Monday, June 22, 2015

Social media in government: 16 to 22 June

Summary

In Europe, Facebook’s photo app was banned for being scarily good. The UK is protesting austerity cuts, as is Greece, while the UK Conservative Government amps up plans to fight radicalisation online. Azerbaijan is getting over an embarrassing viral video in which fake foreigners praise the Baku-based European games. 
Kenya released a “State of social media report” and joked about its proposed Central Bank leader getting grilled in Parliament over his single status (54 and single - how odd…) Nigerians want to undress their overpaid National Assembly for over-spending. 
Iranian women are protesting the mandatory hijab online, amongst other things. The UAE police say that they are not monitoring their citizens online despite the increased number of “electronic” blackmail cases. 
Uzbekistan’s President caused a bit of pandemonium in the capital’s metro with some chuckles and complaints following up in social media. The Chinese are shaming smokers, dog-eaters, and rich kids online. Foreigners can but should not access Instagram on their mobile devices in South Korea, says Pyongyang. Pakistan is censoring radical content online, but a critic says this is not enough. In India, NGOs now have to provide their social media accounts to the Government, and an activist is posting rape videos online. The Vietnamese news are too quick to jump on the social media bandwagon, an official said, and Malaysia’s Minister of Tourism and Culture is having a weird Facebook/Instagram/Twitter argument with the Princes of the state of Johor. The Prime Minister of Singapore tells journalists social media is here to stay, so let’s learn to use it properly, and an ousted former Thai leader is a bit passive-aggressive towards his country’s current leadership via Instagram (though the Thai are too busy debating legalising gambling and the lottery online to see him.) Nauru may have outlawed Facebook, but a viral video of a protest scuffle outside Parliament is still attracting clicks. And the Aussies are after the Sydney promotional agency and angry that a wind farm commissioner may be appointed after the position of disability discrimination Commissioner was eliminated. 
Canadian Ministries spend a lot - like A LOT - on social media ads. Where, why and how? See the relevant article. And lots happening in the USA, including the Government going after online commenters (we knew that, right?), selling ideas about marijuana online, a new GOP Presidential candidate, a controversy over a dated flag, and Guam (yes, the USA’s Guam) publishing its own social media policy. 
Twitter may soon be available to Cuban mobiles, and El Salvador is still jailing women for miscarriages, but a social media campaign hopes to change that. Ecuadorians are still yelling at each other over politics and social media, followed by offline protests with more (in-person) yelling. Find out why…

Oh and the Pope came out in support of stopping - or at least mitigating - climate change, and the world - well, some of it - “celebrated” World Refugee Day online. 


Then there are some awesome reports from the Electronic Frontier Foundation and more, plus a few nice tools…

International


Last week on June 18th, Pope Francis of the Catholic Church called for the world's 1.2 billion Catholics to rally to stop climate change. With the hashtag #Popeforplanet #COP21, millions joined the Pope's call for global citizens to encourage their governments to legislate to better prepare for and minimise climate change.  Pope Francis noted that the science behind climate change is clear, but that the Catholic Church views concern for the earth as a moral issue upon which believers must act.



And June 20th was #WorldRefugeeDay, with netizens across the world taking to social media to show their support for refugees.



Europe

Moments, Facebook's photo application, has been blocked in Europe as a result of Facebook's facial recognition technology, which EU authorities felt violated user confidentiality. “We don’t have an opt-in mechanism so it is turned off until we develop one,” Richard Allen, Facebook’s head of policy in Europe, explained. Facebook's DeepFace AI System is able to recognise users with an accuracy of 97.25%, according to Facebook.

Sources: +The Next Digit

The United Kingdom

Humza Arshad (@HumzaProduction), a British-Pakistani comedian and YouTube celebrity, has partnered with British police to take comedy to British schools to steer at-risk youth away from extremism. Arshad gained thousands of followers on YouTube over the last few years. One of his fans was the son of a British policeman, which led the police to ask Arshad if he would help them in their outreach to youth. Arshad's character "Badmans" is a bumbling would-be gangster who is in fact dominated by his mother - a character, Arshad jokes, that is based "loosely" on his real life.



Sources: @HumzaProduction, +NPR

British protestors took to London's streets Saturday to protest budget cuts aimed at society's most vulnerable, they explained. The UK's new Conservative leadership does plan to reduce spending on social security benefits, amongst other changes. Over 80 000 individuals planned to attend the march, according to social media. Netizens debated the march and its origins online around the hashtag

Sources: +Associated Press


The Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit, set up in 2010 under Section 3 of the Terrorism Act 2006 by the Association of Chief Police Officer to remove unlawful material from the Internet, has censored more than 90 000 pieces of content on social media since its inception. UK Prime Minister Cameron gave the above figure in a speech last week, adding “We are pressing social media companies to take stronger, faster and further action to combat the use of their services by groups like ISIL.”  Cameron wants a “zero tolerance” approach from social media companies when it comes to terrorist content. “We will encourage companies to produce industry standards for the identification, removal and referral of terrorist activity and will consider further action as necessary.” 

Sources: @joncstone, +The Independent 

At the Senate Occasional Lecture Series in Australia, a speech by the British High Commissioner on the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta included a bit about the Internet. The Commissioner, Her Excellency Menna Rawlings CMG, noted a modern Magna Carta should include equality for all regardless of gender, religion or sexual bias. After that, she noted, "The internet – particularly social media – should be used to promote closer relations between peoples and states, not to propagate hatred and violent extremism… in recent years we have been provided with ample evidence that the online communication can also be used to spread poisonous ideologies and hatred… It is important that we take effective action to protect some of the most vulnerable in our society from these influences....the Internet is a powerful force for good in the world. But it also relies on each of us to behave responsibly, to call out the trolls. It also requires collaboration between government and the technology giants – Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft, Google, Apple – to shut down the voices of extremism and hatred, without suppressing freedom of expression. I recognise this balance isn’t an easy one to strike, but in my 21st century Magna Carta, we should at least try.” The original Magna Carta was an agreement between the British King John in 1215 and senior nobility to protect the liberties of the elite ruling class and the Church. It is heralded as one of the first times a king admitted he was not above the law.

