For the past few months I have been watching online and listening to conversations offline about the initiative by a group of people here in Amsterdam which looks at how mobile phones are made and how their production effects people and the environment around the world. It is one of those difficult to address issues, because we are talking about a device that is so essential and so present in everyone’s life in almost every corner of the planet. And while we can be critical, perhaps, of the companies that produce them, we still need the device so sometimes the questions aren’t asked and the practices aren’t closely scrutinized.
Until now.
The concerned group of people involved in Fairphone have decided to build the world’s first ethically produced phone, as they explain it:
Our aim of fairness is simple: to not harm man or nature in creating our phone. Not in transporting or producing it. And not in acquiring the raw materials for it.
As their first step in researching and beginning on the production process of the phone, they recently went to Congo (DRC) to meet with artisanal miners and learn about their working conditions, as well as what they would want in terms of fair treatment and payment as the source of the raw materials that eventually make the devices function. In the process they also purchased raw cobalt and brought it back to the Netherlands to be used in their first prototype phones. Thus completing the very basic but very little known step one of building our mobile phones, the mining of raw materials.
After having learned all about their initial efforts to both build a phone and shed light on an issue with global impact, I decided to get involved as a journalist and a concerned citizen/phone user. My aim is to follow this process and pass on information to the public, to stimulate conversations that could help on the road to more ethical production of the devices we love and use so much.
More information and reporting to come. This was only my own journalistic step 1 towards getting to know fairphone and an industry that could use a good kick in the pants.
All over the world our transportation systems, food production systems, and overal infrastructure are being pushed more than ever before. With the onset of financial crisis and the reality of having less resources dedicated to repairing and renewing these systems, the reality of a multi-level failure, a crisis beyond what is now called a crisis, may very well be in our immediate future.
Eleanor Saitta is a researcher, hacker, artist, designer, and writer who has been looking into and speaking extensively about these issues around the world. In this podcast we will talk about the facts that have her concerned and that what perhaps can still be done… as well as what we are too late to do.
Just a few weeks ago Pauline was here on the podcast to update us about the violence in Ivory Coast, as Pro-Ouattara (the newly elected president) forces fought against Gbagbo (sitting president who lost the election) forces. As you may recall the danger was so clear and present that she was unable to leave her home and reported that most people were doing the same to avoid the risk of being caught in the cross fire.
Photo by flickr memeber: cupcaca
Since that report the world has watched as Pro-Ouattara forces overtook the capital and forcibly removed President Gbagbo. While this does mean the new President is finally able to claim the office and get to work, this also means numerous side effects of being in a country where the President, even if he was elected, came to power by using force and violence.
“the first signs are not encouraging. Ouattara started off in the worst imaginable conditions, his speeches lack compassion, and his FRCI army bears all the hallmarks of a rebel group. The FRCI is gradually gaining control over the city and seems to hunting for thieves and looters among its ranks. Neighborhood grocer Salif walked to the bakery this morning and was a witness to the execution of four “thugs” in military uniform who were about to drive off in a car without license plates.”
According to the UN High Commission for Refugee’s, over 1 million people have been displaced by the fighting over the past few months. They note the usual needs in such a situation, food and water, but an indicator of just how bad things are, they point out the need for medical assistance for gunshot wounds.
Yet another change of power brought on by violence, showing signs of being as violent as any other government before them.
Nadia Plesner is a concerned citizen of the world as well as an artist, and she’s deeply troubled by what has been happening in Darfur. She’s also frustrated with the lack of media coverage the topic recieves, while showbiz news has no such shortage of attention. In her painting “Darfurnica” as well as her other work, Nadia has been depicting images of the horrors that people live in Darfur, the political maneuvering that goes on, and images of what makes major media headlines instead of Darfur. In part of Darfurnica, there appears the infamous photo of the ghastly thin Sudanese child, adorned in Paris Hilton style with a chiwawa in one hand and a Louis Vuitton bag in the other.
This is the story of how the painting came together, and how LV would file a lawsuit against Nadia. Demanding that she not show her artwork which contains images of their bag, and calling for her to pay an expensive penalty (€5,000 per each day the painting is shown) if she doesn’t take down her work. The case is pending a decision in early May. In this podcast interview, we discuss the case as well as Nadia’s work in relation to Darfur.
Darfurnica
Nadia’s website which includes info on her Darfur initiatives which you can be a part of, as well updates about the case.
