Yay! One month ago, I uploaded a video to YouTube, around 4 hours before we had to suddenly wake up to take my then pregnant wife to hospital. In the intervening month, John 2.2 has grown by 2 lbs 5oz, but the film has grown by 15,000 views. Not bad for a few minutes messing around in the office at lunchtime (the film I mean, not the baby…) (more…)
Farzad Kamangar is an Iranian teacher, unionist and human rights activist, charged by the Revolutionary Court of Iran with being a terrorist (through alleged links to the PKK) and sentenced to death on no convincing evidence.
The international teachers’ union federation, Education International, has learned that Farzad has been taken from his political prisoner’s cell in Evin prison (where he has been tortured and denied medical treatment) today in preparation for execution by hanging. He may be executed in the next few hours – it is already afternoon in Iran. (more…)
LabourStart’s photo group on flickr is a great resource for unions and activists looking to illustrate internationally focused communications work. It’s a group of more than 3,000 mostly Creative Commons licensed photographs of unions at work (mostly marching to and fro with flags to be honest, but that gets better pics than branch meetings I guess). Check it out at flickr.com/groups/union
To promote the group and union activity online in general, they’ve hit upon a great idea of a photo contest, awarding flickr account goodies to the winning photos. If you want to enter a pic, you don’t have long left to do so. Go visit flickr.com/groups/labourphotos now and upload your best shot – good luck!
Now I know how Carol Sawyers must feel.
A few hours ago, the little group I started to protest at Derek Blackadder’s unceremonious ditching from Facebook had 28 members. Now at 1,650 users, it’s one of the world’s most popular union-related Facebook groups.
What happened? Well, funnily enough I don’t believe it was solely the wonderful viral potential of the social network (as I was banging on about the other day). Possibly more significant in the development was the fact it made the lighthearted news slot (not much competition as skateboarding dogs don’t have a union) for a LabourStart campaign mailing. Game, set, and in all likelihood match to Eric Lee and his Facebook-schmacebook argument. Eric presses the button. Unionists around the world get mail, and weird things start to happen – very quickly.
So today’s lesson is:
“If you’re not already on the LabourStart campaign action mailing list – join up. Now. Take one of these actions and tick the box to subcribe. ‘Save Derek’ is probably the only mail that list has received that hasn’t been an extremely urgent union case, where a couple of thousand voices in solidarity have a real chance of tipping the balance. ”
Anyway, back to the funnies. This is pretty entertaining to watch (join in here), and will be really interesting to see how Facebook respond. Lots of good organisers coming up with good suggestions on how to take this forward, and a lot of emails going in to Facebook customer services.
All together now…
21 days without a poke,
He’s getting lonely, and it’s no joke,
I say freeeeee-ee De-rek Black-a-dder!
Let Derek back in, and make Facebook safe for unions again!
Okay, having just had a go at defending Facebook from Eric Lee, I’m about to make a sharp Uey and have a go at them myself for something of a slight to trade unions and unionists.
Most people with an interest in the internet and the international trade union movement (yes, all five of us…) will have noticed the name Derek Blackadder more than once. Derek is a CUPE (Canada’s public services union) organiser and one of the leading lights of LabourStart (as well as an all-round stand-up guy). He’s used to running campaigns on behalf of workers the world over, so I think it’s high time we started one in support of him. (more…)
As of this morning, the ZCTU are out on strike across Zimbabwe, in protest at Mugabe’s economic mismanagement. Inflation has risen to 1,700%, the highest in the world, meaning that people’s salaries have become worthless by the time of their next pay packet. Hunger is killing thousands, and reports suggest one third of the working age population have left to try to send home money from neighbouring countries.
Police turned over the union offices again yesterday to try to disrupt the strike and arrested more union staff. This is a very dangerous time to be a trade unionist, in one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a trade unionist.
Labour Minister Nicholas Goche has overruled normal labour law protections for striking workers, saying: “Employers are free to deal with workers who choose to deliberately stay away from work.”
If you haven’t already taken LabourStart’s online solidarity action, then please do. The strikers will need all the support they can get.
Conflicting reports in the expat ZimOnline and the Government controlled Herald. Who is telling the truth? Well, here’s a clue: Which one do you think publishes reader comments?
