Last night in Petaling Jaya, EngageMedia's Malaysian partner organisation KOMAS launched its now famous FreedomFilmFest for 2012 with the provocative theme “Democracy: Who’s the Boss?”

As Malaysia holds its breath for the announcement of the next general election, the timing is impeccable. A panel of speakers offered a number of perspectives on the theme: Adam Adli from UPSI/Solidariti Mahasiswa Msia; Yusri Ahon from Jaringan Kampung Orang Asli Semenanjung Msia; and M. Arumugan from PERMAS. All three were all well prepared and eloquent, but the most interesting comments came from audience members, who were asked to respond to a number of questions about democracy on large sheets of coloured paper. This process revealed the deep frustration of many thinking Malaysians with their democratic system. 'I am the boss,' said one man, 'I pay the politicians' wages!'

All the appropriate dignitaries were at the launch, including his excellency, Vincent Piket, 
Ambassador & Head of Delegation of the European Union to Malaysia, who kept congratulating the organisation 'kompas'. Well, I am sure he has a lot on his mind.

How filmmakers will respond to the theme, we will have to wait and see.

All film makers- aspiring or professional- are invited to send in their film proposals based on this year’s theme. The three best proposals will be awarded RM6000 to produce a film based on their respective proposals.

To kick off the productive year ahead, EngageMedia met up for the second time with Gurindam12, our ASTEKI partners in Riau, Indonesia, to discuss and share more about online video distribution and subtitling.

As we've mentioned in our report on the last workshop in Riau, the Gurindam12 group utilizes video and new media to cover and address many issues surrounding this vast area in the middle of Sumatra, ranging from the rapidly growing rate of deforestation to the loss of much of Riau's unique culture.

Our 5-day workshop with them began with exploring FTP for the stable uploading of files and Handbrake, for efficiently compressing video. The several technical discussions helped everyone to re-cap and gain a better understanding of how best to work with and distribute online video.

With the help of Seelan (our new Video Lingua Coordinator), we had a session on how to use Universal Subtitles for collaborative, online subtitling and translation. We also went through the capabilities and benefits of the EngageMedia team page on Universal Subtitles, which we encourage all of you to join. Here's a recent video that's been subtitled using Universal Subtitles. Check it out, and please add more translations to it to help more people understand it's important content.

As luck would have it, this workshop coincided with some major developments on the EngageMedia site. We’ve succesfully upgraded our site to HTML5 and added direct subtitling capabilities for videos via Universal Subtitles. Since last December, we’ve also built and expanded our server in Indonesia, to help local viewers access our site faster.

We closed this workshop with an added video shooting and editing session that emerged out of the spontaneous exchange of ideas between Gurindam12 and ourselves. One of results of the session is viewable here, and many more should be up soon!

Check out our previous blogpost about Riau Workshop I

We made some big updates to EngageMedia in December going live with Universal Subtitles and html5 video support.

You can now view and subtitle any EngageMedia video online using the Universal Subtitles. Html5 video support means pages load faster, videos can be played on more devices and we are no longer reliant on proprietary Flash software.

We'll be going live with a subtitle and translation community project in the coming weeks. Stay tuned for more on that.

Other key improvements include

• play count on videos is now counted when the video is played embedded on another site
• videos are available for download in multiple (5) formats, including low and high resolution quality
• better and more reliable support for 16:9 video
• sort and find videos by language

Full details on the Plumi Blog.

Papuan Voices is a collaborative project of EngageMedia and Catholic Church groups JPIC and SKP KC. It is a combination of empowerment and production. Since early 2011, together with video activists in Jayapura and Merauke, the project has produced over 20 short videos, from the culture of eating 'pinang', doing the traditional Bilogai handshake, to the plight of the Malind tribesmen to survive in 'Ironic Survival' .

