For Immediate Release, February 25, 2013
Contact: Steven Ruder, 202-429-3825

(Washington) - The United States Institute of Peace (USIP) and the Independent Television Service (ITVS), the leading funder of U.S. independent public television productions, will present Media that Moves Millions on February 28, in Washington D.C. Media that Moves Millions is the fourth installment of the Media as Global Diplomat leadership series, aimed at leveraging global media to highlight innovative models for international conflict prevention. A complete list of the conference’s agenda and speakers is available at mediathatmovesmillions.eventbrite.com.

"USIP is honored to be co-hosting Media that Moves Millions," said USIP Executive Vice President Kristin Lord. "The insights we gain from the powerful change agents coming to this meeting will be key to the development of new ideas with the potential to help reduce future conflict."

Media that Moves Millions looks beyond the headlines to understand the role of social media in mass movements for peaceful social change. A gathering of tech savvy peacebuilders and change agents, the day-long summit will feature many of those people and organizations at the forefront of innovation, including: Nicholas Kristof, journalist, author, op-ed columnist, and a winner of two Pulitzer Prizes; Ben Keesey, CEO of Invisible Children; Frank Sesno, award-winning American journalist; Matthew Perault, manager for privacy and global policy at Facebook; and Alec Ross, senior advisor for innovation to the Secretary of State. Other notable speakers include president and CEO of the United Nations Foundation, Kathy Calvin, Corporation for Public Broadcasting president and CEO Patricia Harrison, and Sally Jo Fifer, president & CEO of ITVS.

"With media consumption soaring around the globe, now is the time to deepen our commitment to using powerful content and tools to help youth develop the skills and capacity for peaceful problem-solving,” said Sally Fifer, CEO and president of ITVS.
 
The first part of the Media that Moves Millions summit will explore campaigns that have captured the world’s attention by successfully using participatory media for social change including the “We Are All Khaled Said”, “Half the Sky”, and “Kony 2012” campaigns. The second portion of the day will offer hands-on instruction by experts from Facebook, Twitter, and Indiegogo to individuals and organizations seeking to use the ever-expanding toolkit of media for social change and peace building.

Among the topics to be discussed: the nexus between participatory media and civic activism; how social media can contribute to raising global awareness and financial support for action on pressing social issues; how old media organizations are using Facebook for new media strategies; how professional content creators and community organizers are harnessing the creative power of the crowd; best practices and strategies for utilizing Twitter for engagement; and crowd-funding technologies and platforms and their role in peace building. The afternoon will also include a sneak peak at the new “Half the Sky” Facebook game launching on March 4, as well as a preview of 10 x 10, both a feature film and a social action organization, presenting global documentaries about women and education.

For those who aren’t able to attend the panel presentations, PBS NewsHour correspondent Hari Sreenivasan will host a live stream broadcast on-site. In addition to watching the panels live, in real-time, Sreenivasan will be answering questions from bloggers and citizen journalists from around the world and providing a behind-the-scenes account of the event (Hashtag: #GlobalDiplomat).

###

About Media as Global Diplomat
The Media as Global Diplomat series is a jointly sponsored conference that takes a distinctly inclusive approach to examine the debate on the future of U.S. public diplomacy and peace building. Many conferences and reports have focused on public diplomacy in recent years, but most have constrained their thinking to only a few experts in a limited number of fields.

In convening the Media as Global Diplomat Summit Series, USIP and ITVS have broken from that approach by including participants from across the spectrum of communication, media, policy, academia, and activist communities both domestically and abroad. They sought to include sometimes-disparate voices from around the world and to examine non-traditional approaches to public diplomacy in an effort to broaden the number of tools available in the U.S. A comprehensive video of Media that Moves Millions will soon be added to the Media as Global Diplomat archive.

About USIP
The United States Institute of Peace is an independent, nonpartisan conflict management center created by Congress to prevent and mitigate international conflict through nonviolent means. USIP works to save lives, increase the government’s ability to deal with conflicts before they escalate, reduce government costs, and enhance national security. USIP is headquartered in Washington, DC. To learn more, visit www.usip.org.

About ITVS
Independent Television Service (ITVS) funds, presents, and promotes award-winning documentaries and dramas on public television, innovative new media projects on the web, and the Emmy® Award-winning weekly series Independent Lens on Monday nights at 10 PM on PBS. Mandated by Congress in 1988 and funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, ITVS has brought more than 1,000 independently produced programs to American audiences to date. For more information about ITVS, visit itvs.org