Sources: Gov.uk

Britain-based analysts from IHS Conflict Monitor have used IS (Daesh) Tweets and YouTube videos to predict the terrorist group's movements in Iraq and Syria. IS is aiming at government stronghold, the analysis reveals. "Daesh is shifting its attention to the weakened Syrian government at the expense of losing territory to the Kurds in northern Syria...This is about undermining the enemy's will to fight....In their grander aspirations, it's about inflicting enough casualties that you bring down the government or spark an exodus of the enemy population," explained Firas Abi-Ali, head of Middle East analysis for IHS. "Neither the Kurds nor the group  appear interested in changing that front line," Richard Jackson, deputy head of political violence forecasting at IHS, said. "That frees them up to push towards the capitals." The only exception is Tal Abyad, a key border crossing into Turkey. The Turks captured Tal Abyad from IS lasat week, cutting IS off from its main entry point for foreign fighters, weapons, and supplies. Given IS moves a lot, they do not seem to mind that their actions are easily tracked via their social media use.

Sources: +AFP

Greece

In Greece, supporters of the ruling Syriza party gathered in front of the Greek Parliament building last Wednesday to rally against austerity. The demonstration was organised via social media but the turnout was much smaller than earlier rallies held in Syntagma Squar. Protestors carried signs with slogans including "Democracy cannot be blackmailed" and "Our lives don't belong to the lenders." Other signs depicted the EU symbol as the Death Star from the popular Star Wars franchise.
Sources: @Reuters


Azerbaijan

A pro-government private TV station, Lider TV, had a video of foreign fans to the European Games go viral when a German news station identified one of the so-called foreigners as an Azerbaijani citizen posing as a Brit. The games are already under scrutiny since activists hijacked the Games hashtag #Baku2015 with calls for Azerbaijan to release political prisoners and critical journalists from jail. (Read more about this in this blog’s May 12th post.)  Lider TV claims it was duped by the Azerbaijani, but critics say the video is a fraud created to promote propaganda. 


Sources: +Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty 

Africa

Global Voices's Sub-Saharan Africa Editor Ndesanjo Macha (@ndesanjo) interviewed the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) East Africa Representative Tom Rhodes (@africamedia_CPJ) last week. Rhodes, living in Nairobi, Kenya, gave an overview of what the CPJ does and then briefed Macha on the state of social media and censorship in Sub-Saharan Africa. In short, social media is better off than print media when it comes to censorship, but the arbitrary application of cybercrime laws aimed, according to Governments, at terrorism and pornography, plus the close relationship between telecom companies and political leadership make life difficult for bloggers and social media-savvy activists and critics in the region. Ethiopia is a particularly frustrating example - the so-called “Zone 9” bloggers, who used their online voices to criticise the Ethiopian Government, have been in jail for over a year without actually being charged with anything.  However, Rhodes is optimistic about the future: “In 2000, there were roughly 5 million mobile phones in Africa and now there are about 900 million. While many of these phones are not “smart phones” per se – many of them are – and we are seeing more and more mainstream media using citizen's footage and social media to capture in-time reporting to the point where citizens enjoy a more nuanced, holistic narrative of events across the continent.” 

Sources: @africamedia_CPJ, @ndesanjo, +Ndesanjo Macha 

Seun Kuti (@RealSeunKuti), the son of the famous Afrobeat musician Fela Anikulapo Kuti used his Instagram account to crticise African countries for not legalising marijuana. Kuti, a musician himself, has recently moved to New York City. Beside the photo of two sachets of marijuana on his Instagram account, Kuti wrote "While the blind government of Africa are still harassing nature and holdin bak the economic potential of marijuana in Africa, this is what's happening in the United States of America. #lifeondroad going on astral travel now..."

Kenya

The Bloggers Association of Kenya (BAKE or on Twitter) released their State of Blogging & Social Media in Kenya Today report last week. Find discussion on the report using #iFreeKe. BAKE is made up of a number of Kenyan online conent creators that want to increase the power and innovation available to Kenyans on social media. BAKE noted, "This report also seeks to highlight the significant gains made by bloggers in the promotion of free speech as well as in the creation of quality and diverse content about Kenya on the internet." The report gives a nice history of blogging in Kenya, noting that the first blog in Kenya was Mental Acrobatics, begun in 2003 by Daudi Were (@mentalacrobatic). Today Kenya has 15 000 registered blogs (with about 3 000 being active blogs) and 2.1 million Twitter users (with 700 000 being active monthly users.) Additional facts covered in the report:
  • "There are 4.3 million Kenyans on Facebook.
  • Kenya has a mobile penetration of 82.6 percent.
  • There are 26.1 million Internet users in Kenya.
  • Brands in Kenya are now appointing bloggers and influencers as brand ambassadors. The big challenge facing brand influencer relations and public relations is the issue of disclosure and this is due to the lack of a legal framework requiring them to disclose if their social media updates are brand endorsements.
  • There is increasing pressure from the authorities to regulate bloggers and subject them to the same manner of strict regulation as journalists. There are about five Kenyans who have been prosecuted because of what they’ve published on microblogs.
  • The value of online advertising industry in Kenya stood at Ksh.165 billion by the end of 2013 and is projected to rise to over Ksh.301 Billion by 2018."
The report also highlights the increasing pressure that Governemnt is putting on Kenyan social media and freedom of speech online. Discuss the report using the hashtag #iFreeKe.

Sources: , @ndesanjo, +Ndesanjo Macha

Kenyans also had a lot of fun on social media after Patrick Njoroge, nominated to head the country's central bank, was questioned by Kenyan lawmakers as to his single status at the age of fifty-four. Njoroge has never been married, but Kenyans were amused to see that this fact made it into his parliamentary hearing where officials asked him why he hadn't. (Kenyan males tend to get married before age forty.)

