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The CPSR Compiler - July 2003
COMPUTER PROFESSIONALS for SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
Turning Thoughts to Actions
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CPSR NEWS
Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility honors Mitch Kapor, internet pioneer and philanthropist, with its 2003 Norbert Wiener Award.
CPSR's new President, Nathaniel Borenstein, notes "Mitch has long been a role model for anyone seeking to succeed in the cut-throat world of high tech business without sacrificing integrity and conscience. There aretoo few people who even attempt to combine these two kinds of contribution, and even fewer who succeed. Mitch Kapor is the best role model I know of for bright young engineers and scientists seeking to make a positive difference in the world".
When notified, Mitch Kapor's reaction was, "Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility has long provided both a public voice and personal inspiration on the responsible use of information technology, and I'm very honored to be receiving the 2003 Norbert Wiener Award from CPSR."
Kapor founded Lotus Development Corporation in 1982 and designed Lotus 1-2-3, the "killer application" which made the personal computer ubiquitous in the business world in the 1980ís. He served as the President (later Chairman) and Chief Executive Officer of Lotus from 1982 to 1986 and as a Director until 1987. For more than 20 years, Mr. Kapor has been an investor in high-technology start-up companies (through Kapor Enterprises, Inc.) and an advisor to entrepreneurs. He was a founding investor of UUNET, Real Networks, and Groove Networks. From 1999 to 2001, Mr. Kapor was a partner at Accel Partners, a leading venture capital firm based in Palo Alto, California. Mr. Kapor has written articles, columns, and op-ed pieces on information infrastructure policy, intellectual property issues, and antitrust in the digital era to publications such as Scientific American, The New York Times, Forbes, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, and Communications of the ACM.
In 1990 with John Perry Barlow, he co-founded the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and served as its chairman until 1994. Beginning in 1997, he created and endowed the Mitchell Kapor Foundation, a private foundation focused on environmental health, education, and the social impact of information technology. Most recently, he founded the Open Source Applications Foundation. OSAF's mission is "to create and gain wide adoption of Open Source application software of uncompromising quality." Kapor has also been a behind the scenes supporters of several worthy groups including CPSR.
For more information on Mitch Kapor and his work, see his web site, http://www.kapor.com .
JUNE 21-22, 2003 BOARD MEETING HIGHLIGHTS
Two Project Directors were approved to work on the Ford Foundation's Capacity Building Grant.
Board Committees reported. From those discussions, there was agreement to develop: a policy and process for awarding travel funds to members; possible alternatives to the present election by the board of board officers; and a procedure for provisional acceptance of a new chapter.
A 2003-04 budget was approved.
A new CPSR President was elected, and Hans Klein was re-elected as Chair.
The Board thanked the President and other outgoing Board members for their outstanding service to CPSR.
Minutes are available by writing to cpsr(a)cpsr.org.
NATHANIEL BORENSTEIN IS SELECTED BY CPSR's BOARD
AS THE NEW PRESIDENT
"After nearly 20 years as a CPSR member, it is a great honor for me to be given the opportunity to lead it in this critical time. I look forward to working with as many of you as possible to make sure that information technology in general, and the Internet in particular, fulfill their immense promise for building a better and more diverse world, while avoiding the dark threats of universal monitoring, homogenization, and conformity. CPSR has a vital role to play, and I hope you will all help me to make it more useful to the needs of the entire diverse community of people who want to make sure that information technology serves the goals of freedom, justice, and human rights around the world." -- Nathaniel S. Borenstein <nsb(a)cpsr.org> http://guppylake.com/~nsb
FORD FOUNDATION GRANT PROGRESS -
CPSR WELCOMES TWO NEW HIRES
CPSR recently received a grant from the Ford Foundation to "create a democratic institution to work as a mechanism for coordinating the telecommunications side of civil society." - Coralee Whitcomb (outgoing CPSR President and grant author). CPSR will act as an organizing force to bring groups together internationally online in order to further develop a public voice on important issues related to the internet and CPSR's other concentration areas. The grant proposal entails further developing the CPSR capacity through new programs including partnerships with other organizations, outreach across working groups, chapters, and the members-at-large, and expanding our media capabilities.
In order to further the strategies outlined in the grant proposal and those to be developed in the coming months, CPSR has hired Sarah Granger (CPSR member since 1993) to be the primary project director.
