Blogger Profiles: Caribé, an incurable idealist and cyberactivist in Brazil
Global Voices Online is very active when it comes to covering the way freedom of speech is being threatened in Brazil. Of these threats, the Digital Crimes Bill, known as the Azeredo Bill, and the discussions over the Electoral Reform Law are considered by the blogosphere as ways of trying to restrict the rights of ordinary citizens on the web. In this post, we meet one of the most influential cyberactivist bloggers in Brazil, the man responsible for the most successful campaign to fight censorship on the Brazilian web, the Mega Não movement [pt].
João Carlos Caribé, popularly known just by his last name, is a born activist [pt]. In his own words: “Activism is part of my DNA—I’m an incurable idealist. The deeper we dig, the more we learn and the angrier we become; sometimes ignorance is bliss.”
Caribé, with the colors of the national flag in the background. The logo represents the Mega Não movement, and was designed by Mario Amaya.
Caribé dreamed of being a superhero and protecting the weak and oppressed since he was a boy, and this childhood ideal has matured over time. He has found various outlets for it, whether in the fight for freedom of speech on the internet, through voluntary teaching, or in his relentless criticism of social media; he says it is impossible to stay still when there are so many distractions. And he is irreverent, as we can see from his Twitter profile:
Procura no Google! Eu falo palavrão, sacanagem e xingo politicos, siga por conta e risco.
Who is Caribé?
My inner scientist leads me to deconstruct established social, economic and cultural frameworks and simulate their obsolescence in order to answer the question “what comes next?” Right now I work in advertising, but in the past I’ve been a DJ and worked in engineering, systems analysis and O&M. I’ve always enjoyed a challenge. I’m an incurable idealist!
How long have you been blogging, and how many blogs do you take part in?
Despite working with the internet since 1996, I only created a blog at the end of 2002. It was called Ex-Gordo [pt]. In 2005 I started my personal blog, Entropia! [pt]. By the beginning of 2006, I had created the group blog Propaganda & Marketing [pt] and at the end of the same year I created another group blog when I first heard about the Digital AI5 and the Azeredo Bill; the blog was called Xô Censura [pt]. We might consider this blog the beginning of my involvement with Brazilian cyberactivism. In 2007 I created the group blog Perspectiva [pt], which is a network for providing and publicizing projects to create opportunities for children and teenagers, and soon after that, in 2008, I created the Blog Cidadão [pt] and the Ciberactivism Network [pt] on Ning. At the beginning of 2009 I was invited by Sérgio Amadeu (who also supports the Mega Não campaign) to be part of the group blog Trezentos (300) [pt], after which I created Mega Não [pt], which aims at being a meta-manifesto, and has far exceeded my expectations.
Between 1996 and 2002 I was involved with other internet projects. In 1996 I started a personal website where I published many posts about management and technology. In the following year I started Flash Brasil [pt], a community that worked with Macromedia Flash. Unawares, I was creating a business model that would lead us to become one of the top 5 resellers of the product, capturing the attention of the Macromedia Marketing vice-president, who began citing Flash Brasil as a successful case study. This got me an invitation to give a speech to an audience of over one hundred network leaders from all over the world in NYC in 2001. Apart from that, 2001 was a kind of baptism of fire, because towards the end of the year internet usage expanded and seriously affected my business. Nevertheless, Flash Brasil still gets a considerable number of visits, with more than 500,000 hits per month.
How did you become a cyberactivist? And what form does this take? (question by Conceição Oliveira on Twitter)
It was more of a natural evolution than a complete transformation. Activism is in my DNA. I’m an incurable idealist. The deeper we dig, the more we learn and the angrier we become; sometimes ignorance is bliss. I felt that I was really making a difference when I devoted myself to volunteering. Currently I don’t have enough time to carry on volunteering, but I miss it, since it’s so rewarding; it’s great therapy, and a foil for depression.
