Notices by Constructive Journalism (constructivejournalism@social.coop)

Co-ops, democratically run and emphasizing long-term sustainability over short-term profits, are a key part of the #SolidarityEconomy.

Earlier this month, Wired UK published a brief but interesting profile of "CoTech, a growing network of tech co-operatives in the UK. There are currently 30 tech businesses united under the CoTech banner, which range from filmmakers to programmers; they collectively employ more than 250 staff and have revenues of over £10.2 million."

http://www.wired.co.uk/article/cotech-tech-cooperatives-blake-house-outlandish

In the 1970s, a group called NARMIC supported the movement against the #Vietnam war with research such as:

- the top 100 defense contractors making the war possible;

- a slideshow showing the automated weapons systems used, and their horrific impact.

LittleSis (which maintains a power research database of its own) is profiling this important work, so that it can inform and inspire #opendata activists today:

https://news.littlesis.org/2017/10/24/researchers-against-the-war-machine-the-story-of-narmic/

https://news.littlesis.org/2018/05/30/the-research-arm-of-the-peace-movement-how-power-researchers-helped-the-vietnam-antiwar-movement/

Lucy Purdy writes about South London's new #LibraryOfThings, a community lending library for various tools and appliances:

https://www.positive.news/2018/society/32703/library-of-things-borrow-power-tools-ukuleles-and-ice-cream-makers-alongside-books

The Wikipedia article about the movement is pretty comprehensive, as well:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_of_Things

Those fighting for change often draw inspiration from #music. A beautiful article about Stimela, a #SouthAfrican song by Hugh Masekela that describes the migrant labor system of the apartheid era.

"This train carries young and old, African men

Who are conscripted to come and work on contract

In the golden mineral mines of Johannesburg

And its surrounding metropolis, sixteen hours or more a day

For almost no pay."

https://theconversation.com/the-best-anthem-for-workers-day-stimela-a-tale-about-apartheids-migrant-labour-system-95794

The Atlantic takes a closer look at how Slack managed to create a more diverse tech team than most other US tech companies, e.g.:

- recruit via training programs focused on women, black and Latino engineers
- ditch whiteboard interviews
- wipe personal identifiers from code reviews
- standardize interview questions
- perform "mock interviews" with existing hires.

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/04/how-slack-got-ahead-in-diversity/558806/

A city, like a social network, can be hostile or welcoming, exploitative or cooperative; it can foster meaningful connections or impede them.

How can we become more intentional about the #cities we live in? We can look at examples of doing things differently, recognize patterns, adapt & apply them. This article by Amanda Abrams looks at a few examples of neighborhood organizing, from "senior villages" in the US to "sharing villages" in Korea:

https://blog.p2pfoundation.net/why-urban-villages-are-on-the-rise-around-the-world/2018/04/14 https://social.coop/media/WpuccAafrhPObJyHXrc

Daphne Galizia, who investigated corruption in #Malta, was murdered last year:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daphne_Caruana_Galizia

Journalists are fighting back against attempts to silence them. 18 news organizations from 15 countries are coordinating the #DaphneProject, to tell her stories over the coming weeks. See, e.g.:

https://www.occrp.org/en/thedaphneproject/

The project is being coordinated by #ForbiddenStories, an NPO specifically set up to amplify the stories of murdered journalists.

More about Daphne:
http://niemanreports.org/articles/she-set-the-standard-and-then-raised-it/

Citations are as important to #science as hyperlinks are to the web. What if the entire citation graph was available as open data? We're getting closer to this being a reality. Dario Taraborelli, who leads Wikimedia's research team, writes on Boing Boing about the Initiative for Open Citations (https://i4oc.org/):

https://boingboing.net/2018/04/14/open-graphs.html

#opendata #openaccess

Have you heard of repair cafes, local meeting places where people come together to fix stuff that would otherwise end up as #waste? According to https://repaircafe.org/ there are more than 1,500 repair cafes world-wide -- a growing, noncommercial global movement.

This article in The Guardian from last month gives a good introduction: "Can we fix it? The repair cafes waging war on throwaway culture"

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/15/can-we-fix-it-the-repair-cafes-waging-war-on-throwaway-culture

Hello fediverse! This account will toot a few stories a week that are examples of solutions-focused journalism: how people are working to address inequality, prejudice, and exploitative economic systems. Want to help curate stories? Send a private message, either to this account or to @eloquence.

This account is not a bot - all stories are selected and summarized with love. :)

#introductions