Wednesday
05Nov2008
Social networking tools failing social justice work
Wednesday, November 5, 2008 at 3:59PM
A follow up on my flickr blues...
I haven't heard back still from the Flickr gods about why my pix were flagged in the first place.. These were the pix that were censored by flickr, and they only un-flagged them after I had emailed them complaining, without giving an explanation:
Palestine murals:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2996403596/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2996455308/
Republican mural:
http://flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2995556355/
Derry photo:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2995571239/
And this photo of me in Derry taken by a friend!:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2995539989/
Whether the censorship was motivated by political reasons like anti-Palestinian and anti-Republican bias, a favor for the Egyptian regime (just like Flickr's mother company Yahoo did in China) or just sheer stupidity, I don't know.. But this has put my work in severe disruption... and moreover friends are alerting me to other pix that flickr has censored too like this photo of me with activist Wael Khalil during Droubi's wedding!!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2995429693/
I donno why the hell would a photo like this one be censored too?! And I don't know how many other photos have been censored, coz I'm always signed in when I check my account..
And since an unknown number of photos are considered "unsafe" by Flickr, my ability to upload my pix to some flickr groups about the industrial actions, trade union news, police torture, have been disabled!
In all cases, Flickr turned out to be just a big screw up like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube...
Please email the Flickr team (case982056@support.flickr.com), with the following message:
Finally, I send my warmest greetings to Flickr and its social network sisters.. Police intimidation, torture and arrests have never intimidated or disrupted the work of Egyptian bloggers... but it's the social networking tools themselves that failed social justice work...
I haven't heard back still from the Flickr gods about why my pix were flagged in the first place.. These were the pix that were censored by flickr, and they only un-flagged them after I had emailed them complaining, without giving an explanation:
Palestine murals:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2996403596/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2996455308/
Republican mural:
http://flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2995556355/
Derry photo:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2995571239/
And this photo of me in Derry taken by a friend!:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2995539989/
Whether the censorship was motivated by political reasons like anti-Palestinian and anti-Republican bias, a favor for the Egyptian regime (just like Flickr's mother company Yahoo did in China) or just sheer stupidity, I don't know.. But this has put my work in severe disruption... and moreover friends are alerting me to other pix that flickr has censored too like this photo of me with activist Wael Khalil during Droubi's wedding!!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy/2995429693/
I donno why the hell would a photo like this one be censored too?! And I don't know how many other photos have been censored, coz I'm always signed in when I check my account..
And since an unknown number of photos are considered "unsafe" by Flickr, my ability to upload my pix to some flickr groups about the industrial actions, trade union news, police torture, have been disabled!
In all cases, Flickr turned out to be just a big screw up like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube...
Please email the Flickr team (case982056@support.flickr.com), with the following message:
Dear Sir,
I voice my opposition to your decision to censor Hossam el-Hamalawy’s account.
Finally, I send my warmest greetings to Flickr and its social network sisters.. Police intimidation, torture and arrests have never intimidated or disrupted the work of Egyptian bloggers... but it's the social networking tools themselves that failed social justice work...
Reader Comments (2)
I'd be tempted to file this one under stupidity. Activists have come across this issue most famously with Facebook, with campaigns being closed and accounts suspended. I found out that they have only 100 customer service staff for 65million active users (one per 650,000), and their time is mostly taken up with legal threats and child protection, so the overwhelming majority of decisions are taken purely by computer. And computers can't make the kind of shades-of-grey decision that activists so often present, so we are more likely to be mistakenly lumped in with spammers and legal threats, and just blanket blocked. The average revenue per user is so low that it's not worth their time to investigate a case properly.
We often think of these kinds of networks as our own space, and of Web 2.0 in general as a relaxed and collaborative place where we're all contributors, but most of the social networks are hard-nosed businesses, who value their contributors as customers, and that means as much as the few cents advertising revenue they bring in. As such, you can't be sure of where you stand, and putting too much faith in them as an activist can mean you end up losing your work.
Sorry to hear you've had such problems here - I'll drop them a note too like you suggest. Congratulations btw on your great photos, which I've noticed many times on flickr.
Ma3lesh ya 7os
open a link in your own site to upload the pics in and PR the link through other websites
eeh ra2yak
Good luck