents using the technology tools of the digital age must remain an important national goal.

Below you’ll find MAGNet’s OneWebDay presentation: Amalia wants to thank everyone who worked on statement and who “clapped loudly” in the front row!

Magnet One Web Day Comments

Oversight or coverup? BART police Chief Gary Gee, left, announces Jan. 12 that the transit agency completed its investigation into the Jan. 1 shooting death involving an officer. Gee said only the shooter was being investigated, but an amateur video, inset left, shows that another BART officer may have punched Grant before he was killed. Examiner file photo OAKLAND – BART’s initial probe into the fatal shooting New Year’s Day of an unarmed passenger by a transit agency police officer is under fire after recently released footage of the incident shows another officer punching the Hayward father in the head prior to the shooting.

On Jan. 12, BART announced it had completed its internal investigation into the death of 22-year-old Oscar Grant III. That afternoon, police Chief Gary Gee said only the shooter, former Officer Johannes Mehserle, was being investigated in connection with the incident. The other six officers on the Fruitvale station platform that morning had followed proper police procedure, Gee said.

But an amateur video clip that aired Friday on KTVU presents a different scenario, legal experts say. A second officer identified as Tony Pirone is shown punching Grant moments before the shooting in what appears to be a clear act of excessive police force, said Peter Keane, a police expert and professor at Golden Gate University Law School in The City.

Mehserle, 27, is accused of murder, but no other officers are facing disciplinary or other charges. The Alameda County District Attorney’s Office, which is prosecuting Mehserle, did not return calls for comment Monday. Mehserle is being held at Santa Rita Jail in Dublin and has pleaded not guilty.

The footage of Pirone punching Grant seems new to the case, but KTVU’s news director said Monday that the same clip has been available for viewing in full on its Web site since Jan. 6, less than a week before Gee publicly exonerated Pirone and the other officers present on the Fruitvale platform.

The question now is whether BART had missed seeing the footage of the punching incident during its investigation or had chosen to ignore it in order protect Pirone, experts say.

“If the police chief made that statement having seen this video … the chief should be fired,” Keane said.

He also said if it’s discovered that officers witnessed the punching and chose not to report it to investigators, they “at a minimum” should lose their jobs.

“This is the most revealing of all the videos, the most damning,” he said.

Grant’s killing has sparked social unrest and led to rioting in Oakland.

Attorney John Burris, who’s representing Grant’s family in a $25 million claim against BART, said he’d “like to believe” BART investigators missed the punching incident while reviewing the available video footage.

“If they saw it, that’s a cover-up,” Burris said.

BART officials said they will conduct a “rigorous” internal-affairs investigation into Pirone’s actions. Repeated e-mails and phone calls asking whether the transit agency had missed seeing the punch during its initial investigation have not been returned.

Timeline of events following shooting death

Jan. 1: Oscar Grant III fatally shot on Fruitvale BART station platform

Jan. 7: Officer who shot Grant, Johannes Mehserle, resigns from BART

Jan. 13: Mehserle arrested in Nevada on murder charges

Jan. 15: Mehserle pleads not guilty to murder charges

Jan. 23: KTVU airs footage showing a second officer punching Grant prior to shooting; BART officials launch internal-affairs investigation into second officer’s involvement in shooting

Friday: Mehserle, who is being held on a no-bail warrant, is due in Alameda County Superior Court for a bail hearing.

maldax@sfexaminer.com

Examiner wire services contributed to this report.
Published on: January 27, 2009

Power Not Paranoia: Friday, May 18 | 7 – 9 pm

Join us at Power Not Paranoia: A Conversation on Surveillance and Race for an evening of dialogue on privacy, race, and government surveillance with special guests Khiara M. Bridges and Virginia Eubanks.

Together, we’ll learn about the impacts of surveillance on communities of color, and what we can do to protect ourselves and defend our rights.

DC Grassroots Digital Security Training: Saturday, May 19 | 9 am – 5 pm

Are you concerned about high-tech policing and surveillance by law enforcement? Learn how to protect yourself from police surveillance at our digital security training.