Sarah recently ran the Gary Hart News online campaign that entailed organizing volunteers online, directing web and technical operations, and guiding strategy for the virtual organization. She was previously a network security consultant for a variety of companies including Phoenix Technologies, Liquid Audio, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. She has published works on network security and hacking, IT policy, modern workplace ergonomics, politics online, and women in technology for Security Focus and Mindjack, as well as being technical editor for three books on security topics. She has actively volunteered for CPSR, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the Forum for Women Entrepreneurs. She is also a member of the USACM Public Policy Committee.
Richard Civille will be working to put together an Advisory Committee to develop a consensus on the strategic direction and design of an effective global membership constituency, and help with a CPSR five year stratetic plan, reflecting a consensus from the existing advocacy community for guiding grassroots efforts.
Richard has been active in the field of community economic development and the use of information and communication technology (ICT) for twenty years, in various capacities ranging from university research associate, project manager, adjunct lecturer, business owner, executive director, and principal investigator. Richard served as a program director for CPSR from in the early 90's. With Marc Rotenberg, Richard organized a series of information policy roundtables funded by Mitch Kapor. From this experience, Richard went on to co-found and serve as Executive Director of the Center for Civic Networking (CCN) that conducted a series of government and privately funded telecommunications demonstrations projects over the past 10 years. Along with an active consulting practice that includes co-directing a Ford Foundation funded sectoral analysis of community technology with Dr. Michael Gurstein, Richard serves as Executive Director of the San Juan County Economic Development Council in rural northwest Washington state. He serves on the board of the National Rural TeleCongress and the board of trustees of the San Juan Island Library. During 2002 Richard served on the Secretariat of the Global Community Networking Partnership, which developed early civil society participation in the planning process for the upcoming World Summit on the Information Society.
SAVE THE DATE FOR CPSR's 2003 ANNUAL CONFERENCE
and NORBERT WIENER AWARD RECEPTION FOR MITCH KAPOR
http://www.cpsr.org/conferences/annmtg2003/index.html
"GETTING THE TECHNOLOGY YOU DESERVE:
COMMUNITY PARTICIPATION IN REGIONAL CABLE FRANCHISE POLICY"
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25 - SEATTLE, WA
Plan to join us for a day of policy, practice, and ACTION for broadband access. Experience the "real thing" with the Seattle case study and the CPSR 2003 Annual Meeting.
Come listen and converse with:
- Local, national, and international experts framing the policy issues -- why is broadband access important and what are the ways to get it.
- Activists sharing how broadband access impacts social change and supports community goals.
- Native and Rural community leaders telling how it can be done even in "impossible" situations.
Be part of the solution !
- Participate in a mock public hearing on our technology future.
- Walk away with strategies and tools to improve your cable franchises and get the technology infrastructure you need in YOUR community.
- Get involved in helping to plan our future, and make it happen.
To volunteer and/or otherwise contribute, Contact Mike Weisman at popeye(a)speakeasy.org
For more information watch http://www.cpsr.org/conferences/annmtg2003/index.html
SAVE THE DATE and CONSIDER SUBMISSIONS FOR
PDC 2004 - Participatory Design Conference
"ARTFUL INTEGRATION: INTERWEAVING MEDIA, MATERIALS,
AND PRACTICES"
July 27-31, 2004 - Toronto, CANADA
The Participatory Design Conferences, held every two years since 1990, have brought together a multidisciplinary and international group of researchers, designers, practitioners, users, and managers who adopt distinctively participatory approaches in the development of information and communication technologies (ICTs).
The overall theme of the 2004 conference grows out of the earlier papers, books, and proceedings of the PDC conferences. It recognizes that an essential ingredient in design practice is the working together of multiple, heterogeneous elements. Whereas convential design approaches emphasize the role of the designer and the creation of singular products, artful integration calls attention to the collective interweaving of people and artifacts to achieve practical, aesthetic or emancipatory syntheses. The conference will include the inauguration of an award for participatory design, named the Arful Integrators Award.
Conference Co-Chairs:
Andrew Clement, University of Toronto, Canada
Peter van den Besselaar, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
Program Co-Chairs:
Fiorella de Cindio, University of Milano, Italy
Doug Schuler, Evergreen State College, USA
Submissions are invited.
See http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/international-chapters
Chapters and Working Groups, which do not have a CPSR email hosted list, can apply to get one by writing to evoy(a)cpsr.org for the guidelines and application form.
