Thanks for your interest in how I contribute. My passion is advancing global CONNECTION, COLLABORATION AND COMMUNICATION. I do this by building engaged networks and empowering individuals 
to be authentically expressed in partnerships and communities.
One of my greatest joys is enhancing global freedom of expression networks. This I have done with teams at Mozilla Foundation, Google, Media Access Project, New Media Rights and the United Nations.
My focus has been on growing the power and potential of the Internet by expanding engagement in media policy advocacy for an internet that is affordable, censorship free and not tiered in its services.
As a lifelong freedom of expression advocate, working as Communications and Development Director at Media Access Project (MAP) in Washington D.C. was a wonderful experience. At MAP I planned events including “The Global Internet and the Free Flow of Information”. Speakers included leading privacy, human rights, internet governance advocates as well as U.S. State Department officials and Google’s freedom of expression leaders. I organized communications databases, grew social media networks and engaged in coalition building for this organization with a long-standing legacy supporting communications rights.
Furthering Global Initiatives
Through advocacy and outreach work in Washington D.C. Google as Public Policy Event Manager, I organized workshops and planned event outreach for the international Internet at Liberty event which convened over three hundred global activists, policymakers and academics at Washington D.C.’s Newseum to discuss relevant internet freedom issues and participate in participatory workshops.
In 2009, I founded Communication Is Your Right!, an advocacy project which builds collaborations and online engagement to enhance the connections between human rights and freedom of expression advocates worldwide. I was first inspired to create the campaign when I was working at the United Nations in 2006 and 2007 as a communications assistant. Our petition asks the United Nations to strengthen their commitment to Article 19 and recognize the destructive effects of media consolidation. Frank La Rue’s report has been a leading report on the importance of protecting human rights online.
National Initiatives
I’ve collaborated with many local and national media organizations to strengthen coalitions and strategy that transform the national media landscape so that media policy serves the public interest and American innovation.
I’m currently working with leaders in the transformational festival movement to define the value of the culture and to build strategic partnerships within the movement.
In San Diego, California I worked as Communications and Information Officer at New Media Rights (NMR) in San Diego, CA. My main focus at NMR was content creation, events management, communications strategy, outreach, website and network management. I also produced videos for New Media Rights and Privacy Rights Clearinghouse.
NMR offers pro-bono legal assistance to individuals speaking answers about United States intellectual property law. Topics of inquiry include DMCA takedown notices, fair use, creative commons licensing, CDA 230.
Local Initiatives
I led the event planning of Drumbeat San Diego event, which was a part of the Mozilla Foundation’s global Drumbeat initiative. The event took place on February 5, 2011. Over 130 participants engaged in Citizen 2.0, open data, and open source platform projects.
The global Drumbeat Initiative is based around the idea that an open web is essential to innovation and education, and the goal is to cross-pollinate ideas from creators of all types to advance projects that better our local and global communities.
The Drumbeat San Diego event was a highly-participatory event that gave locals a great opportunity to meet a diverse mixture of web developers, graphic artists, programmers, filmmakers, activists, community organizers, and creators of all types that want to be involved in projects that better our community and the larger world.
Locally in Southern California, I also worked with groups like the Campaign for Press Reform and Democracy Matters to help community leaders strengthen their media reform advocacy. In August 2010 we met with local Democratic representatives to talk about the importance of local independent media outlets and encouraged representatives to support Net Neutrality.
Content on this blog is openly licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
These are some great websites and organizations I have collaborated with or support in their global internet freedom advocacy and supporting our ability to connect:
Mera Szendro 