Versace has shut down posting to its Facebook Page after activists covered its Wall with messages protesting the Italian fashion house’s use of sandblasting, a technique for giving denim a worn look.
Dozens of messages linking to the campaign appeared on the brand’s Wall last month after a petition to stop Versace’s “killer jeans” appeared on protest platform Change.org.
The anti-sandblasting messages on Versace’s Facebook Wall have been deleted. The company’s half a million Facebook fans can no longer freely post to the brand’s Wall, although they can still leave comments on content posted by Versace itself.
Sandblasting is highly dangerous to workers, says Change.org, which hosted the petition on behalf of human labor rights group Clean Clothes Campaign.
The process requires firing sand under high pressure, and has been known to kill workers in Turkey and Bangladesh. (Turkey banned sandblasting in 2009.) Anyone who inhales large amounts of silica dust can contract a lethal pulmonary disease called silicosis.
Several major brands, including Levi’s, H&M and Gucci, have already cut sandblasted denim from their collections.
Patrick McGregor, group director of communications at Versace, told Mashable that Versace’s denim is manufactured in Italy in accordance with the country’s safety regulations. No lawsuits have been filed in the matter, he said.
The incident underlines a broader debate about best practices for brands on Facebook, particularly those in the luxury market.
In a recent survey of luxury brands, researchers at digital think tank L2 criticized Burberry for preventing fans from posting on its Wall. L2 saw that as a sign that Burberry was not yet ready to “abandon command and control.”
Fashion brand DKNY, which briefly prevented fans from posting on its Page after a PETA protest, reached a compromise by allowing fans to post freely on its Page — but keeps their content half-hidden in the “Most Recent” tab on its Wall. Posts by the brand are displayed on the main Wall tab.
That sounds like a decent compromise, but not one Versace is willing to try. For now, Versace fans will only be able to leave messages in the comments sections of Versace’s posts, says McGregor.
How do you think brands should handle interactions on their Facebook Walls? Should fans’ posts appear on the default tab of a brand’s Facebook Wall, or in a separate tab?
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Women’s rights activists, in support of those fighting a ban on female drivers in Saudi Arabia, are petitioning the U.S. State Department to condemn the detention of Saudi women who were arrested and held for driving earlier this week.
Support Saudi Women, a U.S.-based group that sympathizes with a movement pushing to overturn a ban on female drivers in Saudi Arabia, has launched a Change.org petition calling on the State Department to condemn the arrests. The petition was launched after Mark C. Toner, a department spokesperson, refused an opportunity to criticize the detentions, saying that they were an internal Saudi issue.
During the State Department’s Thursday press briefing, a reporter asked if the department could confirm that women had been arrested for driving around the coastal city of Jeddah on Tuesday.
“These women were detained but not ever charged, and later released,” Toner said. “This is something that was done by the Saudi religious police and not the regular or national police force.”
While reiterating that it was an internal matter for Saudi Arabia, Toner said the department expressed solidarity with the driving campaign, adding that “the Secretary’s [Hillary Clinton] expressed solidarity with these women who are standing up for their rights.”
He was later asked if he thought it was a good thing that Saudi religious police were taking women out of their cars while they were driving and arresting them.
“It’s important to note that this is not about the U.S. or the West imposing their values on Saudi Arabia,” Toner responded. “This is about Saudi Arabian women … standing up for their rights, asking to be heard.”
“This isn’t necessarily going to be an easy process,” he added. “We’re supportive of this. But this is essentially a Saudi process.”
Toner’s remarks come just a little more than a week after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton publicly announced support for the Women2Drive campaign, a largely social media-based movement, which called for Saudi women to drive their own cars on June 17. Though there are no written laws preventing women from driving in Saudi Arabia, religious rulings by clerics — often enforced by religious police — have kept Saudi and foreign women from driving within the kingdom.
Clinton’s comments emphasized that the campaign was something Saudi women were carrying out on their own, without interference from the U.S. However, she also called their efforts brave, saying she was moved by the campaign. Clinton made her public statements shortly after being criticized for carrying out “quiet diplomacy” with Saudi Arabia, which is one of the United States’s allies.
As the U.S. State Department website puts it, “Saudi Arabia’s unique role in the Arab and Islamic worlds, its possession of the world’s largest reserves of oil, and its strategic location make its friendship important to the United States.” The U.S. is the kingdom’s largest trading partner, and Saudi Arabia also happens to be the largest U.S. export market in the Middle East, which likely explains why the U.S. State Department has been cautious when issuing statements about the driving campaign.
Still, members of Support Saudi Women want the department to condemn the detentions — the first reported arrests to take place since June 17 — that occurred earlier this week.
“Does it make sense to anyone that the representatives of the United States to the outside world have nothing to say when asked if arresting women for driving is wrong?” their petition overview asks. “This is an embarrassment to our country and an offense to women. It needs to be corrected immediately.”