Sources: +BBC Trending 

Nigeria

In Nigeria, where legislators are some of the most well-paid officials in the world, a rumour circulating that legislators would now also receive a 9 million dollar wardrobe allowance caused massive protest in Nigerian social media. Users Tweeted and Facebooked the hashtags #9billion, #UndressNass, #OpenNass and #OccupyNass (Nass = National Assembly). "Nigeria has very high maternal and child mortality rates. The economy is not sophisticated and cash is limited. We need MP salaries to be reviewed and the spending of the budget to be open and transparent," Columnist Japheth Omojuwa (@Omojuwa) told BBC Trending. Omojuwa is leading a protest that has demanded authorities reform the official salary system in the next three months.


Sources: +BBC Trending, @Omojuwa

Oluseun Onigbinde, lead partner of non-profit BudgIT, is pushing for Nigeria’s National Assembly to be more transparent when it comes to spending. “Through social media [#OpenNass], the courts and meetings with lawmakers, Onigbinde said he hopes to cut through some of the secrecy: ‘There’s so much speculation today. This is how much the national assembly earns and nobody can give you a fact or a figure unless something that is speculated. And this question is let us know the allowances, let us know how much you spend on managing your office and the rest.’”

Sources: @ChrisJStein, +Voice of America


Middle East

Iran

Nasrin Sotoudeh (@NasrinSotoudeh) is a political dissident famous online and off for her protests against Iran's latest, allegedly fraudulent elections, and for her ongoing demand to be allowed to practice law again in Iran. After her 2010 imprisonment for political protest, the Iranian Bar Association voted to ban "Lady Sotoude," as some call her, from practicing law, most likely under pressure from the Iranian Intelligence Ministry. Since then, Sotoudeh has arrived each morning and sat in protest throughout the day at the Iranian Bar's main offices. But she rarely sits alone. Social media and word of mouth have resulted in many showing up to sit with her, to seek her counsel, and to share their own work. Some celebrities that have sat with her include: Mohammad Nourizad, a former hardline columnist and supporter of Iran’s supreme leader but now an outspoken critic of the government; Mohammad Maleki, ex-chancellor of Tehran University; dissident Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi (she even got a cameo in his award-winning film Taxi); Akram Neghabi, mother of the missing Saeed Zeinali, a student that has been missing since he was arrested in the 1999 student uprising in Tehran. Sotoude also joined the One Million Signatures Campaign - an online/offline campaign seeking to eliminate Islamic laws that discriminate against women. You can find out more about her protest on her Facebook page and on Twitter (@NasrinSotoudeh) and (@freenasrin).

Sources:@GEsfandiari,@NasrinSotoudeh

The Facebook page My Stealthy Freedom allows Iranian women to express their support for choice when it comes to whether or not to wear the hijab, a veil covering the head and the neck, in Iranian society. Masih Alinejad (@Masih_Alinejad), a journalist and religious freedom activist, started the page in 2009 when she left Iran for the UK. Since then, she's received thousands of photos and individual stories from Iranian women throughout the world who would like more freedom and less fear when it comes to wearing or not wearing the hijab - and she shares many of these stories via the Facebook page. Alinejad gave a video interview to Vox last week where she gave a bit of history about the movement and the hijab in Iran. The hijab became compulsory in Iran in 1983, and since then it has been suggested by Conservatives and media in Iran that without the hijab, women are more likely to be raped or sexually assaulted - indeed, one conservative analyst suggested that women who are without hijab and get assaulted cannot complain. In 2014, 3.6 million women were disciplined for "crimes against public prudency and morality" - a common phrase used to describe dress code violations in Iran. Even Alinejad herself has been the subject of an Iranian smear campaign in which it was suggested she was raped in front of her son when she went out without the hijab - a fabricated story designed to contradict her message of choice. That said, Alinejad has successfully grown an online, social-media fueled movement that hundreds of Iranian women participate in each day. “Iran is for all Iranians. Iran is me and my mother. My mother wants to wear a scarf. I don’t want to wear a scarf," Alinejad explained in her interview. "Iran should be for both of us."

A video from Iran with English subtitleWomen of Iran filming themselves and became their own story tellerاگر مایلید ح...
Posted by ‎My Stealthy Freedom آزادی یواشکی زنان در ایران‎ on Friday, June 19, 2015

Sources: +The Christian Science Monitor, @kraewarner, @Masih_Alinejad

The UAE

The Al Ameen state security service, part of the Dubai Police, noted that "electronic" blackmail - usually sexual blackmail - has gone up from 80 cases in 2013 to 212 in 2014. That said, Al Ameen officials were careful to note that they are not actively monitoring citizens' social media.  “There is no censorship whatsoever on social media networks… reports in this respect are mere rumours that are intended to cause trouble to security authorities in the UAE,” an Al Ameen official told Al Youm. Al Ameen sought to contradict rumours of netizens being targeted for online activity. The official clearly noted that only users that infringed on existing laws were of concern, e.g. those using social media to blackmail others.

Sources:  +Emirates 24/7


Asia

Uzbekistan

In a move to remove links to a Soviet past, Uzbekistan's President Islam Karimov changed the names of two major metro stops in the Capital overnight. However, President Karimov forgot to tell commuters. Commuters took to social media to complain about missing their stop and to joke about the situation, posting comments on Facebook like "You [President] better do something useful rather than renaming the stations," "I agree everything should be erased from the earth and be renamed! This way everybody will enjoy 'happy' life!" etc. 

