We’ve launched the Web edition of Speak! with an issue on digital rights. This sounds like an irrepressibly twee idea. Adding to that the ad nauseum press coverage that social media has received for its role in 2011’s rocky events…our idea starts to seem like a gimmick at best, clever posturing at worst.
I’d call it a happy coincidence. The idea of running an issue on digital rights has been burning in our backlogs for a long time, and our move online seemed both like a good time and an honourable way to bring it in the light. We wanted to run this issue and wanted to for so long for a simple reason. Digital rights are relevant not only in and of themselves but because they enshrine a host of other freedoms and rights – the rights to free speech and assembly, freedoms of information and of the press. This interrelation will only grow as more and more of our lives migrate online.
As for the interrelation here and now, I encourage you to find out about it by reading what our writers produced for thed issue. They have all worked extraordinarily hard, so we hope you will click through and comment on what they have to say. Above all, we hope we’ve made you think.
Love,
Hatty, the jhr exec and the Speak! team
