apc.au blog

It was 20 years ago come this May when the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) was founded. Although the name and principles by which it was established were nutted out a couple of years earlier, the formalisation of what has been a journey of ground-breaking efforts across the globe, took a little longer to swing into place.

This May I will be meeting with other members of the APC board nearby the Sterkfontein Caves, about an hour or so from Johannesburg, South Africa. Part of this meeting will put in place some of the activities that will see all members of the APC come together in November to celebrate our achievements and the road ahead.

The Association for Progressive Communications (APC) is conducting an “End of Term Evaluation” covering the period 2004-2008 so they are asking all members to provide a story about the most significant change the APC has produced during that period. As members of APC, we were invited to include our perspective on the most significant achievement of that period.

Where to begin? During this time, staff & members of APC have been key drivers in the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), the establishment of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) and the globalisation of ICANN. To me, this was pretty big stuff as I’m a big believer in the Internet being a global enterprise with equal input required from “we the people” as well as corporate & governmental groups.

Of course, there was much more than that to consider. Over the four year period in question APC has also been achieving great results connecting people in the “Global South” to online information that helps them improve their lives. There has been great work on Gender Issues (including the Gender Evaluation Methodology and GenderIT.org) and the ItrainOnline initiative.

With so much work being done by APC and its members in so many areas, which one thing would we select as being the most significant to us? Well, we actually chose two as they were both fundamental to the work we do.

Here is our submission to APC regarding what we believe was their most significant achievement for 2004 to 2008:

From apc.au’s perspective, perhaps the most significant aspect of APC’s work from 2004 to 2008 has been the publication of resource materials, produced largely in collaboration with contracted members and associates, that members can employ in their own work.

Of specific interest to apc.au has been the development of the APC Internet Rights Charter. Since our beginning in 1997, we have worked towards the goals of equality, freedom and empowerment in the online world. The fundamental concepts expressed in the Internet Rights Charter are a framework that neatly encapsulates the foundations of our work.

Access to knowledge and sharing what we learn are key aspects of the projects we take on and the content we produce. We are frequently recognised as leading the way in the promotion and application of open and flexible content licenses (eg: Creative Commons) and free and open source software. We work within our sector to leverage ICTs to empower people online. All of this is driven by our adherence to the concepts so succinctly captured in the Internet Rights Charter.

The APC Internet Rights Charter, particularly relevant to APC’s strategic planning outcomes for 2004-2008, provides us with a tangible product that expresses our core, fundamental beliefs, our organisational DNA. This allows external groups to understand our motivations and provides us with a measure we can assess our activities against.

In addition to the Internet Rights charter, APC’s engagement with international ICT Policy processes during 2004-2008 has supported our own efforts in Australia, particularly in fostering a broader participation in the early WSIS. Additionally, materials produced through WSIS, such as the ICT Policy Handbook, have greatly assisted in the ease in which complex issues are translated.

The Handbook formed the basis of the “Your Rights Online Forum” events we ran in association with the Arts Law Consortium. These forums gathered representatives from the Australian Creative Commons Clinic, the Australian Performing Right Association, media groups and a number of artists themselves for discussions and debate about what rights artists actually have in an increasingly digital world.

These activities, and the promotion of participation in ICT policy processes was in part a trigger for the co-founding of Open Spectrum Australia with independent and community media representatives.

One recommendation apc.au would like to make, given it’s knowledge of APC’s strategic priorities during the ETA period, from both the perspective of a long-time member and our participation on its Board of Directors, is ensured capacity within APC programs to work consultatively with individual members on their own initiatives. This may not be the case with many members from developing countries, who often enjoy greater participation with APC programs, and so they should, but it ought be far more widespread without taxing the resources of management and staff.

It has been, and continues to be a rewarding expression of solidarity within the APC, both in our relationships with other members and the long-standing engagements with APC’s steady growth, reach and influence.

Grant McHerron & Andrew Garton
Directors, apc.au

Asking the question, what is the commons? A random selection of iSummit 2008 participants, Sapporo, Japan. Two short samplers from the forth-coming micro-doc, Nailing The Commons.

Identifying the Information Commons #01 from andrew garton on Vimeo.

Nailing the Commons #02 from andrew garton on Vimeo.

Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Australia licence.

Last nights VIDEO SLAM Remix Forum was a success… It was amazing! The Horse Bazaar was packed! There were cheers for the teams and discussion between the legal crew after the screenings raised issues that I’d never heard discussed in any Creative Commons (CC) forum space.

Elliott Bledsoe and I spent the last hours of the evening talking about quite a few CC and related projects… he stated again, that this is the only initiative in the world that uses CC licenses in this way, that not only provides a workshop in how they are used, but also results in real, watchable films!

More on the Remix Forum OPEN CHANNEL VIDEO SLAM Blog… includes a run-down of proceedings.

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/andrew-garton/2537852037/ © All rights reserved

From 1988, a small community of computer engineers, software developers, writers, poets, unionists and community workers fanned out across South Asia, South East Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe with modems in their back-packs and dial-up software in their pockets. It was perhaps the single most intensive effort to get people online since the establishment of ARPANET, and certainly prior to the broad scale uptake of the World Wide Web.

Read more…

We’ve come to the end of another heady, productive and weary strategic planning session for the APC’s 2008 – 20012 Action Plan. This was held alongside staff and management meetings, as well as the first meeting of APC’s new Executive Board (elected by APC Council, Nov 2007) .

What we have here is one of the many pieces of butcher’s paper used to visualise program activities… here looked at the role an incubation space would play in relation to each program area, including management systems.

I’m always struck by the commitment APC management and staff make to these processes… our schedule was jam packed from dawn to dusk and often well into each night. The Ithala Reserve is an impressive environment to be working from, to be inspired by and to explore… if there was one thing I would have wanted more of, is time for reflection… something we offer little time for, but which is surely necessary as we move through indeed one of the more complex and challenging times of human history.