I’ve never been to a court house in the Netherlands, in my 9 years in this country, somehow I never had cause to enter one. After weaving through some of the plethora of government buildings one can find in the Hague, I somehow managed to find the courthouse, though I was somewhat surprised there was no crowd out front. Considering the importance of the case, which features an art student being sued by a multinational corporation for depicting their product in her art, I figured there would be at least a dozen people holding signs outside in support. Silly me, too many hollywood films with people behind police barricades in front of ye olde city courthouse.
Court House in the Hague
I waltzed my way in and navigated my way through very modern hallways, past doors A through G, until I found my destination, court room H. A uniformed cop sat outside the door, the lonely figure in the hallway, fiddling with his phone in silence. I asked if I could go in and he gave a nonchalant nod. As I carefully opened the door I found myself in the audience, creeping quietly to find a seat, being noticed by all among the 15 to 20 people in attendance. I choose a spot by some people scribbling in notepads, “how old fashioned and quaint” I thought to myself in a condescending technologist tone. I looked forward and studied the figures in the front of the medium sized room, 2 judge looking people behind the big desk facing me, 2 lawyers dressed in black robes, one woman standing at the little microphone going over what seems to be a prewritten text, a young bearded man to her left going through pages of notes. Just next to them I see the long blonde hair and nervous look of who I immediately recognize as Nadia Plesner. She looks sad, which is not a surprise considering the magnitude of damages (5,000€ per day since January) she faces. As I look on the left side of the room, opposite the defence, I see the profile of what looks like a very shrewd legal mind, the Louis Vuitton lawyer. Close behind him sit 4 to 5 extremely well dressed, prim and proper individuals. Behind them two ladies are gabbing away into small microphones, I recognize what has to be simultaneous French translation, I presume, for the people back at the home office. The rest of the audience sits quietly, an assorted crew of concerned faces, occasionally shaking their head in disagreement or agreement with a statement that is made up front. Many are wearing little hand written pins with slogans about supporting art, supporting Nadia, and urging “Louis” to lighten up. And finally I notice there behind all of us, taking up the entire back wall of the court room is the subject of all this activity… the painting – Darfurnica.
I happen to be sitting right in front of the image of the boy holding the chihuahua and the luxurious handbag, which I now know is a Louis Vuitton bag. He’s decked out like Paris Hilton, while all around him are conflicting symbols of death and horror in Darfur, and Hollywood gossip-news-images of the rich and famous. In between are images of influential politicians with some role in what happens or does not happen in Sudan. Above it all, the sun, just like in Picasso’s Guernica, only instead of a lightbulb inside the sun, it is the logo of Petro-China, the oil company with the most investment in Sudan.
Just when I thought it wouldn’t get too exciting and that perhaps this would all be very routine until the judge finally makes a decision, the Vuitton lawyer gets his 20 minutes. Pacing around his little podium area, often with his arms folded, with a booming voice he presented a story filled with drama, conspiracies, and even some stern looks-jabs at the “media” in the room . Looking at the judge, even he seemed half fascinated and half bored with the extent to which events can be dramatized.
After long back and forth presentations and a few heated moments (more than 2 hours later), court is adjourned. It is hard to tell what the judge is thinking, but he’s giving both sides a critical look and has reprimanded them all at different times. As everyone files out into the hall, Nadia stays in the courtroom to do an interview with the big Dutch news program. Outside the Vuitton friends are huddled with the lawyer, they’re discussing where to get some drinks before some of them fly off to wherever it is they live. They’re confident but they keep it to themselves, glancing only occasionally at the young people adorned with pins, chatting only a few steps away.
As the corporate lawyer, now dressed in a very nice suit, walks towards the exit, he passes one of the girls with supportive pins. “May I have one as well, I think these are lovely…”, the somewhat surprised and nervous girl takes a step back and holds her bag of pins close.. “No, these are for those who support Nadia. Therefore not you. I think it wouldn’t be right.” Realizing the moment has passed, the lawyer shakes it off like he was only kidding, and walks out the door.
In post Katrina New Orleans, prisons and the justice system suffer from a long list of problems, many of which were there before the floods. They’re also the subject of a battle being fought by community leaders to change and fix how crime is addressed in a city fighting to rise again.
My guest for this podcast is Jordan Flaherty, a journalist and community organizer based in New Orleans, where he works on an impressive list of social issues. His book, Floodlines: Community and Resistance from Katrina to the Jena 6 focuses on the struggle of people in New Orleans, the stories of community and culture that do not often reach the mainstream media.