Image via Change.org
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Hacking for social good is more than just a hacktivist reaction to injustice. Many developers and designers are taking a proactive approach to affecting social change by making web apps that aim to improve individual lives and whole communities, too.
At a recent event in San Francisco, about 100 hackers of all stripes gathered to do exactly that: work around the clock for 24 hours to create apps for social good. This resulted in 17 (still quite new) web and mobile applications with a slightly higher aim than that of your average consumer app.
The hackathon, called Hack for Change, was sponsored by Change.org, and was intended to allow some of the smartest people in the Bay Area to create “any feature or app that does good.”
Most of the apps are not yet launched, but you can click through on the links below for early access and sign-ups.
The winners of the day, all of whom received a small cash infusion to help continue building and launching their apps, were three stellar ideas from local devs.
The first-place winner was Good Neighbor, which lets users get quick SMS messages when their neighbors “need a hand with quick tasks or errands.”
Runners-up were FindMeAPet and AnonyMouse. The former is a simple SMS app that notifies users when new dogs arrive at nearby animal shelters. AnonyMouse’s goal is to help people looking for anonymous advice to find guidance and mentorship. Initially, the site will be geared toward closeted LGBT folks.
Other apps built during the hackathon include:
Image courtesy of Flickr, kshep
Image courtesy of Flickr, kshep
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Image courtesy of Flickr, kshep
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Image courtesy of Flickr, kshep
Image courtesy of Flickr, kshep
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Image courtesy of Flickr, kshep
Image courtesy of Flickr, kshep
Top image courtesy of Flickr, kshep
Disclosure: Mashable is a media partner of Hack for Change.
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More Saudi Arabian women drove their cars in the streets of capital Riyadh Wednesday, continuing a campaign — largely rooted in social media — to push the kingdom into overturning a ban on female drivers. At the same time, one of the European Union’s top diplomats sent a long-requested message of support for their campaign.
The drivers were Sara Al-Khalidi, who was accompanied by her mother, and Azza Al-Shamasi, who was accompanied and filmed by blogger Eman Al Nafjan. The group was also filmed by Saudi media group Rotana.
Al Nafjan also filmed another drive on June 17, the original day the Women2Drive movement called for Saudi women with international licenses, or licenses issued by foreign countries, to drive their own cars. According to an email from Change.org Human Rights Editor Benjamin Joffe-Walt, someone later broke the car’s glass and left a note in English that said, “Don’t drive again, Bitch.”
“This could have been a Saudi man or a hired driver worried about losing [his] job,” Joffe-Walt says.
MSNBC has a photo of a similar note attached to a smashed side mirror. The note appears to say “Plz Do Not Drive” on one side and “biatchhh” on the other. Al Nafjan’s family says it was placed as a warning after she was part of the June 22 drive through Riyadh, according to MSNBC. Al Nafjan could not be reached for comment.
The Saudi driving ban on women is not based on any written law, but religious rulings enforced by police have prevented most women — Saudi and foreign — from driving. This has caused Saudi women to rely on live-in drivers or male relatives for transportation, leading to the Women2Drive movement, which began picking up momentum on social media sites around two months ago.
Women did go driving on the designated date of June 17, even though key organizer Manal al-Sherif was arrested and jailed for a few days in May after posting a video of herself driving on YouTube. Some women, like the ones who ventured out Wednesday, are also driving on later dates. According to most reports so far, women stopped by the police have only been briefly detained since they began driving June 17. At least one woman, Twitter user @Maha1410, received a ticket.
Al-Shamasi says she feels the campaign is moving slowly. But Al-Khalidi says she thinks it’s starting to move in a big way, adding that she’s even heard some positive feedback from the more conservative members of Saudi society.
“It seems that a lot of people are appreciating what’s happening,” Al-Khalidi says. “We are not against anyone. We are not trying to provoke anyone.” She does know of some women who have heard negative feedback, while she herself hasn’t received any.
Meanwhile, even Al-Shamasi thinks the campaign might pick up speed. “I think more people are going to drive soon, and we can see that through YouTube,” she says.
Women2Drive continues receiving attention outside Saudi Arabia. The latest message of support comes from Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy. On Wednesday, a spokesperson for Ashton released a statement describing the women’s movement as “courageous.”
“The EU supports people who stand up for their right to equal treatment, wherever they are,” the statement reads. “The Saudi women who are taking to the road are exercising their right to demand that equality. They are courageous and have the High Representative’s support.”
The message came after more than 7,000 people signed a Change.org petition asking Ashton for a public declaration of support, and just one day after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton voiced her support during a news conference.
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1:17 p.m. ET: Updated with statement from Subaru of America
The Saudi Women for Driving coalition has launched a Change.org campaign asking automobile company Subaru to pull out of Saudi Arabia until women have the right to drive. The petition is part of an ongoing movement, with origins largely rooted on social media sites, pushing to overturn the kingdom’s ban on female drivers.
