Inside LabourStart

http://www.schoolbusworkersunited.org/

Originally, an SEIU campaign, now being run by the Teamsters.  Organizing campaign is successful.  Provides people with a forum where workers can talk to workers online.  Site is essentially unmoderated, but some particularly unfriendly comments are directed to other sites.  Some ground rules in discussion.  Every single victory is listed by date, location, company, etc.  Some information on Canadian Teamsters.  People need to log in to participate and comment.  We get names and email addresses.

Stu Elliott:  These sites can be a good source of information for LS postings.

Andrew Casey on “Your Rights at Work” campaign.  Election of labour gov’t last year after conservative administration previously which pushed through many anti-union laws.  Community groups organize their own websites on labour rights.

http://www.rightsatwork.com.au

Your Right to Work (book) on Marriott Workers Campaign lays out how to carry out a successful campaign.  Significant work by Peter Lewis, Workers Online

http://workers.labor.net.au/site/about.html

Richard:  Teamsters request user name, password and gather this data and place into the back of the website.  Continuously gathering email addresses.  People will provide more information about themselves if there are incentives.

This is the most significant political aspect of LS.  Our “secret agenda” for the campaigns is to increase the size of our mailing list.  By definition, these campaigns are small and specific.  However, they also are part of our political organizing; they “raise conscience.”  Campaigns “for apple pie” and against global warming.  Anti-child labor campaign.  Ban nuclear weapons.  Such “supersize” campaigns would greatly increase the exposure of LS.  This is how we get our mailing list to a million names.

Guidelines for campaigns.  Small, local issues are problems.  Some requests for campaigns have been “union vs. union”.  We only will campaign for an issue of global significance.  Must be requested by a national union.  Campaign launches should be accomplished automatically.  Vietnamese and Japanese translations of our campaigns.  Impact on employers will be greater if they are received in as many languages as possible.  Maps:  where are the campaigns centered?  Many in Turkey.  None in Latin America.

All of these grow our lists.  How did we attract a substantial number of Spanish readers in the past.

In Australia, maybe national (non-global) campaigns.  Maybe some country-specific ActNOW campaigns of regional value to LS.  (Not enough people are involved.)  Those on our US lists are often bothered by the international character of ActNOW issues.  Campaign issues:  Asbestos?  Job security?

Workers rights issues seem to generate the largest responses.  Korea?  FedEx?  Canada produces the most asbestos than any other country in the world–in CLC, this gets no play:  many Canadian workers are involved in asbestos production.

Eric:  Iran–“How can we help?”  Photos of two women sentenced to floggings.  From silly employers hit by a campaign–there’s nothing better for us than a good liable suit.

Derek Blackadder said that there have been some important books on unionism and the internet.  Some of that information is now dated.  Eric Lee’s book.  Art Shostak’s book.  On the whole, unions may not be making the best use of the internet.  Derek will place his extensive outline of the issue on the LS blog.

We need a new book on the subject.

Is there a need for it?  Art:  this is a critical moment and an exciting one in this country.  And dangerous.  Our friends take criticism poorly:  others are with us or against us.  These books are indispensable.  Our own unions, however, may ignore this material.  Be careful about your publisher.  Leftist presses may be ignored by our own people.  University presses are problematic.

Stu Elliott:  It doesn’t help us that we’re telling unions how to conduct their businesses.  Stylistic problems with presentation.  We can be critical but a “this is how you do it” slant may work better.

Eric:  This is not a book just for trade unionists.  Must be a global project.  From multiple publishers and in multiple languages that can be used by anyone in the world.

Arieh:  Publishing a “handbook” instead of an extensive book may make the information more appealing.

Art:  A complete history will be valuable for future discussions of history.

Eric:  One book that discusses successes and failures.  Need a book by next May.

Need to address popular sites such as FB and Twitter in this book.  Art:  Are we using information technology to carry the water of the power holders or is there a constellation of values that is independent of governments?  What is the “digerati” philosophy?

Should the book include a section on the history and an analysis of LS?  This will be an LS publication.  In a sense, this book has already been written by Espen Loken … of course, it is in Norwegian.

Ass’n for Union Democracy contests.  Labor Tech Conference.  Lessons to be learned from these groups.

LabourStart Jobs, UnionJobs.com, Jobs on oz.labourstart.org.

