Category: Emerging Tech

ITP2800 – Week 4 – Mobile Commons, TXTPower and Campaign Strategy

Week 4 – September 29 Mobile Campaigns from Text to Video: Texting, Ringtones and Camera Phones


Homework:
1) Create diagrams for your cause proposal based on the pyramid and pillar diagrams below.
2) Read the following:

3) Read this post: Turn Your Blog Into a Native iPhone App in 10 Steps
4) For those interested in Android development, you should download gReporter open-source project and get your development environment setup -> http://developer.android.com/

Here’s the audio from the first hour of class, listen to this while reviewing the text below:

Class begin with a discussion on the use of strategy from the school of non-violent direct action, as means for planning and designing mobile applications for social activism. In other words, approach mobile application design from a typical “product” or “consumer” perspective or even a thoughtful usability/design approach, may not make sense when it comes to trying to implement something to create actual change in society.

In the case of social activism, you must developer a strategy to affect an existing regime. A regime can represent a corporation, government, a specific issue, social prejudice, or any existing state of mind or structure in society that can be targeted for change. A long term strategy is necessary to keep focus on the goal.

Opportunities present themselves over time through the effort to affect change on an issue. They can be expected or unexpected. Your effort should be positioned to take advantage of them as they emerge.

Tactics are short term actions implemented to take advantage of opportunities. They can be of varying length and intensity, but must be aligned with your overall strategy. Multiple tactics can be used at once.

You must also consider deeply the structure of the existing regime you are targeting. Here is a typical governmental regime and the “Pillars of Support” which actually make a government function.

However, this same concept could be applied to more mundane campaigns such as increasing efficiency in shopping or promoting the purchase of only pasture-raised eggs at the Park Slope Food Coop:

These timeless approaches to campaigns, drawing from the likes of Sun Tzu’s “Art of War” as much as from the non-violent victories of Gandhi and Mandela, are useful and powerful constructs within which any campaign must be processed. More specifically, for mobile application design, it is critical that you consider a non-corporate, non-consumer perspective as part of your design process, and ideally throughout your campaigns efforts.

Many thanks to The International Center on Nonviolent Conflict for their great instruction, content and overall efforts in this area of work and practice. Here are some related readings on these concepts and more:

Guest Speakers

Week 4 features two excellent guest speakers. The first, Ben Stein, presented a US-oriented perspective through the work of his organization, Mobile Commons, and the many mobile advocacy campaigns they’ve implemented, including fighting for their own right to broadcast Pro-Choice SMS messages on the Verizon Wireless network. The second speaker, Tonyo Cruz, spoke to us in the midst of the Philippines cleanup from a large storm and flooding in which mobile phones were used to coordinate rescue and raise money. Tonyo’s perspective on the use of mobile in a more social, distributed, “peer to peer” manner, was an excellent contrast to the more centralized broadcast and web-based models that Ben described in the US.

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Ben Stein – MobileCommons – http://www.mobilecommons.com
Mobile Commons’ customers are some of the leading cause-related organizations in the world. They use our web-based application to create mobile programs based around text messaging, voice calls, and web-based interactive components. With those tools, they raise money, build their lists, add interactivity to live events, get more support from the web, and make it easier for their ideas to spread.

Our second guest of the evening was Tonyo Cruz of TXTPower– Mobileactivist, writer and journalist Philippines – Since 2001, Tonyo has helped convene TXTPower, the leading mobile activist group in the Philippines and helped initiate its many high profile campaigns.

ITP2800 – Week 3 – Nathan's Story, Secret Videos and Student Proposals

Homework for week 3:

Here’s what we talked about in class:

I announced my work in porting the Tor Project to Android. Tor is an “onion router” web proxy that allows web surfers in places like Iran and China get free, anonymous access to the web. Having secure, anonymous browsing that can route around censorship is a critical component of my Guardian secure smartphone project.

The story of Alan Turing and his impact on computing came up briefly and I just wanted to make sure everyone knew the amazing yet tragic story of his life. Just recently, an online, crowd-sourced petition effort pressured the British Government to issue a formal apology for causing his suicide, and countless others who were persecuted for their sexuality.

At some point in class, I drew a diagram that I quite enjoyed sharing, and will attempt to recreate here, since I unfortunately didn’t get a photo or capture it using the smart board. The drawing below is an attempt to demonstrate the various layers of network communication layers, both the physical medium and the amount of government/state and corporate control at each layer. Ultimately, the best opportunities for using networks with less control lie at the LAN layer and the Global layer…. though there are opportunities and technologies at all layers.

