WITNESS Joins People’s Climate March

WITNESS added its voice to the hundreds of thousands of people marching in New York City Sunday for the People’s Climate March.

For Kelly Matheson, WITNESS’ Senior Attorney and Program Manager, it was an opportunity to reconnect with old allies.

“I had the honor of marching alongside young people who will be asking the US Supreme Court to determine whether or not our federal government is obligated to protect our air, water and atmosphere.” she says, referring to Our Children’s Trust. The group is one she worked with extensively when she led WITNESS’ involvement in the TRUST Campaign, an effort to fight for climate justice in the United States by pressuring governments across the country to implement science-based climate recovery plans.

For Martin Tzanev, WITNESS’ Video Technology Specialist, the People’s Climate March provided the opportunity to test InformaCam, an open source mobile application we’re developing with The Guardian Project that improves verification of mobile media files.

Martin brought us together, reminded us to follow the methodologies we teach others when filming large scale events in teams, and sent us out to shoot using the InformaCam app. This week he’s sifting through the videos we gathered to learn more about what evidentiary stories can be told via the metadata InformaCam collects.

Below are some photos we took along the way.

Meantime, we keep Kelly’s words in mind: “From Selma and Stonewall to the US Supreme Court, the civil rights and LGBT movements have taught us the power that grassroots activism — combined with hard fought legal battles — has in protecting our basic rights.”

Here’s to those who organized and participated in Sunday’s march, and especially to those who have been and continue to fight for climate justice.

Select an image to view slideshow.

Program manager for Asia Arul Prakkash uses InformaCam to take a picture of the crowd.

Over 300,000 people attended the People’s Climate March.

WITNESS executive director Yvette Alberdingk-Thijm tests out InformaCam.

Digital lead Michael Cervieri demonstrates how you should always turn your phone sideways and film in “landscape” mode when filming on a mobile device.

A WITNESS staff member logs in to InformaCam.

Video technology specialist Martin Tzanev gets executive director Yvette Alberdingk-Thijm set up on InformaCam.

Video technology specialist Martin Tzanev talks with Michael Carbone from Access Now! about InformaCam.

WITNESS also experimented with using a GoPro camera alongside filming with InformaCam.

Protestors at the People’s Climate March.

WITNESS staff get set up with InformaCam.

The full WITNESS crew at the NYC People’s Climate March, Sept. 21st 2014.

Program manager for Asia Arul Prakkash and video technology specialist Martin Tzanev discuss InformaCam functionalities.

Resources & Ideas

InformaCam does a lot of things. At its heart though is a metadata standard we believe will improve the verifiability of videos taken by activists and citizen witnesses alike. For WITNESS’ thoughts and ideas on metadata, see:

• Metadata is Powerful, and the NSA Knows It
• How Video Metadata Can Help Rhinos, Not Poachers
• How An Eyewitness Mode Helps Activists (and Others) Be Trusted

For more information about InformaCam, visit The Guardian Project.

Images: Photos by WITNESS’ Sarah Kerr and Jackie Zammuto.