On Human Rights Day 2011, Papuan Voices showcased five videos in Jakarta, Arso and Jayapura. There were two videos from the border village of Wambes, Arso (Jayapura) - What Mama Kasmira Wants and The Hope of the Cendrawasih Children, one video from the Jayapura market - Awin Meke (My Mother), and two videos from Merauke - the culture struggle in Coconut Trees that Bear Jerry Cans, and an estranged woman's love in a border village in Surat Cinta Kepada Sang Prada (Love Letter to the Soldier).

In Jakarta, the screening was held in Neo Journalism Club, Galeri Foto Jurnalistik Antara. About 100 people packed the little cafe. Aside from the main screening, the event was also a showcase of Papuan culture, where Gorby the Rastaman combined reggae and Papuan music, and dance/theatre group the Black Wissel played a drama about how Papuans struggle with their identities.

In Arso, SKP KC held a screening and discussion in a church filled with over 50 villagers, including the people featured in the videos. They laughed when they saw themselves, and angered when seeing the injustice. In Jayapura, video activists organised a screening in the indigenous market in the City of Jayapura. It was an emotional roller-coaster ride as the market traders, mostly women, watched in anger of their plight for justice in their video Awin Meke, and saddened to see the fate of Maria Goreti in Surat Cinta Kepada Sang Prada.

There are more videos to be made through the Papuan Voices project, and more screenings to be organised. But as the year closed, violence and injustice did not stop in Papua. As one of the Papua Voices video activist FX Making said: "The problem in Papua is more than just about the Morning Star flag. People in Indonesia and the international community must know this.This is why I choose video activism in this struggle."

FFD was again a lovely scene and event in Yogyakarta. It's been a year since our last visit to the festival and it was so fun to meet many old friends in the same place. Our friends from FFD gave us two days: Dec 6th to present our videos and Dec 9th to join a panel discussion about “Video Distribution”. The video screening went well and very interesting topics came up in the panel discussion.

In the panel discussion, we discussed several hot topics such as how to manage videos and we compared several method for archiving video collections. Many people wanted solutions that would make it easier to maintain, copy and distribute their collections.

There was also questions like 'How do we find a simple way to copy videos? How do we get permission for copying? What should we do if we're dealing with copyright? Also, there was time to talk about how to sell video documentary. Most of the speakers and participants agreed that selling a video documentary is still a hard thing to do these days. While there have been many excellent video documentaries circulating among friends, not many of them went to the “market”. It's as if people don't or won't buy a good video, but that may not be true. The real reason for the lack of sales is that, until now, all the tools and channel for distributing video are owned by big corporations or rich individuals.

Several people came with ideas about creating their own viewers in their communities by using new methods. For example using festivals and opening new spaces for youth to hang out could be options.

We were also eager to share thoughts on how cable TV and internet have changed our way of life and how these technologies are influencing videomakers. Keep in mind that the nature of these tools have forcing us to change the way we produce videos and in someway, the content inside.

At the end of the discussion, we came to agree that we also need to pay more attention to many old videos that are being host on our website. This is more about our responsibility to many of these video makers. There are several ways this can be done, for example, by helping to screen many of these videos, everywhere we go. And also to create more detailed information around each video, which is sort of a curatorial obligation to these old videos.

Check this:

https://www.engagemedia.org/Members/forumlenteng/videos/BILAL_OK.divx/view

https://www.engagemedia.org/Members/scottludlam/videos/climateofhope.mov/view

republished from GISWatch blog

New report on internet and democracy is dedicated to the Arab revolutions

Launching on December 10 --Human Rights Day-- the Global Information Society Watch 2011 report investigates how governments and internet and mobile phone companies are trying to restrict freedom online -- and how citizens are responding to this using the very same technologies.

Everyone is familiar with the stories of Egypt and Tunisia. GISWatch authors tell these and other lesser-known stories from over fifty countries including:

• PRISON CONDITIONS IN ARGENTINA Prisoners are using the internet protest living conditions and demand respect for their rights.

• TORTURE IN INDONESIA The torture of two West Papuan farmers was recorded on a mobile phone and leaked to the internet. The video spread to well-known human rights sites sparking public outrage and a formal investigation by the authorities.

