PAST EVENT: 24 Nov: Stop the Snoopers’ Charter – a day for campaigners

Date: Saturday 24 Nov, 2-6pm
Venue: Free Word Centre (map here)
Tickets: Free (available here)

Index on Censorship and the Open Rights Group are bringing together campaigners and activists for a half day of information sharing and strategizing, both to explore the Bill in detail and plan how best to combat it.

Headline speaker Cory Doctorow will be giving his perspective on this piece of legislation, and civil liberties groups including Liberty and Big Brother Watch will lead sessions to plan joint campaign actions, including a mass lobbying of MPs when the bill is published.

The “Snoopers’ Charter” – aka the Communications Data Bill – as it

stands will lead to too much information being collected about too many people. Access to that information will be too easy. This will result in accidental or deliberate misuse of the data leading to significant privacy harms.

Join us for this lively Saturday session.

 

 

 

PAST EVENT: 21 Nov: Standing up to Blasphemy Laws: Sanal Edamaruku and free speech in India

Date: Wed 21 November, 1pm
Venue: Free Word Centre (map here)
Tickets: Free (available here)

Prominent Indian rationalist Sanal Edamaruku, currently fighting blasphemy charges in India, is in London for just 2 days. Join New Humanist and Index on Censorship for a lively, rapid-fire lunchtime event looking at Sanal’s case and more widely at the blasphemy laws in India today.

Joining Sanal will be a panel of experts, including retired appeal court judge Sir Stephen Sedley, phillospher Professor Richard Sorabji, journalist Salil Tripathi and free speech campaigners, to discuss the implications of the case for the future of blasphemy in India and beyond.

This is a free event but there will be a chance to contribute to Sanal’s legal defence. Sign the change.org petition here.

PAST EVENT: 19 Nov: The Poetry of Free Expression: Celebrating 40 years of Index on Censorship

Date: Monday 19 November, 7pm
Venue: Kings Place, Hall One (map here)
Tickets: £9.50 (available here)

To mark our 40th birthday, Index on Censorship is partnering with Poet in the City for a special celebration of Index’s remarkable literary heritage and the continuing role of poetry in free expression.

This evening’s event features poems read by some of Index’s supporters, including acclaimed actors Simon Callow, Janet Suzman and Roger Lloyd Pack, and broadcaster Jonathan Dimbleby, Chair of Index on Censorship. It will also feature contemporary poets Sasha Dugdale and Sarah Hesketh discussing their work in the context of censorship and threats to free expression.  This is set to be a very special celebration of both Index on Censorship and the power of poetry.

PAST EVENT: 13 Nov: Free Speech Bites: the launch party

Date: Tuesday 13 November, 6pm
Venue: Free Word Centre (map here)
Guest passes: Available through Eventbrite (register here - SOLD OUT)

Index and SAGE are proud to launch Free Speech Bites, a new podcast series stimulating debate on the biggest topics in freedom of expression. Hosted and edited by author and podcaster Nigel Warburton, the series features celebrated artists, writers and international campaigners, including:

Martin Rowson on Free Speech and Cartoons, Zargana on Free Speech and Burma, Stephanie Merritt on  Giordano Bruno, Irshad Manji on Free Speech and Islam, Denis MacShane on Thomas Paine, Natalia Koliada on Free Speech and Belarus, Ma Jian on Free Speech and China, and Jonathan Dimbleby on Free Speech and Censorship

PAST EVENT: 18 Oct: The Communications Data Bill: ‘Snoopers’ charter’, or safeguarding our security?

Date: Thurs 18 Oct, 10.30am – 12pm
Venue: Free Word Centre (map here)
Tickets: By invitation only. Please email eve@indexoncensorship.org to request a place.

Index on Censorship and the Global Network Initiative will be hosting this on-the-record panel discussion considering the government’s planned legislation around our communications online. John Kampfner will chair a panel featuring Emma Ascroft (Director, Public Policy, Yahoo! Europe), Jeremy Browne MP (Home Office, tbc), Dr Ian Brown (Associate Director, Cyber Security Centre, and Senior Research Fellow, Oxford Internet Institute) and Kirsty Hughes (Chief Executive, Index on Censorship).

Key questions to be covered:

• Do we need the Communications Data Bill to ensure as good online protection against criminal and terrorist behaviour as offline?
• Can we protect privacy and free expression, while ensuring good security protection?
• How will the government ensure protection against misuse of the vast amounts of data collected across all of the public, and across all types of communications activity?

The invited audience will be made up of influential policy, media, corporate, civil society and government representatives. This a key opportunity for frank discussion on the questions that arise in balancing free expression, privacy and security. It will be on the record.

PAST EVENT: 6-7 Oct: Launch of the latest issue of Index, ‘Censors on Campus’, at Rethinking small media

Date: Saturday and Sunday, 6-7 October
Venue: School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) map here, nearest tube Russell Square
Tickets: £30 (includes conference materials, breakfasts, lunches and drinks reception) Book here
Provisional programme

In partnership with Index on Censorship, the Centre for Media and Film Studies, School of Arts at the School of Oriental and African Studies invites you to join the Small Media Initiative for its second conference, Rethinking Small Media on 6-7 October.