The petition, which has accumulated more than 15,000 signatures at the time of writing, addresses the company as one that “loves selling cars to women, and has built up a progressive brand” for itself. The group of Saudi women’s rights activists uses the letter to point out that Subaru sponsors women’s surf festivals, the U.S. Women’s Triatholon Series and the Outstanding Woman in Science Award for the Geological Society of America.
“It’s funny, though, because while Subaru is marketed heavily at women, your company is simultaneously making hundreds of millions selling your cars in the only country on earth where women aren’t allowed to drive,” the petition says, before eventually going on to ask that the company publicly pledge to pull out of Saudi Arabia until women can drive.
“It’s a chance for your company to live up to its brand, and make a huge difference for nearly 13 million of us Saudi women,” the letter concludes.
Mashable has not received an immediate response to an emailed request for comment from Subaru’s headquarters in Saudi capital Riyadh. However, Michael McHale — director of Corporate Communications at Subaru of America — contacted us to say, “We’re pleased to be recognized as progressive by the coalition and we are looking into the issue.” McHale says Subaru of America intends to monitor the situation closely.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg reports that Tokyo-based Kenta Matsumoto — a spokesman for Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd., Subaru’s parent company — says Fuji Heavy and Subaru dealers in Saudi Arabia haven’t received information about any campaigns. Matsumoto told Bloomberg the company only has dealers in Saudi Arabia — no factories — and that annual sales in the country are limited to 300 to 400 units.
This latest petition comes one day after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton publicly declared her support of the Saudi women’s driving movement. The secretary — who had also been addressed by a separate Change.org petition, asking for support — was previously said to have been exercising “quiet diplomacy” on the issue. But Clinton made her comments during a Washington news conference Tuesday, shortly after the Saudi Women for Driving released a letter expressing disappointment in her silence on the subject.
The coalition is still waiting to hear from Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, who is also addressed in a petition asking for public support.
While Saudi Arabia has no written law preventing women from getting behind the wheel, religious rulings enforced by the police have been interpreted as a ban. As a result the Women2Drive movement began to surface on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter approximately two months ago, and continued to gain online support through copycat social media pages and international viral YouTube campaigns — like Honk for Saudi Women — even after a key organizer was arrested and jailed for a few days.
The Women2Drive movement called for Saudi women with international licenses, or licenses from other countries, to drive on the country’s streets June 17. Approximately 45 did, tweeting images and posting YouTube videos capturing the event. As Eman Al Nafjan, a Saudi female blogger, told Mashable, there is some possibility that women will drive on dates after June 17. Some tweets and videos posted since indicate that this is indeed the case.
Image courtesy of Flickr, David Villarreal Fernández
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Saudi Arabian women plan to start driving their cars Friday, one month after Manal al-Sherif — a key figure in a social media campaign against a ban on female drivers — was arrested when she posted a YouTube video of herself driving around the city of Khobar.
The mass driving campaign is the result of an online movement that began around two months ago, when Saudi women’s rights activists called for the country’s women to start driving their own cars on June 17. Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world that prevents women from driving. Though there is no written law on the matter, religious rulings are enforced by the police, which has the same effect as a ban. Women are forced to rely on live-in drivers or male relatives for transportation.
Activists pushed the movement via Facebook, Twitter and other online outlets before some of those accounts were shut down. And al-Sherif was arrested and jailed after her YouTube video hit the web. Al-Sherif was eventually released from a women’s prison after nine days, pledging she would no longer drive or take part in the Women2Drive initiative.
But online support for the campaign has lived on through copies of earlier Facebook groups. And people in other parts of the world have also taken up the cause. The Honk for Saudi Women viral campaign is one example, featuring videos of women and men from around the world, honking their horns in support of Saudi women who will drive on June 17. The campaign also has a petition on online activism platform Change.org, asking Oprah to make a similar video in a show of support.
Other petitions on Change.org call on U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s representative for foreign affairs and security policy, to publicly support Saudi women’s right to drive.
This isn’t the first time Saudi women have tried to organize such a campaign. The initiative has been in the works since November 1990 when 47 women drove around Riyadh before getting caught and arrested. Eman Al Nafjan, a female blogger and post graduate student in the Saudi capital of Riyadh, says the women were suspended from their jobs and faced widespread condemnation from mosque pulpits. Fliers were distributed with contact information for the women, and citizens were encouraged to call and condemn them.
Al Nafjan says the backlash caused the campaign to quiet down for a while, but this year’s Arab Spring probably inspired women to speak up again — not just to be allowed to drive, but for other rights as well.
Though Al Nafjan, who lacks an international driver’s license, won’t be driving on the streets of Riyadh on Friday, she says she knows of many who are taking part.
