A packed room for the 10 Tactics premiere in Berlin

The Berlin premiere screening of “10 tactics for turning information into action” created quite a buzz among people engaged and interested in activism. Even before the event took place the announcement was widely re-tweeted and spread throughout facebook, while the event blog post was cited across a range of different online media. All of these online promotions resulted in an excellent turnout that well exceeded the organisers' expectations.

The screening took place on an icy Berlin evening at the newthinking store on the 19th January with 80-90 people cramming into a space designed for up to 70. newthinking works on issues of social media, open source strategies, digital culture and society, including digital activism. Andrea  Goetzke, curator and consultant at newthinking, co-organised the screening with Malte Reißig, a local designer and programmer. Both Malte and Andrea attended Tactical Tech's Info-activism Camp in India in 2009 and were motivated to screen the film because they knew many of the stories that were included were from people they met at the camp. “We knew the film would feature some really impressive stories of info-activism from people we knew and we wanted to share these with a local audience, to find out how they could be useful to activists here in Berlin.” says Andrea.

After the screening, several people among the audience said they were inspired to use the film in their own work – for example, by showing it to their students of communication and design, by screening it at a film festival on human rights issues, or by sharing it with their volunteers and colleagues in their NGO networks. Several people, who were not yet very familiar with new digital technologies, said they found the film to be a very good introduction into what is possible.

In order to localise the discussion and turn it into real action in Berlin, after the film Andrea and Malte asked people in the room what they would like to talk about and work on together. The responses included a project focused on migrant worker rights in Indonesia, the establishment of an open data Berlin group, pushing for community radio in Berlin, the development of a local 'Yes Men' like group and more generally networking and sharing of information.

“It was really successful” says Andrea. “And it will be interesting to see what projects and relationships now develop as a result.”

Images from the event

Story by Andrea Goetzke.

Photos by netzpolitik.