MobileActive.org

Fury over Danish cartoons: Do Mobs Rule?

Fury over Danish cartoons - A cell phone is held aloft as protesters angry over caricatures of Muhammad burn Danish and U.S. flags in Amman, Jordan. Digital communication has become a lifeline for protest organizers. (Photo by Ali Jarekji -- Reuters - published on the The Washington Post). [via textually.org]

Control Arms -- Using Mobiles for Petition Campaign

Control Arms, a joint campaign of Oxfam, Amnesty, and Iansa, is running the 'Million Faces' campaign to push for an international arms trade treaty.  Mobile users can upload teir picture and join the petition via their mobile phones in the UK (curiously this is not mentioned anywhere on the site..)

Here is how it works: To join the call for an international arms treaty on a mobile phone, participants text the word 'petition' followed by their full name to a number in the UK (84118) and their name is automatically added to the Million Faces petition.  Alternatively, they can upload their picture (to 07955 474747) with their name and age and their photo will be added to the petition. 

BBC: How mobiles changed the face of news

BBC: How mobiles changed the face of news -

A wonderful 22 minute video from the BBC looking at how user-generated content and mobile phone footage on stories like the London bombings has changed the way broadcasters report the news. The BBC has been looking back at how user generated content has become part of everyday news throughout 2005. Input from news editors from around the world, including Dan Gilmore. [via Cyberjournalist.net]

TXTPower brings gospel of mobile activism to Hong Kong's anti-WTO protests

TXTPower brings gospel of mobile activism to Hong Kong's anti-WTO protests - On Dec. 16 at Victoria Park in Hong Kong, amid anti-globalization forums and protests left and right, convenors of TXTPower successfully mounted a meeting of mobile activists.

Nineteen souls gathered for the meeting, coming from Africa, North America and Asia. The meeting focused more on sharing the telecommunications situation on our respective countries and the challenges facing the individuals and movements using mobile technology for social activism.

Intro to SMS Bulk Messaging, Frontline SMS and a homegrown SMS Gateway

MobileActive held its first conference call for activists, exploring sms bulk messaging. 

Thanks to Ben Rigby of Mobile Voter! Audio of the conversation is here. (thank you, Eric!)

Notes from the call -a Primer on Bulk SMS messaging (focused on the US, for the most part) are here on the MobileActive resource wiki.

Topics discussed included:
* what is bulk text messaging?
* how does it work through an SMS gateway and through an aggregator?
* what are the pros and cons of either method?
* what are other systems (FrontlineSMS, and others) and how do they work?
* what does it cost?
* what is the connection to applications such as CiviCRM (a constituency relationship management system) and Drupal?

Meanwhile, MobileActive Justin Oberman wrote a feature of Frontline SMS, a low-cost tool for small sms campaigns:

Experimental Ring Tones

Here are a couple of ring tones that I made last week after being inspired from the Mobile Active conference. Feel free to pass them around and post your feedback so I can make them better :).
- Bush, “Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job,” overlaid with Arlo Guthrie’s “The Train They Call the City of New Orleans” (listen: streaming download: mp3 | amr)

- Bush on pre-war intelligence, mixed with some British rock/punk including Billy Bragg and Califone. (listen: streaming download: mp3 | amr)

SMS, Social Justice Style, in Africa

Justin over at Personal Democracy has a great article on MobileActive participant Becky, Firoze, and Patrick from Fahamu and their cell phone petition:  SMS, Social Justice Style, in Africa - I had the pleasure of meeting with three representatives of Fahamu while at the MobileActive convergence in Toronto, one of which was the groups director Firoze M anji.... [Live from the conference:]

NYTimes: Text Hackers Could Jam Cellphones, a Paper Says

From today's New York Times: "Malicious hackers could take down cellular networks in large cities by inundating their popular text-messaging services with the equivalent of spam, said computer security researchers, who will announce the findings of their research today." (more)

Interesting research to follow. While it has always seemed that it would be easy to jam a specific phone with many simultaneous messages, the overall networks have always seemed quite resilient to me. I think this research is assuming that the operators don't have a quick way to shut down DOS attacks coming through Internet gateways.

Hopefully, this won't lead to the operators rethinking how open they currently are via SMTP and HTTP, which wouldn't bode very well for us and the type of free and open applications we've all developed and rely on.

$25 cellular handset?

Cell phones need to be cheaper so that more people in developing countries can plug in. Lower cost communication options can help in so many aspects of poor people’s lives, from facilitating the finding of more accurate information on market prices to organizing to speak out against a government that often neglects them.

Bringing cell phones to the masses around the world is also a huge market place for producers to tap. But right now the price of handsets is still prohibitive for may poor people. Cellular-News recently published the article, $25 cellular handset achievable within two years (http://www.cellular-news.com/story/13029.php), looking at industry expectations for lower prices over the next several years.

“Among respondents to the survey, 80% reported a belief that a low-end GSM handset with a total bill-of-materials cost of US$25 can be achieved within two years or less, while 51% believe this level can be reached within one year or less. In addition to electronic and mechanical components, the cost of the handset as presented in the survey was defined to include battery, testing, final assembly, software and IP licensing, and product packaging.”

Mobile Democracy

Donga.com, the Korean news site on technology and the internet, has this little tidbit of an article:

21st Century's Democracy Comes From Citizens

The democratic movement in the Middle East, the democratic revolution in Central Asia, and China;s anti-Japanese protests. These events are weighty incidents that have shaken the world this year. Behind all these incidents are mobile phones and the Internet. In other words,mobile power; and Internet power; made people power.

If the print media led a modern revolution and TV pulled down the Berlin Wall, the thumb revolution,represented by text messages from mobile phones and the Internet, is currently destroying the wall of a controlled society after emerging as a new kind of political power.

Experiencing the recent candlelight protest around Gwanghwamun organized by high school freshmen, the rally against the impeachment of President Roh, and the group of extremely supporters of President Roh in the 2002 presidential election, Korea is already a developed country in terms of mobile phone demonstrations.