Our team of expert security practitioners from Wellstone Action and CMJ will fly in from across the country to share the history and current reality of surveillance under the Trump Administration, and use interactive practices and learning-in-action to get your phone, computer, apps, and services secure.

It’s vital that organizers protect their digital security so we can continue to work for social change. RSVP to save your spot at the training.

Both events will be held at the Center for Community Change, 1536 U Street NW, Washington, DC 20009.

Earlier this year the FCC caved to big internet service providers like Verizon and Comcast, throwing out the net neutrality rules that protect a free and open internet and opening the doors for these companies to control what we see and do online.  

Thanks to a massive public outcry, including from the Media Action Grassroots Network (MAG-Net) and supporters like you, we pressured the Senate to use the Congressional Review Act to overturn the FCC.

Today the Senate is using a discharge petition to demand a full vote in the Senate next week on saving net neutrality. This is a huge, unprecedented move that shows the power we have as a community.

Now, we need to mobilize to win — to protect our digital civil rights and make sure the voices of people of color are heard in the Senate. 

Tell the Senate to overturn the FCC and save net neutrality.

Equal opportunity and voice for communities of color isn’t possible without a truly open internet — that’s why we’re on red alert. There are currently 50 Senators in support of overturning the FCC. Under the Congressional Review Act, we only need 51 votes.Not surprisingly, the big internet companies are mobilizing their army of lobbyists on Capitol Hill to stop us.

But we are prepared for this moment. Thanks to the organizing of thousands, the internet is going “red” today in support of net neutrality – and to display what is possible with a free and open internet. Together, we can ensure that poor people of color and other vulnerable communities are heard loud and clear in this debate. And we can continue to defend our movements, which rely so heavily on an open internet to organize and create change.

This is one of the most significant votes Congress has ever taken on this issue. And we only need one more Senator to win!

Let’s seize the moment. Sign the petition to help us gain one more vote in the Senate and save net neutrality.

“I felt incredibly inspired and energized from the dialogues we had during the retreat. I really enjoyed the opportunity to connect with our members, which helped me learn more about the values each of us bring to this work of building a community dedicated to winning media justice,” said Myaisha Hayes, a National Field Organizer at the Center for Media Justice.

While the retreat began with a focus on the nitty gritty of network governance, an evening event on the first day – Winning Digital Sanctuary in the Trump Era – opened up a broader dialogue on how communities of color are engaging and resisting tech companies in a digital age, featuring thought leaders Catherine Bracy of TechEquity, Lateefah Simon of Akonadi Foundation, and Malkia Cyril from CMJ, in conversation with the S.F. Examiner’s Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez. That served as the perfect segue into the second day’s deeper dive into the specific issues, ideas, and inspiration behind the fight for our digital civil rights.

“Talking with folks about issues like increased state surveillance, social media censorship and shrinking civil society spaces highlighted the urgent need to inform and defend the individuals, organizations and movements we work with,” said Jackie Zammuto, Program Manager at WITNESS. “I was inspired by many of the ideas on how we can strategize for this in the moment, as well as for the long-term. For example, facilitating more holistic digital security workshops, working towards alternative online platforms and being more diligent about learning from the experiences of past movements.”

The media justice network emerged from this intensive week, hosted at Greenlining’s beautiful community space in downtown Oakland, with a vision for the months ahead, and with a greater sense of our collective ability to enact change – even amidst the stifling political climate of the moment.

As Hayes added, “Our dialogues, whether it be around an open internet to abolition in the digital age, pushed me to think more critically and creatively about what freedom should look like. I’m really looking forward to turning these ideas into actions that move us closer in the direction of progress and justice for our communities.”

See more photos from the retreat here and check out pics from Winning Digital Sanctuary in the Trump Era on Facebook.

A free and open Internet is critical to our ability to thrive as Black people and people of color in this country. Social movements like #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo have proven how critical it is for our voices to be heard online while we fight for our lives offline.

