Kallisti's Journal

Nice article by Cory Doctorow in The Guardian, agreeing with Ethan Zuckerman's "Cute Cats" theory that despite all their issues mainstream social networks -- the Facebooks, YouTubes, Twitters, and Google+'s of the world -- are a great place for activism.  He concludes:

First, we have to convince our own governments that when they mandate snoopy back-doors and kill-switches in social media, they give that capacity to dictators, too.

Secondly, we have to make the connection between copyright enforcement surveillance and global justice struggles, by explaining as often as necessary that you can't make a system that prevents spying by secret police and allows spying by media giants.

And finally, we have to convince these businesses that it is in their interests to make the architectural changes that protect their users from arbitrary detention, torture and murder when they make the unplanned transition from cute cats to impromptu atrocity videographer.

That's 2012, then, and several of the years that will follow. Let's get busy.

Indeed!