Continuing our campaign supporting MediaLab Prado in the face of a possible private enclosure, today we’re republishing their Manifesto regarding the takeover. Please read and share.

Manifesto in support of MediaLab Prado

Medialabs are a crucial element in societies, they foster innovation, participation and knowledge dissemination. MedialabPrado (Madrid) has proven to be a successful model and has been consequently recognized. A fundamental aspect of its success is its growing community of deeply engaged users, both in the local and global arena.

MediaLab-Prado was  inspired by the new collaborative practices arising from digital  networks, and has been able to answer two of the great challenges of our  time: first, to shorten the distance between people and institutions,  creating a style of close organization in which users feel included;  and second, to connect and integrate different areas of knowledge and practitioners from the arts to technology, from academia to amateur, and from activist to hacker.

Currently, MediaLab-Prado is ready to evolve and adapt to changes, provided that it definitely has stable working conditions and the support of the City of Madrid. Following a move that altered its normal course of business,  rumors about its future do not raise the morale of its staff and community, nor its image.

MediaLab-Prado has proven to be a learning organization that is able to adapt to new circumstances and  to ‘do more with less’. But times of distress should end as soon as possible. After so much has been achieved, it would be an inexplicable waste for the city of Madrid to lose this space of innovation and acceptance of new and more radical forms of cultural artistic, technological and social expression.

You can change the building  and change the people but it is impossible to transfer a project like MediaLab-Prado that has accumulated an unquantifiable capital. We want the City Council to reconsider the situation, and we offer six reasons why it should reaffirm its commitment to the most vibrant, inclusive and innovative cultural forms:

• It is a project open to the participation of all citizens. This openness translates  into work formats that offer various modes of involvement and  transparent management of resources, programs and activities.

• It is formed as a distributed network (no bosses, no centers, no leaders) that succeeds in welcoming very different and diverse active communities of  users.

• It  functions as a breeding ground for the creation of alternative forms of  economy that redistribute access to decent jobs and occupations at  local and global scale, relying on practices based on collaboration,  experimentation and criticism.

• It encourages  forms of self-organization and self-management based on the commons,  and intends to challenge the need to build relationships with the  private sector that go beyond merely cultural.

• It is an organic organization that reflects on their own practices, incorporating those who use its facilities into the process, allowing constant learning and evolution.

• As an open project, it has produced an innovative pedagogy that has inspired many initiatives, companies and governments to learn new ways of management closer to the production model that many authoritative thinkers predict for the near future. Medialab is an urban innovation engine in the city of Madrid.

The lack of transparency with which Telefónica has been holding talks with the city of Madrid clearly prevents us from assessing  the scope of these decisions and how they affect the future of this  project. Who is involved in the negotiations? What are the arguments? On what are they based? Under what criteria  does the Madrid City Council measure profitability ? After months of uncertainty, it was recently published that Telefónica aims to manage the building to install a center for entrepreneurs, a  ‘co-working’ space and  an exhibition hall. We understand that Medialab Prado is already a  collaborative workspace between citizens, institutions and companies  that promotes entrepreneurship and the dissemination of various projects through exhibitions.

Medialab-Prado in its own projects such as  Interactivos?, has  had a presence in the United States (New York), Brazil (Belo Horizonte  and Rio de Janeiro), Mexico (Mexico City), Peru (Lima), Ireland  (Dublin), Slovenia (Ljubljana), etc. Its workshop format was even worthy of a special mention in the 2010 Prix Ars awarded by the prestigious Ars Electronica Austrian institution for its form of working collaboratively.

Medialab-Prado turns  out to be by far the institution of the council with greatest  international presence and recognition. Few  public programs can boast of  having been thus emulated  internationally. It is incomprehensible that  an institution that acts  as an international ambassador for the city of  Madrid, providing an image abroad  of the contemporary city and linked to  technological and social  innovation, is neglected in this way by the City Council, who seems  unaware of its potential.