That’s why the Center for Media Justice is teaming up with Color of Change to take a bus full of people of color and their allies to the state capital on May 29th to make sure lawmakers hear our voices and respect our digital civil rights.

Space is limited so register today to reserve your spot on the bus.

Registration is free; light breakfast and lunch will be provided. We will be meeting at Oakstop in downtown Oakland at 8:30am for a brief lobby day training and light breakfast before departing for the State House. We will return to Oakland by 5pm.

It’s hard to keep dreaming when you’re under attack — when your communities are being surveilled and silenced, and technology is being used to criminalize and incarcerate those around you.

That’s exactly why we need the vision and inspiration of the leaders in the Media Action Grassroots Network. And they are prepared to provide it, as they come together in Detroit at the Allied Media Conference next month to create an action plan for continued resistance. But they need your help to get there.

Will you pitch in to help these leaders imagine a new future?

We’ve launched a fundraising campaign for the Media Justice Action Fund – which allows the Center for Media Justice to support local, grassroots racial justice organizing for media and technology rights. Your gift will not only help leaders of color travel to the Allied Media Conference next month, but if we reach our goal, your dollars will fund digital security trainings and media justice convenings in cities across the United States.

Instead of backing down, we’re uniting to strategize and strengthen how we continue to protect our digital civil rights in the Trump era. In the past month alone this media justice network has helped win the Net Neutrality vote in the Senate and pushed Facebook to engage in a major civil rights audit. These are important victories, but leaders on the frontlines need to be given the creative and collaborative space to continue to win. You can make that happen.

Donate now to help Team #MediaJustice come together, dream big, and win the future.

In addition to holding our convening, we’re co-hosting a Media Justice Mixer on Saturday, June 16! Join us to meet new friends and allies who work, organize, and have an interest in digital security and media justice at the Allied Media Conference. All are welcome at this party, co-hosted by MAG-Net, Global Action Project, and Free Press, so bring your friends! RSVP and find party details here.

Finally, more than a few of our members are leading or participating in their own workshops throughout the Allied Media Conference. Check out the schedule below and follow the #MediaJustice and #AMC2018 hashtags for updates throughout the week!

MAG-Net Member Workshops Schedule:

FRIDAY

Black Touch- Alternate Roots

11-12:30pm / STUDENT CENTER: Room 025

Black people need the medicine of our bodies. In a society that demonizes and hypersexualizes Black bodies touching we create a container for liberatory physical dialogue to bring connection, unity, and transformation. Participants will explore somatic techniques rooted in compassion and shared presence, releasing tension and recalling our innate worth and value as beings. Together we share the wisdom of our bodies to organize and heal, to affirm that we are not alone.

#MoreThanCode: Findings from the Tech 4 Social Justice Field Scan – Media Mobilizing Project

12:45-1:45pm / STATE HALL: Room 114

What does it look like to really use technology as a tool for liberation? We`ll share key findings from “#MoreThanCode: Practitioners reimagine the landscape of technology for justice and equity,” a nationwide field scan by the Tech for Social Justice Project that included over 100 interviews and 11 focus groups (including one at AMC2017!) You`ll explore stories, data, and recommendations, then workshop methods to advance design justice in your own workplace.

Building a Research Justice Network – Advancement Project CA

12:45-1:45pm / STATE HALL: Room 131

We’ll review the Research Justice Track’s mission and vision, review what past AMC’s have developed, update our track frame with attendees, and strategize how we can develop and sustain a national network of radical researchers. We will walk away with a plan of action for maintaining our network and defining research justice.

BYP100 Presents the Black Joy Experience – BYP100

2-3:30pm / STUDENT CENTER: Hilberry C

Join BYP100 for the first stop on their live listening session tour for the upcoming debut album, The Black Joy Experience. The soul driven project highlights freedom songs and liberation chants from the current Movement for Black Lives.

