[ijc] The virtual movie-viewing experience and civic engagement
Today I went to a packed strategy session with forty-some human rights activists and advocates to talk about how to best take advantage of an upcoming documentary on the International Criminal Court. It was awesome re-connecting with old colleagues from my time at the Coalition for the International Criminal Court, as well as to making new connections with people doing really neat human rights and justice work.
Leaving the strategy session, I started thinking about the enormous potential for combining socially relevant films and virtual worlds to complete the circle from public education to civic engagement...
I've long thought that virtual movie-viewing was a "killer app" of virtual worlds. Watching videos in Second Life has a lot of the advantages of going to the movies -- a shared social experience happening in real-time -- while minimizing the disadvantages -- having to travel to a movie theater, distracting chatter during the movie, exorbitant popcorn prices. One of my favorite all time experiences in Second Life was organizing a machinima festival in conjunction with a real world machinima festival in New York in 2006.
From a civic engagement perspective, virtual movie viewing is a great way to engage a broader public. Movies are automatic draws for lots of people, since they are rich media experiences. SL residents love the experience of watching live video together, and enthusiastically engage in backchat during the show that often is as entertaining as the actual movie.
Watching a socially relevant film in Second Life enables you to have a rich, guided conversation with the crowd as they are watching it. The filmmakers can get real time reactions to their work, even while a movie is still in production. Activists can suggest actions to viewers who are moved by the footage. Educators can provide links to more information on subject matter brought up in a film.
And at the end of the film, you can continue the conversation that will likely already be in progress among the viewers.
For the ICC documentary in particular, I think there is enormous potential to connect people in affected communities to communicate with movie viewers directly using the mobile phone text chat tool that we are developing. Imagine viewing the dramatic story of a refugee in Uganda and then having a conversation with that same person in real time from their village! How powerful would that be?
I'm eager to see how we can integrate into the Justice Center and the Teen Grid video content like this, and use it as the jumping off point for thinking about these vital justice issues.