Spectrum Of Network Control

I also realized that I hadn’t given the class a background on myself, and decided to share a talk I had recently given at Parsons on my life and work. The presentation tells my story through the various computing hardware and devices I’ve owned, used, hacked and programmed in my life. Notice that the devices get smaller, more powerful and more connected over time. The slides are posted below, and then a video from the talk I gave at Parsons is below that.

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the audio starts after a minute or so…

Finally, we reviewed week 2 homework, specifically “mobile videos shot under duress” and the first draft of proposals for the cause they’d like to work on and the technology they plan to use.

You can search #itp2800 on Twitter and ITP2800 on Delicious to see links to some of the homework.

That’s all for week 3…. leave a comment here if you have any questions or feedback.

ITP2800 – Week 2 – Slides, Whiteboards, Videos and Homework

Here are is the homework, slides, notes, links and videos from the second week of ITP2800 – Social Activism using Mobile Technology.

Homework for Week 2

  • Watch the videos linked to here: http://delicious.com/nathanialfreitas/itp2800+week2
  • Continue reading/finish “Little Brother” http://craphound.com/littlebrother/download/
  • Take pictures or video using a camera phone or Flip-style device of something controversial or in a place where you might be seen as a threat to the subject of the video or photo. The goal is to feel/experience the state of using mobile technology under duress. Post videos to a public website and share the link via textmarks ITP2800 or twitter
  • Write a one page proposal for developing a mobile technology solution for a specific cause

The slides begin with a review of a breakdown of the class title “Social Activism using Mobile Technology” that the class went through in week one. Out of that, I came up with some slightly silly, but potentially introspective, alternate titles for the course:

  • People Organizing Portable Robots
  • Social Justice Protest. Invsibiel + Frustrating.
  • Casual Talking Grassroots Gadget (Not Naturally Evolved)
  • Shared Experiences. Mobilized Magic. Organically Evolved.
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Some brainstorming on the service value grid I shared…. the class brought up the idea that synchronous request/response service might provide a different experience than asynchronous messaging application. Larger questions about how and when to make value judgements about mobile services which interrupt, distract and complicate our lives was also brought up.

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Week 1 homework results – students were asked to come up with their own TextMarks keywords and Twitter hashtags to promote a cause, idea or movement.

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The tags/textmarks were: Sgsyn, Desair, IWantData, IWantHealthcare, SavePhillyLibraries, DaveBMiller, Represent, SiOnTheWeb, Mediate, Jeeee, IHeartPV, SecretPublicSpace, Rendezvous, WhatsThatBug, Rainforest, FirstJob, ITP101, GivKwik, PopulationPlanning, NoSmoke

The goal was to consider how to create a memorable tag that is also short. Positive feedback was given on tags that were intriguing, calling the user to take action to find out more. Some of the tags were actually put into use, gaining hundreds of re-tweets in just a few weeks. Another student created posters with mobile barcode images to promote their tag.

The overall topic of this week was “Simplicity is Powerful”, and so we did a whiteboard analysis of the “Flip cam”, cheap video cameras that have proliferated the market, and their usefulness in the service of social activism:

Flip Video Cameras are simple… but powerful.

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– Cheap < $100 in some cases - Durable - Great battery life (electricity is a common foe) - Push-button "fisher price" - double as hard drive storage - Unambiguous about what it is far - Ambiguous in that it might look like a cellphone or iPod - low profile - has a screen for display - has a video output jack - has a tripod connector (gorilla grip clamps work too!) - Can't remove storage (this is a plus and minus) - Easy to carry - quick to use, boot, load, very responsive UI - standard, global usability, globally available - standards based plugs, video (usb, rca 1/8 inch) While it is easy to dream up complex, James Bond-esque technology solutions, often it is the more MacGuyver-esque "off the shelf" approach of combining cheap, easy to use things, that can make a greater impact.

Our first guest speakers for the semester were Mark Belinksy and Emily Jacobi from Digital Democracy. They visited the class through a live Skype video connection, and presented the slides below, discussing their recent visit to Burma (Myanmar) and work in Thailand refugee camps, sharing information on digital communication and social media tools.

Subversive Technology: Burma's Struggle for Democracy

View more documents from Mark Belinsky.

Unfortunately, the video capture of the event failed, but you can view clips from a previous event with Mark and Emily – “Subversive Tech and Burma’s Struggle for Democracy”, a talk held in Brooklyn, NY in June 2009, involved a presentation by Digital Democracy on the use of technology inside and along Burma’s borders, footage from the Sept 2007 Saffron Revolution, where mobile phones and the internet allowed protesters to coordinate and publicize the largest protests seen in a generation, and a Q&A with “Stanley”, a Burmese computer programmer and chairperson of the All Burma IT Students Union.