Can You Hear Us Now? Movement, Techies and Technology Politics – Progressive Technology Project, May First/People Link, 18MillionRising

2-3:30pm / STATE HALL: Room 134

As the vitally important information technology is being threatened, how should our movement and our movement technologists collaborate? Coming off the historic movement techie convergence at Highlander last year – attended by about 90 percent people of color, over half women, and a large number gender non-conforming and LGBTQ people – and the Movement Technologist Statement published this year, this workshop will discuss the question: What is the role of technology today and in our future?

Data-Driven Research for Abolition – Media Mobilizing Project

2-3:30pm / STATE HALL: Room 115

What happens when systems adopt “data-driven reform” without engaging with the communities they study, sort, and control? We’ll explore practical tactics we can use to reclaim the role of data in the conversation about criminal justice reform. By drawing from our experiences collaborating across academia and grassroots organizing, we`ll workshop a set of strategies that organizers and academics can use jointly to develop research that supports an abolitionist agenda.

Archiving Movement Media – Media Mobilizing Project

2-3:30pm / STUDENT CENTER: Hilberry B

How do movement media organizations preserve raw media content? Over the last 12 years the Media Mobilizing Project has been documenting movements in Philadelphia and beyond. In the summer of 2017 we began the process of cataloging and preserving our raw media with the intention of deploying a public archive of movement media. In this session participants will learn what our process looks like and strategize around how MMP and other movement media organizations can take on preservation.

Data for Police Accountability – Stop LAPD Spying Coalition

2-3:30pm / STATE HALL: Room 114

Revisiting Asset-based Mapping – Advancement Project CA

4-5:30pm / STUDENT CENTER: Room 384

What community assets should you be mapping? Revisit asset-based mapping with two interactive Los Angeles maps that show cultural points and movement building tools to see what tips you can take back home. Asset-based mapping highlights existing strengths and creates a usable community map. This goes against the grain of research that points to deficiencies in communities for long-term recommendations. Participants will walk away with new ideas to bring research into the hands of communities.

Digital Consent is Coercive – Stop LAPD Spying Coalition

4-5:30pm / MCGREGOR: Room F/G/H

This session will collectively explore if algorithmic accountability is even possible in an oppressive and unjust system. We will explore where our fight begins in the establishment of consent in the ever expanding digital world. Participants with collectively map and understand the trajectory of coerced consent. Participants will learn about tools that facilitate informed consent and resistance.

SATURDAY

#Owning Our Stories: Race, Power and Media – Generation Justice

11-12:30pm / STATE HALL: Room 131

It`s time for us to collectively tell the truth about the role of news media in upholding white supremacy. Using the 50th anniversary of the Kerner report to set historical context, our presentation by media makers of color—including journalists, artists, organizers, filmmakers and educators—will examine racism in the media and how narratives are weaponized against our communities. We`ll use this power analysis to engage participants in a discussion about how we strategize to own our stories.

Local Opportunities to Preserve Net Neutrality – Media Mobilizing Project

11:12:30pm / STATE HALL: Room 123

What’s next for net neutrality? With its repeal of rules protecting net neutrality, the FCC gave powerful internet service providers a free pass to shape what you do online. This session will brainstorm new ways to get communities involved. We`ll generate ideas, explore what`s happening now, and articulate next steps to win net neutrality and other digital justice policies. You`ll leave with clear strategies for engagement and partnerships you can count on as you organize for digital justice.

StoryShift: Amplify, Resource & Support Accountable Storytelling – Working Films

4-5:30pm / STATE HALL: Room 134

How can we amplify, resource and support community accountable media? In this session, we will explore the principles and praxis of StoryShift, a new initiative building a generative future through a just and equitable transition away from exploitation of people and the planet. We will screen/show creative work, share our stories around the realities of developing deep collaborative partnerships, then close by collectively exploring the concept of “accountability” in the field of storytelling.

Fight Your Racist Camera – Global Action Project

4-5:30pm / STUDENT CENTER: Hilberry D

Is your camera a racist? Yes! The whole history of film and video is rooted in white supremacy, even down to the settings in your camera! During this workshops we will look at the history of racism in video (particularly lighting) and learn how to fight back with F.I.S.T. (FStop, ISO, Shutter Speed, and Temperature). Learn basic lighting and camera techniques for how to best capture Black & Brown bodies on video using professional cameras and also basic skills on your phone. Bring your phones and DSLRs if you have them!