NON-CPSR OPPORTUNITIES
Nominate civil society organisations, community-based groups, networks, and social movements for the 2003 APC Betinho Communications Prize: Recognising outstanding examples of people-centred information and communication technology (ICT) initiatives that are improving the lives of people and communities in Latin America and the Caribbean
See http://www.apc.org/english/betinho - http://www.apc.org/espanol/betinho - - or write to betinho(a)apc.org
Contribute to E-Democracy: Technology, Law and Politics - Report of the working group E-Democracy
Forum e-Government of the Austrian Computer Society (OCG)
How can the Internet be used for the support of democratic decision making and citizen participation ("e-democracy") ? These proceedings aim to summarize the current state of the discussion not only in Austria, but also on the development of e-democracy on an international scale. Contributions may specialize in the fields of IT-related issues, legal, political or sociological aspects of e-democracy. Both theoretical research, comparative studies and case study reports are welcome. Editors: Prof. Alexander Prosser, Mag. Robert Krimmer See http://e-voting.at/proceedings .
Enter your story in the ICT Stories Competition 2003 for a Tony Zeitoun Award
If you have worked on a project that uses Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) as a tool for achieving development, then this is an opportunity for you to share your experiences with the world. The ICT Stories objective is to capture the learning process that accompanies the introduction and implementation of ICTs in a project in exemplary stories. These stories describe good practices and lessons learned from contributors' experiences. Winners will be given the opportunity to travel to Switzerland to present their findings at the ICT4D platform at the WSIS. See: http://www.iicd.org/stories
Email: stories(a)iicd.org
Submit Nominations for 'The Gender and ICT Awards' of GKP and the Association for Progressive Communications Women's Networking Support Programme (APC WNSP) under the "Multistakeholder" and "Community-based/ Individual" categories.
Awards aim to:
- Recognise gender and ICT initiatives globally and provide further impetus for others to mainstream gender in the field of ICTs; and therefore support a number of internationally agreed recommendations for gender equality, women's rights and empowerment,
- Give due recognition to community-based or small-scale initiatives designed and implemented by women and women's organisations/networks; while appreciating larger scale but cost- effective multi-stakeholder initiatives,
- Provide much needed opportunities to develop new collaborations/partnerships and opportunities for upscaling small-scale and community-based initiatives. See http://www.globalknowledge.org
ACTIVITIES
Today Al Whaley, CPSR's Palo Alto Chapter Chair, wrote to California State Senator Debra Bowen to give CPSR's support to her sponsored legislation, SB 12, about unsolicited email communications. See http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/postquery?bill_number=sb_12&sess=CUR&house=B&author=bowen
CPSR supported EPIC's recent testimony in the House Financial Services Committee regarding the FCRA. The hearing focused on HR2622 (Bachus), which gives the industry preemption and does not do much for the consumer.
They made five arguments:
- That the FCRA should not preempt state privacy law.
- That amendments to the FCRA should create strong protections against identity theft.
- That amendments to the FCRA should ensure greater accuracy, and ease of correction of errors.
- That there is a need to address the problem of medical information appearing on credit reports.
- That the FCRA should continue to apply to background checking services (there is a movement to exempt PIs & others from having to comply with FCRA when doing investigations).
See http://www.epic.org/privacy/fcra/
http://www.epic.org/privacy/preemption
CPSR Pittsburgh Chapter endorsed a petition calling for the Pittsburgh City Council to oppose Patriot Two, the new Patriot Act. See http://www.thomasmertoncenter.org/USAPATRIOT.htm
Jimmy Hale and Peter Wood of the CPSR Portland Chapter represented CPSR at another free exhibitor table from O'Reilly, at their Open Source Convention. As a result, connections were made with other groups, Jimmy attended the Geek Volunteerism summit hosted by Tim O'Reilly, Jimmy was interviewed on radio, he is fired up to revive the Portland Chapter with speakers, more than 300 CPSR brochures are in the hands of potential members, and ten more "Question Technology" shirts are hitting the streets.The MP3 for Jimmy's radio interview is at http://www.kboo.fm/news-dept.php .
To see the "Question Technology" shirt, and consider it for yourself, or as a gift see http://www.cpsr.org/links/t-shirts/index.html
To order directly use http://cpsr.org/membership
CPSR-Peru, the Peruvian Training Labor Forum (Foro Peruano de CapacitaciÛn Laboral - FOPECAL), the National Industries Society, the Lima Chamber of Commerce, the National Institute for Research and Training in Telecommunications (INICTEL) and other institutions of the Peruvian private sector, co-organized the First National Congress of Free Software.
Carlos Horna and Gustavo Hung, CPSR-Peru members, spoke in the First National Congress of Free Software. CPSR-Peru made possible a connection by video conference with Richard Stallman, founder of the Free Software Foundation and Project GNU. See http://peru.cpsr.org - - http://www.fopecal.org/congresosl
Katitza RodrÌguez and Pedro Mendiz·bal updated the Peru-related parts of the Human Rights Privacy Report 2003 of EPIC.