Subversive Tech & Burma’s Struggle for Democracy (Part 2) from Not An Alternative on Vimeo.

That’s it for week 2… see you next time!

Guardian Project: SMS Encryption (non-)Options for Android

My first post was titled “Guardian Approved” as I did want to highlight applications that were of a certain quality or caliber. Unfortunately, in the realm of secure, private, encrypted short messaging (SMS), I can’t really say I have anything to approve! The best, most trusted solution out there (from CryptoSMS.org) hasn’t been ported to Android yet, and the rest of the offerings either cost too much, aren’t targeted directly at SMS, are closed source or generally poorly written alpha quality applications.

I’ve quickly realized that a quality SMS encryption application for Android (along with interoperability with other mobile phone platforms) is a critical application for the Guardian Project to focus on. One of the really cool aspects of building apps for Android is that you can completely replace the core applications on the device, meaning that an encryption-enabled SMS application isn’t relegated to a third-party status within the device. It can actual take over and replace the built in “Messaging” application and seamlessly handle SMS traffic and transparently handling encryption of messages to and from those addresses you have done a key exchange with.

Where Its At

In the meantime, here is a quick breakdown of what is available on Android today:


  • While not used for encryption, ChompSMS represents an excellent example of a “power-up” replacement for the built-in Android messaging application. It does offer an ability to send SMS through their Internet-based SMSC gateway. This means that as long as you have an mobile Internet data connection, you can send SMS messages without being monitored by the local mobile carrier, and even send SMS over a WIFI connection.


  • Encrypted SMS – $1.99 – “Parents Spy Much? Here’s your solution!” – This app is clearly targeted at the “passing secret notes in class” audience and not meant for anything serious. The encryption used seems to be of the basic letter substitution pig-latin variety, which could be cracked in about two seconds by someone with a pencil and paper.
  • Platinum RSA SMS – Free – “Encrypted text messaging service for your Android device. 1024 bit RSA math” – While the potential for this app seems good and the heavy use of the phrase “RSA math” indicates they know SOMETHING about encryption, the user interface is very confusing, even for me a seasoned user of terrible mobile user interfaces.
  • TXTCrypt – $9.99!

    “With TXTcrypt just enter your message and a password for it , now the encrypted message can only be decoded with that password , just tell it to someone , and send them message encrypted with it , they can use TXTcrypt to decode it..”. This application is very powerful and well written. However, it costs way too much for what it offers. No key change, no proper integration with SMS… it is just a basic password-based plain text encryption tool.



CryptoSMS

As mentioned before, there is a quality, open-source solution available called
CryptoSMS. From their site: “Cryptosms provides public/private key encryption, key generation and key management. it sends and receives encrypted sms and public keys, de- and encrypts files, offers key verification via fingerprints and provides a secure login. ”

Unfortunately, CryptoSMS is only available for J2ME-based phones today, which Android is not. There is a J2ME emulation app for Android, but it is a terrible user experience. What this is all adding up to is that the Guardian Project must/will plan to contribute to and otherwise support porting efforts of CryptoSMS to Android… while the user experience and integration with Android OS concepts like intents and content providers will take some work, the core engine of CryptoSMS appears to be just what is needed.

If you are in the New York area, and would like to learn more about CryptoSMS, you can attend a workshop this Thursday evening, August 13th, at The Change in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. More information available here…

Predicty: Mobile Magic App built with HTML5

Here’s another fun mobile app I helped implement recently using all the latest greatest visual tricks offered by HTML5, CSS, Javascript and Webkit (aka Mobile Safari).

Ryan Oakes, a talented professional magician and proprietor of Solid Oak Productions, spied me sitting in a coffee shop one day working on some code, and asked me if I knew how to build iPhone apps and if I liked magic. Always up for a new and interesting challenge, I said yes, and now, “ta-da!”, anyone can learn and perform a great trick using their iPhone…

Here’s a little more about Predicty:

Finally, a professional-looking magic trick specifically designed for the mobile phone! Designed by a professional magician to make YOU look like the star… not the phone. It doesn’t look like the phone does all the work, but it does! So easy to do, yet people will be totally amazed.

Perform it for friends! Perform it for your family! Perform it in a bar to break the ice with strangers!

Two versions included in app: “Think-a-Drink” and the family-friendly “Predict-a-Pet”

Download it now on the App Store!