“It’s a huge inconvenience not being able to drive,” Al Nafjan says. “And the taxis in Saudi Arabia are unsafe. They are not supervised, so getting into a taxi alone as a woman is dangerous.”
She adds that there are also a number of men supporting the campaign. “It is a huge burden on the men to have to drive all their female relatives around, or to have to provide them with drivers,” she says.
There are also quite a number of men and women against the campaign; Al Nafjan believes they are afraid of change. One Facebook page (now removed) called for women who drive on June 17 to be beaten. And while June 17 was a date chosen at random, Al Nafjan says, some opponents have linked it to a Shia Muslim holiday and claimed it is an Iranian conspiracy against Saudi Arabia. (Shia Muslims are a minority in Saudi Arabia, and a majority in Iran.)
Despite safety concerns, Al Nafjan says many women will still go through with their plans to drive on June 17 — though others might make their protest on a different date.
“If I drove today, or if I drove next week … the only thing that will happen to me is that I will be taken to the police station, but I wouldn’t be taken into jail,” she explains. “They would make me wait until my male guardian comes in and signs a document, pledging that he will make sure I won’t drive again, and that will be it.”
A statement from Saudi Women for Driving and Change.org makes clear that no one expects immediate transformation from the campaign. But many participants view it as a start. And Benjamin Joffe-Walt, Change.org’s human rights editor, says he believes the campaign’s momentum may stay alive — unlike the November 1990 event — through social media.
“It was a big story, it made international news. But the story kind of died in two weeks,” Joffe-Walt says of 1990. “Now, women can really reach out within Saudi society. They can organize themselves via email and Twitter in a way that’s monitored, but much safer.”
“Most importantly, they can get a lot of attention both domestically and internationally for their cause,” he says.
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Online activism platform Change.org is hosting a hackathon called Hack for Change, designed to get engineers coding quickly for social good.
Change.org will pick 50 engineers from a list of applicants and throw them into a programming blitz at its San Francisco headquarters. The goal is to get coders, designers and other creative types to start applying their talents to the non-profit and social good sector. While other hackathons have tried to get its talent to think like programmers, Hack for Change is trying to convince programmers to work for social good.
“The smartest people in the world are focused on problems that don’t really matter,” says Ben Rattray, founder of Change.org. “What we want to do is dedicate the time, effort and energy of those people to important issues.”
The event’s rules are simple, if a little vague: “You can create any feature or app that does good.” Participants can hack using any languages or available APIs and must post their code to GitHub. They can hack individually or in teams but teams still must apply — and be accepted — individually. That kind of openness will hopefully inspire off-the-wall ideas thanks to unexpected pairings (not to mention lack of sleep).
Spanning just one weekend, the programming starts June 18 at noon and ends 24 hours later. The finished products will then be presented to the attendees, invited media and judges.
There will be prizes, but that’s not really the point. Hack for Change is aimed at introducing a new community of talent to the non-profit world. Rattray and his team are trying to make the transition as easy as possible by giving social good greenhorns a slew of ideas to get their fingers moving. The conference will start with presentations by non-profits and conscientious companies offering their APIs. There is also a forum where anyone can suggest issues that need fixing.
Change.org is offering $10,000 of its own cash as seed money — $5,000 of which will go to the top project, with the rest to be divvied up amongst the top picks. The hackathon isn’t intended as a one-off; Rattray hopes to make it a regular event. “We want to create a very clear path by which engineers and designers can find full time work in the social change sector,” he says.
What do you think about a hackathon for change? Are designers, programmers and hackers the next wave of talent to revolutionize social good? Let us know in the comments.
Disclosure: Mashable is a media partner of Hack for Change.
Image courtesy of Flickr, stephenjohnbryde
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Online petition platform Change.org is suffering distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks in the wake of a campaign calling for the release of Chinese artist and activist Ai WeiWei.
As an artist, Ai is best known for his role in the construction of the Bejing National Stadium for the 2008 Olympics and his Sunflower Seeds exhibit at the Tate Modern in 2010. He has also played a role in uncovering government corruption over the past few years, including, most notably, a scandal involving the construction of Sichuan schools that collapsed during the 2008 earthquake.
Ai was taken into custody by police at an airport in Bejing earlier this month.
The petition has attracted more than 90,000 signatures, including many from leading museums such as the Guggenheim, MoMA and Tate Modern, since it was posted last week.
A Change.org spokesperson says that the site has suffered intense DDoS attacks since Monday, sending it offline for periods of time. At the time of writing, Change.org was still offline.
“There’s no evidence that this has come from the Chinese government, but clearly the circumstantial evidence is pretty powerful,” the spokesperson says, noting that the for-profit organization has called on the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of East Asian Pacific Affairs for assistance.
Change.org has been blocked in China for various intervals over the past few years, the spokesperson says.
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