There are roughly 5,000 protesters at the Democratic National Convention this week. This Wired News story points out that while they may differ on many issues, they unanimously reject the so-called free-speech zone in which they’re penned by the U.S. Secret Service and local authorities. Wireless tech helps, though.
The protesters are also coordinating actions outside the free-speech zone by sending text messages on their wireless phones. Some protesters for a short time Monday converted the zone into a mock prison camp by donning hoods and marching in the cage with their hands behind their backs. The protest zone, which most people here simply call “the cage,” is beneath an elevated section of disused subway tracks near a newly paved bus parking lot.
Activists say the zone resembles the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The zone, surrounded by two layers of chain link fences mounted on Jersey barriers, draped with black mesh and topped with razor wire, violates the protesters’ free-speech rights, said a legal observer for the Boston chapter of the National Lawyers Guild.
“You can’t have free speech inside a prison,” said the observer, Tony Naro, a recent college graduate who plans to start law school this fall.
Link (Thanks, Mike, who also points out that indymedia has been doing a lot of geek tech organizing for protesters on-site)