As part of the conference, Index will be launching the latest issue of its magazine, Censors on Campus, after the Saturday afternoon panel with a short speech by Kirsty Hughes, Index’s CEO, and a drinks reception kindly sponsored by our publishers SAGE.  Click here for subscription options and more.

The conference will bring together journalists and activists to discuss the terrain of media and political change, namely the potential for digital connectivity and new media to alter politics. In exploring these issues and the debates surrounding them, we will ask:

•  How/when can new media politics and face-to-face politics complement each other?
• What are the characteristics of old social movements and new? What might each learn from the other and which are most successful at achieving their aims?
• How can relationships between smaller and mainstream media be fostered?

Confirmed panelists include:

Jérémie Bédard-Wien (Association pour une Solidarité Syndicale Étudiante, Québec)
Gus Hosein (Privacy International)
Sameer Padania (Open Society Foundation-London)
Annabelle Sreberny (SOAS, University of London)

For more information about the Small Media Initiative and this event, please visit www.smallmediainitiative.com

PAST EVENT: 5 Sept: Index at the Picturehouse – a preview of Anna Karenina followed by a Q&A with Tom Stoppard and Paul Webster

Date: Weds 5 Sept
Venue: Clapham Picturehouse (map here, nearest tube Clapham Common)
Tickets: NOW SOLD OUT

To celebrate our 40th birthday, Index is teaming up with Picturehouse cinemas to host a preview screening of Anna Karenina, directed by Joe Wright, featuring Keira Knightley and Jude Law. The screening will be followed by a live Q&A with screenplay writer Sir Tom Stoppard and Producer Paul Webster chaired by Sandra Hebron.

Amid the glamour and commotion of 19th century Russian society, Anna Karenina feels alone. Trapped with a husband she despises, Anna’s imagination brings her to desire other things. But desire is a dangerous force, and leads Anna even further from the light. Screenplay writer Sir Tom Stoppard, whose past adaptations include the Oscar-winning Shakespeare in Love in 1998, will participate in a Q&A about the film and the creative process of taking a respected text to screen.

Back in 1972, Index on Censorship was born as a challenge to Soviet censorship and the shadow of censorship over artistic and literary free expression. With the support of loyal patrons, including Sir Tom Stoppard, Index continues forty years on to support journalists, writers and activists in their crucial fight for free expression.

PAST EVENT: 19 July: What will Lord Justice Leveson conclude about the future of the British press?

Date: Thursday 19 July
Time: 7-8.30pm
Venue: Frontline club, 13 Norfolk Place, London W2 1QJ
Tickets: Book here

It has been a year since the Prime Minister announced an inquiry examining the culture, practices and ethics of the media in light of the phone-hacking scandal. Since then we have heard from journalists, editors, proprietors, politicians and victims of phone-hacking. As hearings come to a close and Lord Justice Leveson begins to compile his report, join Frontline and Index on Censorship for a panel discussion, followed by Q&A on what the Inquiry has learned and what it should achieve.

Will new regulation damage the free press? How should public interest be defined? Can we ensure protection for sources and whistleblowers? How should relationships between journalists, proprietors, politicians and police be conducted in the future?

Panel includes:

David Aaronovitch, writer, broadcaster, commentator and regular columnist for The Times. He is author of Voodoo Histories: The role of Conspiracy Theory in Modern History and Paddling to Jerusalem: An Aquatic Tour of Our Small Country. Twitter: @DAaronovitch

Brian Cathcart, professor of journalism at Kingston University London and founder of the Hacked Off campaign. He served as specialist adviser to the commons media select committee in 2008-10. He was a journalist at Reuters, the Independent and the New Statesman, and has written books about the murders of Stephen Lawrence and Jill Dando, as well as on the history of nuclear science. Twitter: @BrianCathcart

Helen Lewis, deputy editor at the New Statesman. As well as commissioning and editing, she writes for the NS magazine and blogs for its website, with favoured topics including comedy, feminism, politics and computer games. She has also written forEdge magazine, the Stylist, Square Meal and the Guardian; she reviews the papers on Sky News and has appeared on the Today programme, Woman’s Hour and The Daily Politics. Twitter:@helenlewis

Angela Phillips, senior lecturer in journalism at Goldsmiths College, author of Good Writing for Journalists and co-author of Changing Journalism. She has been a journalist for over 30 years, starting in the alternative press of the 1970s and moving on to work for national newspapers, magazines, television and radio (the BBC and independents). She is also the chair of the Ethics Committee of the Coordinating Committee for Media Reform and gave evidence to the Leveson inquiry on Friday 13 July, 2012. Twitter: @AngelaELL

You can read our policy note on the key challenges for the Leveson Inquiry below:
Freedom of the Press, Governance and Press Standards: Key Challenges for the Leveson Inquiry