Welcome to the Tactical Media Files, a 'living archive' for Tactical Media's present, past and future. More than an archive, TMF is an active news and documentation tool for the evolving practices of tactical media.
On Saturday, December 17th, noon, Occupy Wall Street - with support from more than 1400 faith leaders, elders of the civil rights movement, prominent artists and community members - will gather at noon in Duarte Square, downtown Manhattan, for an all day performance event. This event is part of a call to re-occupy in the wake of the coordinated attacks and subsequent evictions of occupations across the nation and around the world.
It sounds like something out of Hollywood, but as of today, mass interception systems, built by Western intelligence contractors, including for 'political opponents' are a reality.
Buy nothing day / a 24 hour moratorium on consumer spending / north america nov 25th, international nov 26th.
adbusters.org/bnd
UPDATE: Call to Occupy
UPDATE #2: Occupy Wall Street and the 99% Movement Persevere
Nov. 15: A massive police force is presently evicting Liberty Square, home of Occupy Wall Street for the past two months and birthplace of the 99% movement that has spread across the country and around the world.
The raid started just after 1:00am. Supporters and allies are mobilizing throughout the city, presently converging at Foley Square. Supporters are also planning public actions for the coming days, including occupation actions.
On Thursday November 17th, the two month anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street movement, we call upon the 99% to participate in a national day of direct action and celebration!
This guide is not a road map or instruction manual. It's a match struck in the dark, a homemade multi-tool to help you carve out your own path through the ruins of the present, warmed by the stories and strategies of those who took Bertolt Brecht's words to heart: "Art is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it."
www.skor.nl/artefact-5492-en.html
April 25, 2011
Declaration drafted during 4 months by the Free/Libre Culture Forum.
Each year, the FCForum brings together key organisation and active voices in the sphere of free/libre culture. It responds to the need for an international arena in which to put together and coordinate a global framework for action, and to the need to defend and expand the sphere in which human creativity and knowledge can prosper freely and sustainably.
Chobi Mela VI to Open a Portal to a Restive World of Dreams
"All that we value, that we strive to uphold, all that gives us strength, has been made of dreams"
Re:Group proposes that with participation now a dominant paradigm, structuring social interaction, art, activism, the architecture of the city, the internet, and the economy, we are all integrated into participatory structures whether we want to be or not. The exhibition showcases work that subverts existing systems or envisions new alternatives to the ways in which individuals can take part, or choose not to take part, in social and cultural life.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Dow Throws a Dismal Party, Few Attend
Underattended "Run for Water" plagued by death, zombies, and dozens of "Dow spokesmen"; truth seems to run free
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
"SPECIAL" NEW YORK TIMES BLANKETS CITIES WITH MESSAGE OF HOPE AND CHANGE
Thousands of volunteers behind elaborate operation
Thursday, May 29, 2008, 7PM
Eyebeam 540 W. 21st St. (btw 10th and 11th Aves.)
Free and open to the public
Organised by de Balie and Portsmouth University, ISEA and V2_ In collaboration with Virtual Platform.
Thursday 12 April
Expert meeting: 10.00 ? 13.00
Public presentations: 15.00 ? 18.00
Publication: Legacies of Tactical Media - The Tactics of Occupation: From Tompkins Square to Tahrir.
Out now and available for download: INC Network Notebooks 05 - Legacies of Tactical Media
Tactical Media employ the 'tactics of the weak' to operate on the
terrain of strategic power by means of 'any media necessary'. Once the
rather exclusive practice of politically engaged artists and activists,
the tactical appropriations of media tools and distribution
infrastructures by the disenfranchised and the disgruntled have moved
from the margins to centre stage.
Webcasts Media Squares now available
International public seminar on the new forms of protest and their media, hosted by De
Balie, centre for culture and politics in Amsterdam, on Friday September
30, 2011.
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Short animation film in homage to the Syrian revolt.
by La Chaise Renversee
Realisation :
Dani Abo Louh et Mohamad Omran
October 2011 - France
Source:
http://vimeo.com/30585735
Oct. 29 #RobinHood Global March
"We take from the rich and give to the poor.
Alright you redeemers, rebels and radicals out there,
We're living through a magical moment ... #OCCUPYWALLSTREET has catalyzed
into an international insurgency for democracy ... the mood at our
assemblies is electric ... people who go there are drawn into a Gandhian
spirit of camaraderie and hope for a new kind of future. Across the
globe the 99% are marching! You have inspired more than you know."
Social Media and the UK Riots: "Twitter Mobs", "Blackberry Mobs" and the Structural Violence of Neoliberalism
"One formula [...] can be that of the mob: gullible, fickle, herdlike, low in taste and habit. [...] If [...] our purpsoe is manipulation - the persuasion of a large number of people to act, feel, think, known in certain ways - the convenient formula will be that of the masses". - Raymond Williams
#OCCUPYWALLSTREET
A shift in revolutionary tactics.