The post MediaLab Prado’s Manifesto appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Image by Carla Boserman, www.carlaboserman.net

Yesterday we spoke about MediaLab-Prado‘s plight in the face of its threatened enclosure. Today we’re republishing an Open Letter pleading for help, penned by José Luís De Vicente, director of the Visualizar Program for Data Culture and part of MediaLab’s defense collective. Along with the letter, there’s a video from a year ago featuring international figures showing support for the lab.

“There’s no one better than you to help us to make them understand how important is protecting and preserving the valuable role that Medialab Prado has played in the last ten years. For this, we are requesting any of this three things:

1. A statement or blog post in your own website explaining why you appreciate and value the role of MLP and showing your concern for how the current situation could threaten it. We will link to it and translate it from the website of support we are currently setting up, that should go live in the next hours.

2. For those of you with affiliations with universities, museums or companies, a signed letter of support with the logo of your organization. If you can send it to me I will get it into the website and also printed to send them all together to the City Council.

3. A short video that we can embed in the website, offering your support.”

“Dear Friends,

Probably many of you have already heard about the serious problems that Medialab Prado is undergoing currently that threatens to stop the activity of the center and maybe, in the mid term, it’s very existence. I know many of you have in the past years taken part in projects and activities there, and have good memories of the institution. Even those of you who have not been there have heard about it and know it’s an interesting, lively place that has made significant contributions to this community. Now it needs as much support from the community as possible to go on.

What it’s going on?

Less than one year ago, Medialab Prado opened, after 5 year of renovation and 6 million Euro of public investment, a brand new building. A new facility that multiplies the size of the previous space by eight and creates all kind of new opportunities, with much better resources. While the previous space kept the organization relatively under the radar for many in the city council, the new building is really iconic and has raised the profile of the organization considerably.

Recently we have learned that major telecommunications multinacional Telefónica is looking for a building in Madrid to set up its new startup incubator and has expressed interest in the Medialab Prado building. The City Council, always eager to please, has considered the request and has acknowledged in public that they are under negotiations to satisfy this request. The implications for Medialab Prado are, obviously, quite serious. While they insist in theory on keeping their support for the institution, the reality is that:

• they have not made a firm offer of a new space that is already available and in the right conditions to continue the program with no major disruptions
• they have not committed to invest any resource in allocating the center in a new space
• they have not guaranteed that any transfer could be done promptly and without a long transition that could stop the activity in the center for many months

The reality is that Medialab Prado could be stuck in a limbo for a very long period, and any development from the possible eviction onwards is at this point very uncertain. The community of users of Medialab Prado has serious concerns that this could start a process that could end with the death of the institution.

To make things worse, it’s important to notice that the building that Telefónica wants to take over has been renovated with public money and with the specific goal of being a cultural facility.

How can you help?

We need to show the City Council in clear terms that Medialab Prado is an important institution that is highly respected and valued internationally. One of the most ironic aspects of this situation is that given the problems they’ve always had to understand what is Medialab Prado -not being a museum, a gallery, or an arts production center- they have never been understood that this is one of the most influential and valued cultural institutions today in Madrid and Spain.

There’s no one better than you to help us to make them understand how important is protecting and preserving the valuable role that Medialab Prado has played in the last ten years. For this, we are requesting any of this three things:

1. A statement or blog post in your own website explaining why you appreciate and value the role of MLP and showing your concern for how the current situation could threaten it. We will link to it and translate it from the website of support we are currently setting up, that should go live in the next hours.

2. For those of you with affiliations with universities, museums or companies, a signed letter of support with the logo of your organization. If you can send it to me I will get it into the website and also printed to send them all together to the City Council.

3. A short video that we can embed in the website, offering your support. Here are some videos from 1 year ago -before the crisis started- that can be used as a model:

http://medialab-prado.es/article/medialabinternacional

That is all. If you have other suggestions or contributions, please let us know. Thanks for helping us keep Medialab Prado alive.

Best,

MediaLab-Prado”

The post An Open Letter from MediaLab-Prado appeared first on P2P Foundation.