Mobilizing the web at this historical moment has heavy implications for the way we interact in and conceive of public spaces. At a moment in our local history - 2010 Vancouver - where public space is being severely locked down and demarcated into official and unofficial zones of public participation, our rights as citizens to tell stories to each other is being challenged, by everything from the increase in surveillance of public spaces, corporate logo protectionism, archaic media accreditation processes and the throttling of networks to induce certain kinds of behaviour that are convenient, but totally unnecessary. Advocates of an open web must be cognizant of the political, economic and cultural minefield into which they are about to traipse. In this talk I will try to outline the features and problems of this new terrain, and will invite/present live backchannel discussion on how to make these emerging, public, mobile networks our own.

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