• THE TSUNAMI IN JAPAN Citizens used social media to share actionable information during the devastating tsunami, and in the aftermath online discussions contradicted misleading reports coming from state authorities.

Other countries include China, Iran, Lebanon and Pakistan.

“Written by internationally-renowned experts, the report brings its readers easy-to-read and yet comprehensive articles, many with policy proposals, on the most important challenges protecting human rights on the internet is facing today,” says lawyer Matthias C. Kettemann, co-chair of the Internet Rights and Principles Coalition. “The report's country studies –which are in turn saddening, moving, uplifting-- shed light on how the internet can truly be a catalyst for change – and how it can be misused.”

In his preface to the report Frank La Rue, UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of opinion and expression says “GISWatch 2011 offers timely commentary on the future of the internet as an open and shared platform that everyone has the right to access.”

GISWatch 2011 also includes expert reports from:

• Egyptian blogger Ramy Raoof on the the role of the internet in the wave of recent social resistance in North Africa

• Alex Comninos on revolutions and cyber crackdowns in the Middle East and North Africa

• Ron Deibert (Open Net Initiative) on cyberwarfare and counter-terrorism: implications for an open and free internet

• Joe McNamee (EDRI) on internet intermediaries - the border control guards who get to monitor and censor your content simply because they host your information

• Ben Wagner on Who profits from restricting speech?

Global Information Society Watch 2011

Internet rights and democratisation - Focus on freedom of expression and association online

Published by the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) and Hivos

The report is available online for download from December 8. Watch this space for information about how you can buy a paperback copy.

MEDIA ENQUIRIES

Members of the media may obtain print copies of this and previous reports on request and interviews can be arranged with authors by writing to

Karen Higgs, APC communications manager

khiggs@apc.org

A video distribution workshop have been conducted from 2-5 Dec 2011, jointly by Engagemedia and ASTEKI, People's Association Television. About dozen of young people, mostly student in Pekanbaru came and participated. Pekanbaru, the capital of Riau, a province of Indonesia, located in the center of Sumatra along the Strait of Malacca. Indonesian official language was based on the Riau version of Malay language. Riau is currently one of the richest province in Indonesia.

Many students and young people now helping local news agency, Gurindam 12 (part of ASTEKI network), Bahana (student's monthly magazine), and SIAKvideo to cover news and stories about forest deforestation, illegal logging, poverty. This province is rich with natural resources, particularly petroleum, natural gas, rubber, palm oil and fiber plantations. However extensive logging lead to massive decline of forest cover from 78% in 1982 to only 33% in 2005. Engagemedia-ASTEKI workshop is aiming to share knowledge, tools, skills, to help these young people in this process.

Please check our flickr and ASTEKI page to get more details.

Josephine Lie, a student of visual communications at the University of Technology, Sydney, has recently completed a project called 'Merapi: Stories from the Volcano'. This is an interactive documentary exploring the 2010 eruption of Mount Merapi, Central Java. Shot on location over 15 days in July this year, and (probably) constructed over many months hunched at a computer screen, Merapi Stories looks at the eruption through a multi-perspective framework of 21 local and diverse individuals.

Josephine's approach shows some of the great ways that stories can be told from multiple perspectives through video. She creates a fantastic map of the event that does a lot more than sensational news footage ever could in terms of giving victims and witnesses voice, and contextualising disaster in terms of response and recovery.

It can be viewed at www.merapistories.com

Very flash heavy, so I am having trouble with my low bandwidth, but this is a site I am sure I will return to. And tell Josephine what you think... Projects like this need feedback!

We've done some updates to the site to support widescreen, 16:9. If your video is 16:9 it will no longer be squished to 4:3.

We're still sorting out a few more issues, like retranscoding the whole catalog of more than 2000 videos on EngageMedia. We in fact need to set up a new larger and faster server for this, we're busy on that now. Also you'll notice there is a less than attractive flowplayer logo behind 4:3 videos, we'll be getting rid of that one as quick as we can.

Big thanks to the Unweb tech team for getting this sorted.