Alright you 90,000 redeemers, rebels and radicals out there,
A worldwide shift in revolutionary tactics is underway right now that
bodes well for the future. The spirit of this fresh tactic, a fusion of
Tahrir with the acampadas of Spain, is captured in this quote:
"The antiglobalization movement was the first step on the road. Back
then our model was to attack the system like a pack of wolves. There
was an alpha male, a wolf who led the pack, and those who followed
behind. Now the model has evolved. Today we are one big swarm of
people."
- Raimundo Viejo, Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, Spain
Signs of the Times: the Popular Literature of Tahrir
Protest Signs, Graffiti, and Street Art - a special issue of Shahadat
This issue takes as its focus the popular literature of the Egyptian
Revolution. Drawing on protest signs, graffiti, and street art in Tahrir
to read the culture of resistance particular to the Egyptian
Revolution, the curators examine how protesters changed the political
narrative through the use of images, memorials, and expressions of daily
life. Featuring examples from an extensive gallery of online images
culled from the collections of several prominent Egyptian journalists
and activists, the online piece is a visual tour of some of the creative
production of Egypt's Revolution. A collaborative curation project
split between New York City and Cairo, this is ArteEast's first critical
look at the cultural production related to recent political
developments in the Middle East.
- Co-curators, Rayya El Zein & Alex Ortiz.
Interview with Rami Nakhle, a Syrian activist in exile in Beirut, who uses social networks to disseminate news from protests on the streets in Syria across the country.
(April 26, 2011 - '14:54)
TMF editors: This video has achieved a somewhat iconic status for depicting the internet dimension of the protests in Syria. The rising death-toll of the protests in Syria shows, however, that these 'cyber-protests' are not without material consequences on the ground. Neither are the protests primarily media-based, of course. They are first of all staged in the streets. Deeply troubling questions emerge about the dilemma's media-activists face promoting the image of a popular uprising with dramatic consequences (even more so keeping the descent into civil war in Libya in mind). We have linked this video with an excellent and rather controversial interview with Syrian political blogger Camille Otrakji, published by the Qifa Nabki blog.
The 1988 Tompkins Square Police Riot - A Video Point of View
Saturday night on August 6th 1988 was stiflingly hot and humid. My
apartment had no air conditioning and I was dying from the heat.
Fortunately that night I was booked from midnight to 7 a.m. at Broadway
Video at Broadway and 49th street to do special effects and editing on
my video work entitled "Free Society".
Unknown Quantity - Foreword
"Contemporary civilization differs in one particularly distinctive feature from those which preceded it: speed. The change has come about within a generation," noted the historian Marc Bloch, writing in the nineteen-thirties. This situation brings in its wake a second feature: the accident. The progressive spread of catastrophic events do not just affect current reality, but produce anxiety and anguish for coming generations.
10 tactics for turning information into action explores how rights advocates around the world have used information and digital technologies to create positive change. This 50 minute film documenting info-activism success stories is part of a larger package containing tools, tips and advice for info-activists.
Published by Tactical Technology Collective, November 2009.
www.tacticaltech.org
Crossfire - An Installation by Shahidul Alam on Extra Judicial Killings
Drik Gallery, Dahka, March 22- 31, 2010.
The Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) was set up on 26th March 2004 to curb
corruption in Bangladesh. It consists of members of Bangladesh Police,
Bangladesh Army, Bangladesh Navy and Bangladesh Air Force. RAB has
increasingly been criticized for the extra judicial killings and
torture that have taken place of people in custody.
Twelve Theses on WikiLeaks
Thesis 0
"What do I think of WikiLeaks? I think it would be a good idea!"
(after Mahatma Gandhi's famous quip on "Western Civilization")
THE YES MEN FIX THE WORLD is a screwball true story about two gonzo political activists who, posing as top executives of giant corporations, lie their way into big business conferences and pull off the world's most outrageous pranks.
From New Orleans to India to New York City, armed with little more than cheap thrift-store suits, the Yes Men squeeze raucous comedy out of all the ways that corporate greed is destroying the planet.
Brüno meets Michael Moore in this gut-busting wake-up call that proves a little imagination can go a long way towards vanquishing the Cult of Greed.
Who knew fixing the world could be so much fun?
5th April 2010 10:44 EST WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad -- including two Reuters news staff.
www.collateralmurder.com
A documentary by Alberto Arce and Mohammad Rujailah.
Running time: 113"
Language: Original in english and arabic. Subtitles in english.
Country: Spain.
Production year: 2009
Distribution and press: Eguzki Bideoak Merced, 21
Directors: Alberto Arce/ Mohammad Rujailah
Script: Alberto Arce/ Miquel Martí Freixas
http://toshootanelephant.com
Book Launch Critical Strategies in Art and Media
Following the September 2009 roundtable conference organised by the World Information Institute in New York, the follow-up publication will be presented on Thursday April 15 at the New School University. The book launch hosted by Ted Byfield,
with remarks by Marco Deseriis (NYU), Steve Kurtz (Critical Art
Ensemble), Andy Bichlbaum (The Yes Men), Ken Wark (NSU), and Trebor
Scholz (NSU)
Wollman Hall, New School University, 65
West 11th St, 5th Floor, New York, NY.
6:30 - 8:15 pm
Some points of departure
Introductory essay for the second editon of the Next 5 Minutes festival of tactical media, 1996.