CPSR-Peru is co organizing and participating in the virtual forum called "Myths and Realities of Free Software", organized by CONCYTEC. See http://socinfo.concytec.gob.pe/softwarelibre .
Coming soon:
August 8. CPSR-Peru is organizing a Free Software, Free Society Conference with Richard Stallman in Lima .
August 11-13. CPSR-Peru will be in the First Latin American and Caribbean Conference of Free Software, organized by UNESCO, the Instituto Nacional de Estadistica e Inform·tica (www.inei.gob.pe) and the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y TecnologÌa - CONCYTEC (http://www.concytec.gob.pe) in Cuzco, Peru. See http://www.lacfree.org .
Peru's National Conference of Free Software had more than 400 attendees. See a press release in spanish at: http://www.peru.cpsr.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=32&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
After this conference, CPSR-Peru members received invitations to speak from three universities around the country, with all expenses paid. They also have the commitment of RMS for a meeting prior to the I Latinoamerican Conference of Free Software, and some other invitations from local universities.
Hans Klein was quoted in an article about MoveOn.org by the Pittsburgh Post Gazette See http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/03180/197225.stm
CPSR Chair Hans Klein has launched a number of new policy projects at the Georgia Tech School of Public Policy:
- "Opportunities in WSIS": This study examines eight previous UN world summits to learn what they accomplished and what mechanisms were used to effect positive social change. The lessons learned are then applied to the on-going world summit on the information society to identify strategies by which activists can have impacts.
- "The Atlanta Grassroots Peace Movement": This study analyzes how the Atlanta-area peace groups have emerged in a decentralized and loosely coordinated movement. The study seeks to understand the dynamics that lead to movement fragmentation, and it seeks to design Internet tools and strategies that allow for better inter-group coordination. In a second phase, the project will develop web-based coordination tools.
- State-level DMCA (S-DMCA): Georgia is one of the states considering new intellectual property protections, as advocated by the MPAA and the RIAA. This study examines the relationship between state-level lobbying and national-level (federal government) and international-level (WTO) lobbying. The study will analyze the "big picture" within which state initiatives have appeared, and it will offer policy recommendations.
- Speaker Series on Internet and Civil Liberties: former US Congressman Bob Barr will participate in one or more public forums at Georgia Tech. The first forum will examine the proposed Patriot II legislation. For more information on these projects, see the Internet and Public Policy Project (IP3) at Georgia Tech http://www.IP3.gatech.edu .
Doug Schuler's New Community Networks: Wired for Change has been translated into Spanish
Es muy grato anunciarles que varios capÃtulos de mi libro "Nuevas Redes Comunitarias: Alambrado para el cambio" est·n ahora disponible en la Red en Espa"ol. El libro describe por quª las redes comunitarias basadas en la Red son importantes y lo que puede hacerse para desarrollarlas. Aunque gran parte del libro se ha basado en mi trabajo en la redes comunitarias de Seattle (), espero que tenga relevancia fuera de Seattle y fuera de los Estados Unidos. El URL para la "Nuevas Redes Comunitarias" se encuentra en http://www.scn.org/ncn/nrc . El primer capÃtulo se titula "Comunicado y TecnologÃa-- Un casamiento por necesidad"
Vol.2 No.1 Issue.4 of Iconnect Ghana is out and full stories posted. ICONNECT GHANA is a quartely online, offline and e-mail knowledge service designed to enable the use of ICTs as a tool for Ghana's development. See http://www.iconnectghana.org
Madan Rao attended InfoSoc 2003: Youth and ICT for Development in Mayalysia in June. See http://www.nitc.org.my/infosoc
Veni Markovski attended a Diplomacy & Cyberspace seminar at the Italian Diplomatic Institute in Rome in June.
Kwasi Boakye-Akyeampong has been invited to attend Information Technologies for Development at Oxford University on July 18. See http://pcmlp.socleg.ox.ac.uk/it4d
The CPSR Compiler is a monthly notice with short updates on recent activities of our members and opportunities to engage in the development of the public voice through CPSR projects.
To report news for future issues, send a sentence or two (and URL if available) to cpsr(a)cpsr.org
CPSR provides a discussion and project space where individuals can contribute to the public debate and design of our global digital future. Through CPSR's chapters and working groups, members focus on regional and civic issues developing the public voice. To insure a democratic future in a time of intense globalization, the voice of the public must command a prominent position on the world stage. CPSR frames and channels the public voice.
(c) Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility 2003.
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Last modified June 09, 2006 03:54 PM
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