In 2006 I heard of the Digital AI5 through Omar Kaminski —a Brazilian lawyer renowned for matters relating to new technology and the law—in the cyberculture community in Orkut. The bill was proceeding through the Senate and was going to be voted in on November 8th, 2006. I jumped in and we did what we called a protest-o-matic, which was a kind of form that anyone could fill in to send a message to all the senators. More than 3000 emails were sent in less than 24 hours, the bill was not passed and the senators decided to hand it over to other committees.
Since then, I literally taught myself about politics, and through studying I started to recognize clear political strategies. I now saw a world that I had never come into contact with before, one that I could never even have imagined. In the process, I met other cyberactivists and I noticed that the internet is a world of new horizons, where I could live out all those fantastic theories like collective intelligence, crowdsourcing, the cluetrain manifesto, and many others.
I have almost never participated in activism outside the world wide web. I believe that cyberactivism— what many critics call “armchair activism”—is much more powerful, rapid and efficient. It just needs to be consolidated with face-to-face activism so that the “analog critics” are able to understand it. Besides a spot of anarchist activism in my college days, the only public demonstrations I have taken part in were the Mega Não in Rio de Janeiro and (via Skype) in Rio Grande do Sul.
Caribé gives a speech about the Mega Não and censorship on the internet during a public demonstration in Rio de Janeiro. Henrique Antoun is on his left. On his right are Federal Deputy Jorge Bittar and Deputy Alessandro Molon.
Please talk about the Mega Não. How did the idea behind the movement come about?
The Mega Não symbol by Mario Amaya.
Mega Não was a case in which I targeted the rabbit, but ended up hitting the elephant. Digital AI5 was being processed rapidly and gaining momentum within the Chamber of Deputies. We felt the urge to do something broader, something ‘mega’, and I came up with the idea of creating the Mega Não. The initial proposal was to create a sequence of online and offline events that would direct people and audience to the Mega Não movement. I discussed the idea with Daniel Pádua, who contributed lots of interesting ideas, and it really took off. Nevertheless, it took a great deal of dedication to bring the project to fruition. After we came up with the idea of the public demonstration in São Paulo, I decided we would make this our grand finale. Time was not on our side, so the blog was made in a hurry and isn’t as we originally envisaged it. Throughout this process, we were greatly helped by Antonio Arles and Myris Silva.
The name “Mega Não” was perfect, and rapidly became synonymous with cyberactivism against the Digital AI5. The idea of transforming it into a meta-manifesto was crucial for making it a source of information about activism. It was made in a hurry by those involved, but it turned out to be rather good. It spread rapidly via social media, and the blog now receives a decent number of visits, and it is cited on other blogs.
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Developed by several Brazilian activists alongside João Carlos Caribé, the movement has already reached the ears of the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation), with a blog post on the Brazilian President Lula’s recent statement about the Azeredo Bill and its impact on Brazilian politics.
You’re heavily involved in Brazilian cyberactivism. What motivates you to fight for freedom on the internet? (Question by Antonio Arles on Twitter)
“Caribbean Pirate”. Photo by @_thebest_
One reason is my incurable idealism. I suppose the other is my passion for this cause. I was born and raised under the aegis of censorship, but nowadays we have a bit more freedom. The internet allows the voice of the ordinary citizen to be heard. Anyone can produce anything on the Internet, because it has put an end to the economy of scarcity, it has democratized knowledge, it allows people to relate to one another through ideology or other affinities, and it gets rid of the middleman.
As it says in the Free Culture Manifesto, the internet is a window of opportunity for society to bring about a great revolution at all levels. We are paving the way for “social capitalism”, a system based on both wealth and sharing, and that scares the establishment.
There is a covert war against this social movement, provoked by the big oligopolies, corrupt and repressive governments, banks, cultural industries, deceptive mainstream media, and others who are interested in keeping the status quo. My struggle, my passionate motivation is to maintain the benefits that the internet has already provided, and to extend them.
What do you think of the Brazilian blogosphere?
