Project Title:Hollaback!
Requested amount from Knight News Challenge:$100,000
Expected amount of time to complete project:1
Total cost of project including all sources of funding:$100,000
Describe your project:Don't just walk on, Hollaback! Comments like "hey baby, nice tits," and unwanted attention like groping, public lewdness or even assault are an everyday part of life for women around the world. They are also illegal, demeaning, and demoralizing. Unfortunately 97% (2007 study) of these crimes go unreported. Those that attempt reporting to police are frequently told there is "nothing" they can do. Authorities in most countries (including our own), regularly fail to take street harassment seriously and follow through on reporting these crimes, making them invisible to the media and policymakers.
We envision a different option to report, document, and track street harassment. Women worldwide will stop harassment and assault with digital, open-source technology.
We propose to create an online map where women can "Hollaback!" directly from their cell phones. Quick, 140 character stories can be submitted through three easy portals: a) text it, b) tweet it, and c) submit it through a "Hollaback" mobile phone app. Once submitted, harassment and assault data will be mapped and later analyzed in an annual "State of Our Streets" report which will be sent to the police, public officials, and the media. Automatic email alerts noting real-time harassment will also be available. Local citizens and policy makers can sign up for alerts on incidences in their own communities, or review our HARASSmap to see harassment hot-spots.
After piloting in New York City, we want to make this open-source technology available to countries with pre-existing anti–street harassment communities including: India, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa. A HollabackWORLD site will be launched to document and build awareness around street harassment worldwide.
How will your project improve the way news and information are delivered to geographic communities?Hollaback! gives women the power to document street harassment using the simplest of tools: the cell phone. By providing a platform for citizens to "hollaback" against street harassers, Hollaback's bottom-up reporting strategy creates a pipeline of data that can be used by communities, media, and policymakers. This information will be available online and analyzed in an annual "State of our Streets" report. Over the past four years, HollabackNYC and its citizen journalists have been featured in over forty media outlets. The stories result in real policy changes, including anti-harassment posters in the New York City subways. The new Hollaback! will make it even easier for women to report these otherwise invisible crimes.
How is your idea innovative? (new or different from what already exists)Hollaback! combines community-based activism with technology to create a safe, immediate, and empowering response to street harassment. In 2005 we launched HollabackNYC.com. HollabackNYC integrated two relatively new forms of technology, the blog and the cell phone camera, to create a platform where women can “hollaback” by submitting pictures and stories of street harassment to the site. In 2009, we have new forms of technology available to us. Smartphone applications, GPS mapping, and SMS texting have changed the way people communicate. A 2009 study showed that 85% of Americans own a cell phone. The cell phone has democratized technology, allowing us to pursue a new goal: documenting where and when street harassment happens.
What experience do you or your organization have to successfully develop this project?Hollaback! is a joint project of Oraia Reid, executive director of RightRides for Women's Safety and Emily May, co-founder of HollabackNYC.com. Oraia and Emily are nationwide experts on public safety for women. They have been featured on over 40 media outlets including ABC, CNN, NBC, the New York Times, and published two op-eds. Oraia has attended Harvard and Columbia's Business Schools and is a Junior Fellow at the Nonprofit Leadership Development Institute. Emily has a Master's Degree from the London School of Economics, is a winner of the 2008 Stonewall Women's Award and is a Progressive Women's Voices Fellow.
RightRides for Women’s Safety (www.rightrides.org), is an award-winning nonprofit offering free, late-night rides home to women and LGBTQ folks in NYC and is currently expanding nationwide. HollabackNYC.com is a website with 15 chapters worldwide that is dedicated to ending street harassment by having women submit pictures of their street harassers and stories to an online blog. Together, Oraia and Emily launched New Yorkers for Safe Transit (www.nyfst.org) in 2008, a coalition of community groups dedicated to ending gender-based violence on public transit. Within months of launching, the new organization successfully lobbied the MTA to put anti-harassment ads in the subway in 2008. Oraia and Emily's work unites three key strategies for ending street harassment under one roof: direct service, reporting, and advocacy.
Hollaback! will impact street harassment worldwide by giving women an empowering tool to document these otherwise invisible crimes.
