The last couple of weeks have not been good ones for those who see communications as a social justice issue.
The 2015 Open Internet Order, which ensured Internet neutrality and fairness, was finally stripped out of the law books per order of the Trump FCC, now run by a former lawyer for Verizon. San Francisco’s plan for a publicly-owned fiber broadband network was put on hold, and all indications are that Mayor Breed will likely bow to AT&T and Comcast by keeping it from resurfacing. And California’s own net neutrality bill, designed to reverse what Trump’s FCC had done, got ambushed by an upstart young Assemblymember. Continue reading Profiles in Corruption: How Telecoms Control the State Legislature→
This week on CounterSpin: “As a company, Microsoft is dismayed by the forcible separation of children from their families at the border,” the global tech company declared in a statement. “Family unification has been a fundamental tenet of American policy and law since the end of World War II.” The same Microsoft bragged a few months ago about ICE’s use of its Azure cloud computing services to “accelerate facial recognition and identification” of immigrants, though the post has since been altered to omit the phrase “we’re proud to support this work with our mission-critical cloud.”
The spotlight on the White House’s inhumane agenda on immigration and immigrants is exposing more than the devastatingly cruel practices in force at the border, but also the numerous big corporate and institutional players that are—often invisibly—enabling that agenda. And just like the agenda, the impact of these collaborations extends well beyond immigrant communities. We’ll talk about all that with organizer/advocate Tracy Rosenberg, executive director of Media Alliance and co-coordinator of Oakland Privacy.
In a sign-on letter, 28 groups are calling on some of the world’s largest companies – including Facebook, Google and Amazon, as well as digital advertisers like Nestle, Walmart and JPMorgan Chase – to use Europe’s impending General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) regime as a baseline standard worldwide for all of their services, including in the U.S.
On May 15th, the City Council of Richmond, CA voted 6-1 to enact a Sanctuary City Contracting ordinance, sponsored by Councilmembers Jovanka Beckles and Ada Recinos.
The Sanctuary City ordinance (model legislation can be found here) was developed by the 19-member Deport ICE coalition which seeks to strengthen sanctuary protections in California cities.
A broad coalition of 85 human rights groups have asked Facebook shareholders to increase accountability at the social media giant.
Tageted shareholders include: Vanguard Group, Blackrock ,FMR LLC (Fidelity), State Street Corp, T Rowe Price, Capital World Investors, Northern Trust Corp, Invesco LTD, Geode CapitalManagement, LLC, Morgan Stanley, Bank of New York Mellon Corp, JP Morgan Chase & Co,Norges Bank, Goldman Sachs Group Inc, Baillie Gifford & Co. Continue reading 85 Human Rights Groups Ask Facebook Shareholders To Take Action→
Today, Media Alliance joined The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, Upturn, Georgetown Law’s Center on Privacy & Technology and 37 leading civil rights, racial justice and community organizations sharing a series of recommendations with the “artificial intelligence (AI) ethics board” launched this morning by Axon, a major U.S. police technology vendor. Continue reading Civil Rights Advocates Urge Ethical Review of Axon’s Police Technologies→
In a case filed by public access TV legend Deedee Halleck and poet Jesus Papaleto Melendez against NY’s public access chanel Manhattan Neighborhood Network, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals revived a free speech lawsuit after a lower court had dismissed it.
