HacktionLab Leeds 2008/02

Hacktion Lab Leeds 26th October

Summary

This gathering is the same weekend as the Indymedia gathering the day before. So do come along to both. Details of the venue, catering and accommodation arrangements are on that page.

The idea is to follow up on the technical field work that happened at the first Hacktion lab earlier in the year, and the collaboration with the Media team at the Climate Camp.

Let us know you're coming by adding yourself to this list or by signing up to the mailing list and sending an email (please include where you're coming from, if you need crash space or if you can offer space and what you're diet is. Thanks).

Minutes

Some of the sessions listed below have been minuted, although not all of them. You can find the notes from the tech day at LeedsMeetingMinutes

Sessions

Introduction

General introduction to the day and Brunch!

Mobile Communications at gathering

Debrief from the Climate Camp and the systems used for mobile communications used there.

Video editing with Linux

Update! What have we learned so far - and an attempt to work on a how to guide.

Incorporating RSS feeds into Campaign websites

At the climate camp RSS feeds from the UK Indymedia site and VisionOnTV were incorporated into the site. There are a lot of advantages of working this way but some technical issues that we didn't really resolve on the ground. We'll revisit that and try to find solutions.

Video Distribution CMS Tactical Tech and Strategy

How should video and audio be distributed on the Internet? Is it ok just to upload to YouTube and create a link to a high quality download in a Free(ish) codec? Well it's a good start but we can probably do a lot better.

This session is inspired by the work of the Transmission network - http://transmission.cc (nb Zoe from IFIwatch.tv can only join on Sunday afternoon, so please schedule this session for then - thanks)

This discussion will look at alternatives for distributing Video and Audio which are either online services, or systems that you can get installed on a server.

• Blip.tv - an all in one solution that is quite hard to rival
• Drupal - looking at sites currently set up including http://ifiwatch.tv , http://witness.org/thehub
• Plumi - sample site http://engagemedia.org
• Tube Mogul - uploads to loads of corporate sites
• Indymedia - Uk and video.indymedia sites
• VisionOnTv - using RSS feeds and a specialised Miro player

Is there anyway we can work together as a network to come up with a good solution to increase the visibility of our Video and our Audio?

Proposal for RiseUp-style services for the UK

We would like to table a discussion and from this discussion obtain a working group to move forward with the following proposal:

"To establish a group of servers and techs to run a UK-based network of servers to provide web hosting, lists and email services to activist groups, social projects and not-for-profit organisations in the UK (and Ireland)."

Here are some initial proposed aims for this network:

• manage a network of contracted servers hosted at different (worldwide) locations with full provision for back-up and mirroring.
• be a not-for-profit organisation and have a mechanism by which all 'customers' are also 'members' of the organisation.
• have well established procedures and be well-documented, so that it is easy for new volunteers to get involved.
• not duplicated services that are already well-covered by networks such as riseup, but compliment them, fill the gaps, or even augment them.

We are hoping that members of the Aktivix, BLAG, Riseup, Tachanka and Escapegoat.org projects will be there too to join in the discussions.

Some relevant links for consideration

• http://www.eff.org/cases/indymedia-server-takedown
• http://docs.indymedia.org/view/Local/UkBristolServerSeizure