Sources: +BBC Trending

China

In China, the Yulin Dog & Cat Meat Festival 2015 has sparked an online social media campaign to stop it: the #stopyulin2015 hashtag with the corresponding Facebook page Stop Yulin Dog & Cat Meat Festival 2015. However, given both social media networks are banned in China plus the fact that many Chinese do not consider the custom awkward, the online attention has been largely outside of China, with some Chinese netizens weighing in to roll their eyes (virtually) at the foreigners criticising Chinese customs. “Dog-meat eating is a custom belonging to other people, the same way that people of the Islamic Hui ethnic group doesn’t eat pork...They won’t protest us for eating pork. We should mutually respect each other. If you don’t want to eat something, then don’t," one netizen complained. Another wrote: “Let’s all protest the Christmas practice of eating turkey!” That said, there is significant online animal activism in Chinese recently, spurred by social media. Animal activism is not censored by the government like online protests around human rights or democracy. In fact, online and offline Chinese activists were able to stop a 600-year old dog meat festival held in Qianxi Township in Jinhua City. The same activists and their colleagues have encouraged netizens and protestors to show up to Yulin to protest the festival there as well.

Sources: +The Independent, @jamiefullerton1

China's richest individual, Wang Jianlin, has a son who is notorious in Chinese social media for using social media to declare he only wants women with big chests and for posting lewd photos of his dog. The younger Wang and other Chinese second-generation rich kids are making nasty waves in Chinese online media, contributing to scandals and anger amongst Chinese netizens.  For example, some wealthy Chinese children were arrested in the USA for torturing a university classmate, and the story was leaked in Chinese social media where netizens complimented the US for reigning in the bad behavior. Wang and others were required to either donate to charity or to attend the third annual weekend-long course on proper online and offline behaviour sponsored by the Chinese Government. The Government, tired of online scandals, is hoping that this class will help the Chinese super-rich offspring learn to behave more responsibly. 

 Sources: @dhewittChina

The Chinese in the capital Beijing are using social media to shame those that violate bans on smoking. Bans on smoking in open-air spaces near schools, sports venues, and historical sites are regularly flouted by Chinese; however, a recent government-crated hotline, Weibo account, and WeChat accout plus a message board called an "Exposure Table" have incentivised Chinese to share photos of those flouting the ban with disapproving and angry comments. 

Sources: +BBC Trending  

North Korea

Internet provider Koryolink in North Korea has been posting warnings that Instagram is blacklisted (though still accessible by mobile) by the Government after images of a fire on June 11th at a luxury hotel in the capital Pyongyang were posted to the social networking site. The site says
"Warning! You can't connect to this website because it's in blacklist site." Twitter and Facebook are functioning normally (for tourists at least). 

Sources: +Sky News, +Mashable 


Pakistan

In January, Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif announced a 20-point National Action Plan to combat terrorists, including "concrete measures against promotion of terrorism through Internet and social media" with a "ban on glorification of terrorists and terrorist organizations through print and electronic media." Since then, Pakistan's Government has been active in asking social media companies to block accounts linked to terrorists and anti-military propaganda. Minister of State for Information Technology Anusha Rehman calls the activities of such accounts "cyberterrorism....The government has proposed giving authority to the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority to block websites that go against the constitution of Pakistan," Rehman explained to journalists. However, many worry that this is simply not enough. Sana Ejaz, a Peshawar-based human rights lawyer, advocates more than just banning online accounts. She says in a "proper counter-response policy...The government should establish a social media think-tank team to respond to propaganda of the militants on social media." Pakistan has an estimated 29.1 million Internet users and 19.6 million active social media users, which comes to 10 percent of the population. Most use mobile applications to access their social networks.

Sources: 


India

The New Delhi Government is planning to expand its online news monitoring service to include social media. “The blueprint of the proposal is being prepared. It would require a dedicated team of experts who understand the dynamics of social media besides having a nose for news. Unlike monitoring of the print and the electronic media, here the team would have specialists. Since there is staff crunch, we might employ new people, or even outsource some,” a source close to the ruling Arvind Kejriwal government explained. 

Sources: +The Hindu 

 Sunitha Krishnan (@sunita_krishnan), the founder of the anti-sex trafficking charity Prajwala and a survivor of gang rape, is posting rape videos circulated via WeChat in India to the web. She edits each video to blot out the face of the victim and then posts these videos to her website, asking users to help identify the rapists. After that, she goes to the police. The trend to film rapes - usually using a personal mobile - is not particularly new in India. Videos like this are circulated often by the rapists themselves out of misplaced sense of pride or masculinity. However, Krishnan's decision to start uploading the videos online to publically identify and shame the rapists is new, and has led to 3 arrests - and a lot of controversy.



Sources: +BBC Trending , @sunita_krishnan

In India, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) will now have to provide the details of their social media accounts and their funding to the Government. In an amendment to the Foreign Contribution Rules of 2011, it became mandatory for NGOs to report this information to the Home Ministry. While critics claim the new rule is so that the Government can keep tabs on NGOs, the Home Ministry says it simply wants to make sure no NGOs work contrary to the goals of India. 


Sources: +The Economic Times 


Vietnam
Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Information and Communication Truong Minh Tuan said in an interview last week that journalists need to learn to better fact check news they collect via social media. The Minister cited cases where journalists had used topics popular in social media to attract more viewers, only to discover the topic was a rumour or to cause unneeded trouble to a private individual.  For example, the traditional media jumped on the sensationalised rumour that Vietnamese young football star, Cong Phuong, had lied about his age - and the rumour turned out to be untrue. Then there is the case of Do Quang Thien, a senior high school student from Dak Lak Province, who tried to help a man hit by a car but was then charged and jailed for causing additional injuries to the man. At least one Vietnamese newspaper chose to ignore the story, which it said was causing undue pressure in the student’s life - particularly as a result of all the attention the story received in social media. 