There is a large market for union jobs.  Labourstart Jobs has been shut down because of high-fees issues.  However, Union Jobs Clearinghouse at www.unionjobs.com has provided an excellent service since 1997.  No ads, no links.  $35/position/month.  There are also postings for internships.

Continuing discussion from morning.  Walk through some of the features of UnionBook.

Blogs and blog aggregators:  Stuart Elliott speaks about Talking Union, the DSA labor blog … and pineapples.  Some are linking LS to their blog pages.

www.unionblogs.ca

www.tigmoo.co.uk

laborgeeks.com

There are an increasing number of bloggers in US, who have no specific union backing, who post material on trade union issues.  Blog aggregators help build a sense of community among bloggers.  They have also created increasing interest in the labor movement, at least in Canada.  There seem not to be prominent blog aggregators involving union issues in the US.

Bernie Lunzer from the Newspaper Guild:  Discussion on the crisis of journalism in the US and the attitude of journalist who are also trade unionists to the internet and its tools.

Facebook?  Twitter?  Our Twitter page is updated automatically every time a Top LS story is posted.  UnionBook:  Elgg allows us to build a Facebook-type site, an integrated social-networking tool.  Eric demonstrated the use of UnionBook and how it can be set to automatically update Twitter page.  Once the coding problems are solved, UnionBook should become much more useful.

UnionBook can be used for immediate and continuing news, such as updating the situation in South Korea’s auto plants recently.

Spammers’ access to UnionBook is a new problem that needs to be solved.

Are we duplicating our efforts?  Different networks reach different people.  Some people spend much time with Twitter who don’t necessarily check UnionBook.  One can receive UnionBook RSS feeds through email.

Keep in mind that if we had had this same discussion a few years ago, it would be in reference to MySpace and not Facebook.

Eric Lee’s  introduction.  Topics:  LS campaigns.  Australian Right to Work.  Written campaign guidelines.  “Super Campaigns” on enormously popular issues.  International relations.  Revive Portuguese LS.  Top Ten languages and  new editions of LS.  Spanish LS edition has doubled in the past year.  LS news service syndicated to hundreds of labor sites.  Regional meetings.  Take Unionbook to the next phase.  Blog aggregators.  Use Unionbook as a blog platform.  Multimedia:  Radio LS.  Labor film.  Photo of the day.  Sell more books online.  Success and lack of success of various projects.  Fund raising:  LS must be the cheapest project that the labor movement has ever known.  Next year’s conference.  Where should we be this coming Wednesday?  “To do” list for 2009-2010.  Most trade unions in US to not know about LS.  Welcome to Washington … let’s have a great conference!

Discussion:  More than half Australian labors use the LS news feed.  After lunch tomorrow, we will continue to discuss how to make ourselves better known to American unions in more detail.

Is is possible to get a feed for particular states?  Yes.

When labor-website writers create websites, about 70% request LS news feed.  Many American trade unionists do not have a sufficient degree of interest in labor projects not directly related to their own work.  Still, many trade unionist don’t appreciate the necessity of having websites.  Average trade unionists are different from “hard-core” organizers and activists.  LS is often approached by individuals who seem not to understand whether their particular concern is one that deserves international attention.

It is surprising that many union locals will allow a LS news feed on their sites.

Languages:  LS began only in English.  We add new languages quite often.  Other than English, LS’s most popular languages now are Finish and Norwegian.  We will not promote an “English only” agenda.  LS is now in 23 languages. What are languages would be useful and that have large constituencies?  Spanish news feed for Latino-speaking unions and locals would be useful.

Computer literacy and access are concerns, too.

See this …

http://blog.aflcio.org/2009/08/17/welcome-labourstart/#more-17584

… for James Park’s report on the LS conference.

LS podcasts?  Should we?  May not be sufficiently popular now.  LS and internet radio:  BBC once sent a reporter to see our London “studio.”  WINS still exists:  mostly American labor news.

Tula Connell introduced President Sweeney.  President Sweeney discussed the role LabourStart has provided for online labor news for the past ten years.  The labor movement hopes to pass the Employee Free Choice Act, hopes to pass health care legislation.  LabourStart has helped the labor movement to provide new models to reach out to trade unionists and the American labor movement hopes to use the internet and these new technologies to reach out to new members and to spread the word.