DigiActive.org

Tactic: Online Video Protest in (Virtual) Tunisia

You can see a larger version of the video on the Nawaat site.

Description: In 2007, the Tunisian government, led by President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, blocked the video-sharing site DailyMotion.com, in part because the site hosted video testimony of Tunisian political prisoners. In response, the human rights organization Nawaat has created an online video protest on Google Earth. If you visit the Tunisian presidential palace on Google Earth, you will see that it is covered with links to the same videos of political prisoners which President Ben Ali was trying to block (see video above). Now, at least online, evidence of Tunisia’s political prisoners are right in the President’s front yard!

Organizer: Nawaat (”the core”), a Tunisian human rights site, co-founded by Tunisian digital activist Sami Ben Gharbia, creator of the video above.

Purpose of Action: To show President Ben Ali that he cannot censor the truth about Tunisian political prisoners, that the truth will come right to his front door.

Organizing Tools: Google Earth, YouTube

Outcome: Unknown.

Ease of Replication: Pretty easy. You can add the Google Earth video geo-tags through YouTube. when you upload a video to YouTube you have the option to specify the date and the location of the video. When you click on that option, you will find a Google map which you can zoom in on. Then you place the geo-tag marker on the location you want the video to be associated with, in this case, the Tunisian presidential palace in Carthage. You can also place the geo-tag marker by inputting the longitude and latitude of the location. There is such easy interactivity between Google Earth, Google Maps, and YouTube because all three applications are owned by Google.

Tactic: Pakistanis Use SMS and E-mail to Mobilize

Although President Musharraf ended the state of emergency on December 15, this video is still worth a look. It recounts how Pakistani’s used SMS and e-mail to organize protests against the state of emergency, which was declared November 3rd.

Here’s a key quote from Semar Benala, a protester: “Actually, we do this through e-mail, through SMS’s, because even all the television channels have been shut down, but because we want to bring about change we are, like, trying out other mediums of communication.”

click the image to be taken to the Daily Motion site.