Sources: Vietnam News


 Malaysia

There has been an ongoing but slightly ambiguous row happening at the highest levels of politics in Malaysian social media in the are of Johor. Malaysian Minister of Tourism and Culture Nazri Aziz stated that the Tunku Mahkota of Johor (the Crown Prince of Johor) should not involve himself in politics if he was not prepared to be "whacked." The Crown Prince, Tunku Ismail Sultan Ibrahim, posted a wordless video response to the Johor Southern Tigers Facebook page. In the video, the Crown Prince makes a hand gesture that seems to say "come on." Now, the Prince's younger brother  Tunku Idris Iskandar has posted a photo to Instagram of the Johor state’s agreement to become a part of the Federation of Tanah Melayu (the original Malaya Federation that disbanded in 1963 into Malaysia,  Singapore, North Borneo, and Sarawak.) In the agreement featured in the Instagram post, signed by the late Johor Sultan Abu Bakar, it is noted that the Johor Government agrees to the Federation only if certain conditions are met such as making Islam the official state religion and ensuring that the power of the Johor government remains in the hands of the Sultan. Comments under the photo range between supportive and calls for peace. 





Sources: @fmtoday

Malaysian gymnast Farah Ann Abdul Hadi won a gold medal for her floor show at the Southeast Asian Games last week, inspiring national pride as well as a national debate online. A Malaysian TV channel posted a photo of Hadi in her gymnastics uniform to their Facebook page, and several Malaysian religious authorities then criticised the gold medalist for her uniform. The critics felt that the uniform revealed Hadi’s “aurat” or private parts. The TV channel took the image down, but not before netizens reacted angrily to the criticism. A copy of Hadi’s photo accumulated widespread support for the gymnast both inside Malaysia and without, sparking the Facebook page "Farah Ann Abdul Hadi For Malaysia" with over 22 thousand likes and the hashtag #‎FARAHnatics.

21-year-old Malaysian gymnast Farah Ann Abdul Hadi faced backlash from officials and Internet commenters because, they...
Posted by BuzzFeed News on Friday, June 19, 2015
Sources: +The Malay Mail Online, +BuzzFeed, @RachaelKrishna

Singapore


Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong (@leehsienloong) of Singapore gave an interview on social media and governance to ASEAN journalists. He noted that with people spending more time on Facebook and Twitter, Governments need to use social media particularly for the people “who will not be reading speeches and this is one way to reach them.” In Singapore, 3.6 million people - around 66% of the population - are active on social media. The Prime Minister cited the propinquity aspect of social media - the sense of nearness and immediacy - as something helpful in building engagement with users. Challenges for politicians, he noted, included navigating online clutter and turning online likes and reTweets into offline action. 

Sources: +The Straits Times

Thailand

Thaksin Shinawatra, the prime Minister of Thailand from 2001 to 2006, posted an image of himself meditating in front of a Buddhist statue to his Instagram account, allegedly in an indirect message to the current Thai Government. The Thai Government recently revoked Shinawatra's passport after he made he made some controversial remarks to journalists in South Korea. The former Prime Minister has frequently been accused of corruption; however, his photo, obviously meant to portray him as a respectable Buddhist to his followers, included the following caption: "But this time I also extended loving kindness to all the powers-to-be, in hopes that they are free from greed, anger and delusion, and have the wisdom to solve the country's problems and bring about true reconciliation...All things arise, exist and disappear, so do passports...Laws and guns can't solve problems, but loving kindness can."
หลังจากได้อุ้มหลานที่สิงคโปร์ วันนี้กลับมาอยู่ดูไบแล้ว ได้มีเวลานั่งสมาธิ เช่นเดียวกับวันว่างทุกวันที่ผ่านมา แต่ครั้งนี้ได้เพิ่มการแผ่เมตตา ให้กับผู้มีอำนาจทั้งหลาย ได้พ้นจากความโลภ โกรธ หลง เพื่อจะได้มีสติปัญญาในการแก้ไขปัญหาบ้านเมือง สร้างความปรองดองให้เกิดขึ้นจริง ไม่ใช่บริหารแต่อำนาจ และสร้างความแตกแยกให้มากยิ่งขึ้น สำหรับผมเชื่อในคำสั่งสอนของพระพุทธเจ้าที่ว่า “ใดๆ ในโลกล้วนอนิจจัง" คือ ทุกสิ่งไม่มีอยู่จริง เมื่อเกิดขึ้นตั้งอยู่แล้วก็ดับไป พาสปอร์ตก็เช่นกัน ก็ไม่อยากให้เป็นเรื่องวุ่นวายใหญ่โตอะไรกันมากมาย ผมก็ยังเป็นคนเดิมจนกว่าจะลาโลกไป อยากให้คนไทยมีเมตตาต่อกัน กฎหมายและปืนไม่สามารถแก้ปัญหาได้ นอกจากเมตตา เท่านั้น
A photo posted by Thaksin Shinawatra (@thaksinlive) on
Sources:  @BPbreakingnews

Meanwhile, Thai social media is buzzing after the national police chief agreed that casinos should be legalised. Netizens likened casinos to buying lottery tickets, claiming that lottery players were already engaged in legal gambling - why not let others?

Sources: @Aim_TH


Nauru

Last week in the island nation of Nauru, videos of a scuffle from a 300-strong protest outside the Parliament building made the rounds on social media (despite the island nation’s controversial ban on Facebook, covered in this blog in May.) The protests were in reaction to allegations that the Nauru President and Justice Minister have been bribed by Australian companies. One Member of Parliament, Mathew Batsiua (@MBatsiua), was involved in the protests was arrested, and more protesters have since demanded Batsiua’s release. However, an official statement from the Government denied the allegations of corruption and called the protests “disgusting….Mathew Batsiua was one of three suspended opposition MPs leading the riot and was arrested on a charge of disrupting the legislature.” Batsiua has since been released from custody on bail. 