Logos for Change – SPNN

4-5:30pm / STUDENT CENTER: Room 285

Is your organizing dragging due to a boring logo? We will help give your activism a boost by helping you create a new look. In this hands on workshop, youth leaders from SPNN`s Youth Action Committee will help you learn the fundamentals of Adobe Illustrator and Dimension, and make a logo based on simple shapes. You will walk away from this workshop with an image you will be proud of that represents the important work you do.

Staying Power: Creative Tools for Housing Belonging – RYSE Center

4-5:30pm / STATE HALL: Room 128

Come build narrative power for housing justice & belonging! In this session we look at art tactics developed to shape public narratives specific to Black displacement in Richmond (CA) thru a year-long art and organizing process – a know-your-rights mural, videos, poetry, and more. We will explore how these projects supported policies such as “ban-the-box” for housing, and rent control. Participants walk away with transferable creative tools to support material wins for housing justice.

#MediaJustice Mixer – MAG-Net, Free Press, Global Action Project

6-8pm / TBA

Meet new friends and allies interested in media justice at this year’s Allied Media Conference! Join the Media Action Grassroots Network, Global Action Project, and Free Press for a fun mixer Saturday night at AMC — with light refreshments, music, and great company.

SUNDAY

Conducting a “Person on the Street” Style Interview – Frogtown Community Radio

10-11:30am / STATE HALL: Room 116

Person on the street style interviews get real, unscripted feelings and answers from a variety of strangers. With purpose and well researched questions, this technique gathers a public opinion sample on the topics being explored. We will learn how to: ask great questions, build rapport with your interviews, where to interview, how to approach people, how to use a microphone, and what to do with your interviews afterwards. Participants will walk away confident to interview and record anyone!

Black Trans Love is Black Wealth Writing Workshop – BYP100

11:45-12:45pm / STATE HALL: Room 125

We write this call to Black Trans, gender-non-conforming, and non-binary folk with excitement and urgency: It is our time to add our voices and our stories to this vibrant Black queer literary lineage. We are hosting a writing space for Black Trans and GNC folk to write, share, and build the strength of our writerly voices as individuals and a collective.

Character Animation for Every BODY – SPNN

1-2:30pm / MCGREGOR: Room B

Are you fed up with not seeing a true representation of all body types, hues, and abilities in animation? Come right this wrong! In this workshop, SPNN Youth Action Committee leaders will show you how to use the fun and easy Adobe Character Animator program to build an animated character and make the character talk! By the end of the workshop, we will have created a short animated video with messages challenging narrow definitions of beauty and celebrating every BODY.

Mariposas & Unicorns: Narratives Defying Borders and Binaries – Global Action Project

1-2:30pm / STATE HALL: Room 118

This session will show how immigrant and TGNC youth and communities are joining forces to build liberatory narratives. Their stories resist xenophobic and transphobic tropes in dominant culture. Youth producers from GAP will feature their music video “Borders & Binaries Rejects” and speak about their process for building community power through media. National partners will speak on the impact their media has had on culture shifting xenophobic and transphobic narratives and attacks.

For communities of color that have long been the primary targets of surveillance, these programs threaten to further criminalize our speech and our right to dissent.

Thankfully, organizers across the nation have developed an array of tactics to expose the truth about high tech policing and challenge its expansion. Join us on June 26th to learn why Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests have become so central to this work.

During this webinar we’ll be chatting with Rend Smith from Working Narratives, Hamid Khan from Stop LAPD Spying Coalition, and Matt Cagle from the ACLU of Northern California to discuss how filing for a FOIA request – and demanding the public release of information – has helped expose the realities of surveillance programs and informed next steps for leaders on the ground.

RSVP now for Freedom of Information: Exposing Surveillance & High Tech Policing.