Sources: @haydencooper

Australia

Graeme Innes (@Graemeinnes) was Australia's disability discrimination Commissioner until he resigned last year. Then the Australian Government ended the position. Innes has continued his activism and outreach via social media, and he recently came out to criticise the Australian Government for creating a wind farms Commissioner after removing the position of disability discrimination Commissioner. "I felt pretty hurt and pretty upset, because the message that it sent to me is that the Government thinks that a wind farm watchdog is more important than a disability guide dog...And I think that that's not a message that would be very acceptable to the 20 per cent of people in the community ... who have a disability....I've had a lot of opposition in the disability sector from both people I've spoken to and people with whom I'm connected on social media" Innes said.


Sources: @SamDonovanABC

Destination NSW, which receives a $19.8 million dollar annual advertising budget from the Sydney Government to promote Sydney to tourists, is under scrutiny for improperly reporting its advertising budget to escape government reviews of its work. Included in the criticism, the agency is under fire for sharing social media content that includes ministers when all content shared should be apolitical, authorities explained. Destination NSW disputes the charges and has called for more clear rules when it comes to social media and government contracts. 
 
Sources: +The Sydney Morning Herald, @nicole_hasham

North America

Canada


According to the Canadian House of Commons, the Harper Government spent 1.6 million dollars in ads on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Xbox in only three months. According to ipilitics.ca, “Facebook garnered the lion’s share of federal government advertising, cashing in on more than $719,913 worth of sponsored posts between Jan. 29 and April 29. Twitter was next with more than $552,742, followed by $303,998 for YouTube. Xbox trailed the pack with $7,170 – all of which was advertising for the Public Safety Department’s anti-cyberbullying campaign.” Each Ministry used demographics to drive its online ad spend. If you head to this article, you’ll find a nice interactive graphic explaining how much was spent by which department and why. 

Sources: @LizT1, +iPolitics.ca 

The United States

After the horrible murder of 9 parishioners in a racial hate crime in Charleston, South Carolina, netizens in social media demanded the removal of the Confederate flag from the Capital - at the very least. The Confederate flag a symbol of the Southern states during the American Civil War and has been re-used in pop culture to symbolise the white South. The shooter also used the symbol in much of his social media in the lead-up to his horrendous actions. It remains to be seen if South Carolina's Government will respond to the widespread online demand.


Sources: The US Internet, +Mashable

The US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York issued a subpoena and a gag order (since lifted) demanding that Reason Magazine turn over "any and all" information on commenters reacting to an article posted in the magazines Hit & Run blog. The conservative magazine managed to relay the government's interest in them to the commenters just before the gag order took effect. The magazine did a blog post on the experience, outlining what happened and their reactions to it.

Sources:  @nickgillespie, @MattWelch

The US island territory in Mocronesia, Guam, adopted a social media policy for all government employees. Governor Eddie Calvo (@governorcalvo) signed an executive order last month adopting the policy, which covers all user-driven content technologies, from Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to those that have not yet been widely adopted or even developed. The social media policy basically points out that the use of social media by GovGuam is acceptable and indeed, encouraged, but that employees should be aware of the risks involved: “keep in mind that any of your conduct that adversely affects your job performance, the performance of fellow Government personnel or otherwise adversely affects the Government of our stakeholders or which interferes with the Government's legitimate business interests, may result in disciplinary action up to and including termination.”

Sources: @governorcalvo,@guamnews_kuam

Hilary Bricken (@CannaBizLawyer), a lawyer in the Cannabis industry as well the lead editor of the Canna Law Blog, published a guest post on the Above the Law blog looking at social media and discussions around marijuana in the USA. Facebook censors articles related to maurijuana law and legalisation as does Instagram***, limiting the reach of the Canna Law Blog. Bricken argues that while she understands banning commerce-related content, content the simply discusses the legal and health implications of marijuana should be allowed under the Constitutional right to free speech. Bricken cites the US Supreme Court case  Central Hudson Gas & Electric Corp. v. Public Service Commission of New York, which established "a four-part test to determine whether government regulation of advertising speech is valid: (1) Does the advertisement involve lawful activity?, (2) Does the government have a substantial interest?, (3) Does the regulation of the advertisement advance the substantial government interest?, and (4) Is the regulation the least restrictive means of advancing the substantial government interest?"
**** Instagram outlaws the hashtag #weed, but it seems to miss a lot of related posts. See the introduction to Africa above and read about Seun Kuti's critique of marijuana policies in Africa.

Sources: @atlblog, @CannaBizLawyer

The USA's Online Trust Alliance (@otalliance) published its 2015 Online Trust Audit and Honor Roll. The Audit looks at 1 000 websites in different sectors and reviews their commitment to “security, privacy and consumer protection.” Out of the sites reviewed, Twitter got top overall scores for the third year in a row, while 42 percent of government sites made the honor role and "held the highest average privacy score across evaluated industries." However, 54% of government sites got a failing grade for “inadequate domain, brand and consumer protection.” In particular, it was noted that government sites have poor email authentication.  

Sources: @NaomiEide, @otalliance

In the USA (as in other places), public officials continue to run into trouble when there is no clear social media policy and guidance. This month, a County law clerk in the US State of New Jersey resigned after posting "disparaging Facebook comments about the death of New Jersey State Trooper Anthony Raspa." Raspa died when his police cruiser hit a deer. Winnie Comfort, spokesperson for the New Jersey Courts, explained that judiciary employees need to adhere to a code of conduct within a social media policy. In addition to trying to integrate social media usage into existing conduct codes. the state is employing training sessions and outreach to help employees better understand how social media use can impact the New Jersey government as well as their own careers. 

Sources: +The Press of Atlantic City, @ACPressWeaver

Pro-choice and pregnant advocates have started a tumblr  on being, well, pro-choice and pregnant after a Washington Post article interviewed an anti-abortion activist who was confused by an abortion rights activist who was pregnant. The tumblr is called "Pregnant, Parenting and Pro-Choice" and features stories about parents who think that the right to abortion is important. Parents explain their decisions to have children and why they think being pro-choice is important.

Sources: +BBC Trending 

Oakland city in California has become the first California city to partner with ArchiveSocial to provide an open online archive of all its social media posts to citizens. "Providing transparency and access to data are critical needs of our community. I believe that for cities to experience the transformational benefits of open data, they need to leverage technology to get data into the hands of the people. Solutions like ArchiveSocial allow for the public to gain access to information on their terms," Oakland's Chief Information Officer Bryan Sastokas (@bsastokas) said. 

Sources: +Digital Journal, @bsastokas

In Fort Meyers, Florida, the Fire Department has finally published a  social media policy after a heated debate over free speech amongst employees. Florida is one of 25 right-to-work states in the USA, so it is easier to fire individuals within the state. However, the Fire Fighters union believes the social media policy may be counter to the US Constitution. It will be interesting to see how the story develops. 

 Sources: +NBC News 

 Last Monday, former Alaska Governor and Republican Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin published a post to Facebook entitled “Hey Girls! You Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Government to Succeed!" In it, Palin asked conservative women to attend the Young Women's Leadership Summit in St. Charles, Illinois. “These aren’t your mother’s feminists,” says Palin of the convention attendees. The PAC bearing her name is sponsoring the conference. Palin goes on to explain that today's technologically savvy female leaders are “studying tools and techniques to spread an empowering, genuine feminist message back on their college campuses this fall. This gives us hope for America! The girls are going rogue!...The motto here is ‘women don’t need government to succeed...Right on! I admire them embracing one of the most politically incorrect positions the Leftist PC Police goes ballistic over – the truth that God has equipped women to be capable and courageous enough to make it without Big Daddy government enslaving us under its freedom-killing control...The empowering truth that ‘women don’t need government to succeed,'” Palin says in closing, “reminds our next generation that they don’t need ‘big brother’ for success, any more than they need a man for fulfillment, any more than a fish needs a bicycle. THAT’S the message of genuine feminism, and I’m heartened to see conservatives return to our roots and live it. Ladies, 2016 is time to put the heels on and take the gloves off! Best wishes on a successful summit!” The conference is offering training sessions that "will  cover a wide range of topics including how to organize on campus, how to plan and execute events, how to message conservatism on campus, how to launch a career in conservative politics, and how to use social media to advance conservative ideas.  We’re teaching the cutting-edge community organizing tactics of the left, and each of our Summit attendees will leave with an action plan so that they can be effective and efficient activists in their own campuses and communities.”

Hey Girls! You Don't Need No Stinkin' Government to Succeed! This week in Hillary Clinton's true hometown of Chicago,...
Posted by Sarah Palin on Monday, June 15, 2015

 Sources: Sarah Palin, +Raw Story 
Robert Safian (@rsafian) interviewed US President Barack Obama to get his take on technology and Government. Some of the high points for me: “. With all the crises we were dealing with—the economy collapsing, the auto industry on the verge of collapse, winding down wars—this did not get the kind of laser-focused attention until ­Healthcare.gov, which was a well-­documented disaster, but ended up anyways being the catalyst for us saying, "Okay, we have to completely revamp how we do things." The results there were so outstanding, and because we discovered that there are folks at Google and Facebook and Twitter and all these amazing firms who really wanted to find some way to engage in public service—and many of them could afford to do so because they had done very well . . .I had a bunch of 23- and 25-year-olds, tinkering around, and the next thing you knew they had created some new application and they’d explain to me how it was working and why it was that eight people in Idaho without any staff or direction had suddenly organized a 15,000-person meeting. Right? And I started paying attention…..part of the reason why we’ve been successful so far is I have essentially provided air cover for these teams because I can call up the secretary of transportation, or HUD, or the Small Business Administration, and say, "I want this to happen. And I don’t want us to find a reason not to do it just because it hasn’t been done before. And I want us to bring together a team to be as creative as possible…..And by loosening up some of those constraints, our team then can come in and, I think, be really successful.” Read the full interview here. 

Sources: @rsafian


The US Treasury plans to put a woman on the US $10 dollar bill, and the Treasury has turned to social media for suggestions - and boy, have the comments been flooding in. “The favorites for portraiture on the first day since Mr. Lew’s announcement seemed to be Eleanor Roosevelt, the first lady, feminist and United Nations ambassador; Rosa Parks, the civil rights icon; and Harriet Tubman, the slave-turned-abolitionist who was the top choice of an online petition earlier this year. Many Americans want to give a second chance to the social activist Susan B. Anthony or Sacagawea, the Shoshone guide for the Lewis and Clark expedition, who in recent years were honored on two $1 coins that proved so unpopular that their minting ended.” 


ICYMI: Secretary Lew joined @CBSThisMorning to talk about putting a woman on #TheNew10.
Posted by U.S. Department of the Treasury on Friday, June 19, 2015

Sources: @calmesnyt, +New York Times 

Yahoo Screen, Yahoo's video platform, will launch its Viewfinder docuseries June 22nd with the episode "Uniquely Nasty: The U.S. Government's War on Gays." Viewfinder will use each episode to explore a new topic and each episode will be made available on Yahoo Screen and the social media site Tumblr.  Reported by Chief Investigative Correspondent Michael Isikoff, the first episode explores 60 years of persecution of lesbians and gays by the government through the eyes of an openly gay associate of George W. Bush.


Sources: @outmagazine, @cory_fernandezz

Another candidate has declared his entry into the US Presidential race. Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump) is seeking the Republican nomination for US President. The social media reaction was immediate and rather merciless as Trump is known for his somewhat unorthodox comments. The billionaire made his announcement after descending from Trump Tower in New York City to give a stream-of-consciousness speech. He shared his speech on Periscope, the Twitter live-streaming application, and trended worldwide on Twitter. Trump's campaign bragged “3.4 million Facebook users in the US generated 6.4 million interactions regarding the launch of his campaign, the highest by far, among all 2016 GOP candidates.” Trump was later accused of paying actors to cheer at his campaign announcement - an accusation he denies.


Sources: @Josh_Richman, @realDonaldTrump, +Breitbart News, @ASwoyer

Remember, if you want to keep up with the USA Presidential candidates on Twitter, you can subscribe to this 2016 Presidential Twitter list or check out the Tweets below.



Alternatively, you can follow this Facebook list.


Central America

Cuba

Last week both Google and Twitter made moves towards opening up their services in Cuba. Since US President Obama  announced plans to normalise US relations with Cuba, both companies have explored how to improve connectivity in the country. About five percent of Cubans have Internet access; however, for Twitter, the answer is to pursue creating a shortcode that will allow Cubans to Tweet via cell phone. With shortcodes, mobile phone users opt-in to allow a company to send them notifications (in this case Tweets) via their cell phones. Twitter will need to negotiate with the government-owned ETECSA, Cuba's telecommunications company, to further their plan.


Sources:  @aaronlmorrison, @nancyscola

 

El Salvador

Between 1999 and 2011, 17 women were sentenced to up to 40 years in jail for miscarriages in El Salvador. #Las17, as these women are called in social media, are victims of a system in which any sort of abortion or perceived abortion is penalised. This includes aborting pregnancies that result from rape - indeed many of the largely poor women that go to jail under this system are victims of rape or even gang-rape, a massive concern in poor areas of El Salvador where gangs control the local population. There is a movement online and off to encourage the El Salvador government to grant a pardon to these women - and at least one has been granted to Carmen Guadalupe Vásquez Aldana, a woman who at age 18 was raped and then miscarried the baby before being sentenced to 30 years in jail in 2008.  The Agrupación Ciudadana por la Despenalización del Aborto (Citizens’ Coalition for the Decriminalization of Abortion - @AbortoPORlaVIDA) estimates that "129 women were prosecuted for abortion-related crimes in [El Salvador] between 2000 and 2011. Of these, 23 were convicted of receiving an illegal abortion; 26 were convicted of homicide."

Sources: @AbortoPORlaVIDA, @ErikaGuevaraR

South America

Ecuador

More protests were planned and executed in Ecuador after the Ruta Viva protests two weeks ago (covered in this blog here - press CNTRL + F and search for Ecuador.) Social media is being used to coordinate the actions and promote the viewpoints of both sides - both of which are pretty one-sided, at least online. Pro-government rallied June 15th while opposition protestors marched June 18th. President Correa (@MashiRafael) accused his opponents of planning a coup while his critics allege the President continues to censor and harass opposition.




Tools

 American Civil Liberty Union (ACLU)'s application

It bears repeating - this is an awesome application for your iOS or Android phone that will ensure whatever you film is uploaded directly - with no lag time - to the American Civil Liberty Union (ACLU) website where members of the ACLU will review and catalog your evidence. Don't risk having your phone destroyed or a video deleted, just download this app and make certain anything you want shared gets shared in real time.
https://www.aclu.org/feature/aclu-apps-record-police-conduct

Digital Democracy

Former Sen. Sam Blakeslee (@samblakeslee) and his Institute for Advanced Technology and Public Policy, located at California Polytechnic State University, launched the website www.digitaldemocracy.org May sixth. The site allows users to search for what lobbyists say at hearings, review and watch government meetings, see what donors are contributing to different California politicians, and more. “What might take 10 hours of research on what a politician said on a specific issue, you can now get in a matter of seconds by typing up the search term,” said a computer engineering professor that participated in the project. “If a politician is talking about vaccinations, for example, it will cue up everything that person said about that and provide the video of them saying it.”
“One of the interesting things about this program, too, is that if people find something amusing or interesting they can share it on social media,” Cal Poly political science graduate Zachary Antoyan said. “It could go viral.” The team hopes to grow the platform through improving its services as well as expanding the site to look at all 50 states.

Sources: @NickWilsonTrib, @samblakeslee

Minds.com


Minds.com is a social network that offers users more privacy, more transparency, and less advertising than Facebook. The Minds website explains that "For every mobile vote, comment, remind, swipe and upload you earn points which can be exchanged for views on posts of your choice." Minds also offers message encryption by default, keeps no information about its users, and points out that its open-source software includes "peer-reviewed" privacy code. This means developers and users can examine the code to determine its strength rather than just ask users to trust them and their secret code. "Regain control of your social world," Minds.com notes on its website.  Minds launched its mobile app last Monday.

Sources: @reason
 

 

Reports

Breaking News Consumer's Handbook

The US-based National Public Radio show On the media has published a "Breaking News Consumer's Handbook" for those in the USA that use their digital devices to record breaking news. From filming police brutality with your mobile phone to understanding what your rights are when it comes to sharing your content online, this is the handbook for you. And while you are at reviewing the handbook, don't forget to download the American Civil Liberty Union (ACLU)'s application for filming and directly sharing your mobile video to their website. The ACLU has your back - even if the police take your phone and delete your video, if you use this app, it's too late to stop the video from being shared with the ACLU and their massive online audience. The ACLU points out that, even if the video isn't legally actionable, it's important to share experiences with authorities - both good and bad - to highlight to both the general public and authorities what such experiences involve.

Who has your back

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, sworn to “defend your rights in the digital world,” has released its 2015 “Who has your back” report. The report gives a star to online companies for each of the following:

  • Follows industry-accepted best practices
  • Tells users about government data demands
  • Discloses policies on data retention
  • Discloses government content removal requests
  • Pro-user public policy: opposes backdoors

At the top, with five stars because the companies do everything listed above, users can find Adobe, Apple, Credo Mobile, Dropbox, Sonic.net, Wikimedia, Wordpress, and Yahoo. Facebook dropped a star this year (apparently Facebook no longer discloses government content removal requests), and Google dropped two stars (Google doesn’t tell users about government data demands and does not disclose policies on data retention). Snapchat, last year’s loser, edged up a bit while AT&T is this year’s one-star wonder; AT&T follows industry-accepted best practices, but allegedly does nothing more. 


Sources: +Electronic Frontier Foundation


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