Secondary ticketing: Inflating sport prices or useful service?

A regular problem for football fans on big-match days

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It is an exciting time of year to be a UK sports or music fan, with big cup finals and major name concerts coming thick and fast.

From the climax of the European football season and a summer of top-class cricket and tennis events to the Rolling Stones and Who concerts, there never seem to be enough tickets to go round for die-hard followers.

At one time that might have meant hanging around outside a venue hoping to buy off a tout, or someone else with "a spare" to sell.

However, over the past decade a new phenomenon has arrived on the UK's shores - the "secondary ticketing" exchanges that allow individuals, sports clubs, and other organisations to legally sell spare tickets - often, but not necessarily, at more than face value.

Among the biggest names on the internet are Viagogo, Get Me In, Seatwave, and Stubhub, all of whom are keen to highlight that dealing with them is financially secure.

But on the other hand, one sports fan group say we are seeing "legalised touting", and that these firms are able to act in a way that the ordinary fan cannot.

'Safe experience'

Navin Kekane, is business operations director of Stubhub, a major American ticket exchange, and part of the Ebay group of firms. It employs more than 1,000 people in the US, and provides services for buyers and sellers of tickets for sports, concerts, theatre and other live entertainment events.

It launched in the UK in March 2012, and employs about 35 people in the UK and Republic of Ireland, with a physical office in central London and a customer service team based in Dublin.

Stubhub's Navin Kekane has overseen the transfer of Ebay's music concert ticket sales to Stubhub

Stubhub provides a service connecting those with spare tickets to those who want to buy them. Ticket adverts state that "prices are set by sellers and may be higher than face value", with the face value price clearly displayed.

For Everton's game against West Ham at the weekend, there were tickets for sale at both above and below face value.

"What we do is all about supply and demand, and you can find tickets at below face value," says Mr Kekane, adding that "ticket prices often start to fall as an event approaches".

Sellers are charged a 12% fee including VAT and with PayPal fees waived, For buyers booking fees, delivery and VAT are included in the ticket offer price, with no additional costs at checkout.

Sports organisations

The firm has recently moved its music concert listings from Ebay to its own website. Mr Kekane said the move offered extra features not available to ticket sellers using Ebay and that Stubhub was a superior platform for music ticket sales.

And if problems ever arise, he says, Stubhub's ticket-buyer guarantee means "we will do everything we can to get you into that event with an equal or better ticket".

"There is a passion around music and sport and we want to make sure things go right and people get the tickets they have paid for," says Mr Kekane.

Stubhub has signed a number of deals with sports clubs, including Leicester Tigers

"We have good relationships with sports organisations and box offices," he adds, pointing to official relationships with seven organisations in the UK, including three Premier League clubs, Leicester Tigers rugby union club, the Lawn Tennis Association, Jockey Club, and concert promoter AEG.

In the UK the resale of football tickets is illegal under section 166 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, unless the resale is authorised by the organiser of the match. Stubhub currently has deals with Sunderland, Everton, and from next season, Tottenham Hotspur.

Rival Viagogo has deals with Aston Villa, Chelsea, Fulham, Manchester City, Newcastle United, QPR, West Bromwich Albion, West Ham United, Wigan and Reading.

'Legalised touting'

"At the moment if you are a fan trying to sell a spare ticket and are not authorised to do so, then you face a criminal conviction, even if you sell it at face value," says Malcolm Clarke, who has been chairman of the Football Supporters Federation (FSF) since it was founded in 2002.

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I do not think the actions of these exchanges are justified”

Malcolm ClarkeFootball Supporters Federation

"But secondary ticketing exchanges, because they are authorised, are allowed to do it. Many clubs grant these these agencies the right to allow re-sell of tickets for their matches at above face value. I don't think that can be right."

Mr Clarke recognises ticket exchanges offer some financial security not found in more informal online ticket trading.

"I suppose if you do buy a ticket from one of these exchanges and did not get it, then you would have some comeback, and I do know there have been horror stories about people being cheated by unauthorised ticket sites on the internet," he says.

"But in one-to-one physical transactions I have never heard of the ticket seller grabbing someone's money and running off, and I do not think the actions of these exchanges are justified."

He says more clubs should look at setting up their own ticket exchanges, as Liverpool and Arsenal have done.

The FSF would like to see more big clubs launch their own ticket exchanges, as Liverpool has done

"I don't think it would be too hard to organise such a scheme, for returning unsold tickets from your fans for other supporters to buy," he says.

"These [clubs] are big organisations and in these days of high technology I don't think it would be too difficult for them to run [resale] schemes themselves. It is sheer laziness on the part of the clubs - they prefer to see it as a problem and hand it over to someone else."

Despite such resistance to the idea of secondary ticketing, Mr Kekane believes the market will continue to grow in the UK as consumers become more accustomed to the concept, launched in the US more than a decade ago.

And he points out that his firm does not itself actually buy or sell tickets.

"We do not buy up huge stashes of tickets looking to sell them on - Stubhub does not own, price or sell any tickets on the site".

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US shale oil supply shock shifts global power balance

A steeper-than-expected rise in US shale oil reserves is about to change the global balance of power between new and existing producers, a report says.

Shale oil production adds economic value, but critics say the costs to the environment are also large

Over the next five years, the US will account for a third of new oil supplies, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).

The US will change from the world's leading importer of oil to a net exporter.

Demand for oil from Middle-East oil producers is set to slow as a result.

"North America has set off a supply shock that is sending ripples throughout the world," said IEA executive director Maria van der Hoeven.

The surge in US production will reshape the whole industry, according to the IEA, which made the prediction in its closely-watched bi-annual report examining trends in oil supply and demand over the next five years.

The IEA said it expected the US to overtake Russia as the world's biggest gas producer by 2015 and to become "all but self-sufficient" in its energy needs by about 2035.

The rise in US production means the world's reliance on oil from traditional oil producing countries in the Middle East, which make up Opec (the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries), would end soon, according to the report.

Slower growth

US production is set to grow by 3.9 million barrels of oil per day (bpd) from 2012 to 2018, accounting for some two-thirds of the predicted growth in traditional non-Opec production, according to the IEA.

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The regional fallout from the 'Arab Spring' is taking a toll on investment and capacity growth”

IEA

Meanwhile, global oil demand is set to increase by 8% which would be met mainly by non-Opec supplies, the report said

The IEA still expects production capacity among traditional Opec suppliers in the Middle East to continue to grow over the next five years, but at a slower rate.

Opec capacity, which counts for 35% of today's global oil output, is expected to rise by 1.75 million bpd to 36.75 million bpd in 2018, about 750,000 bpd less than predicted in the IEA's 2012 forecast.

The IEA cites the "growing insecurity in North and Sub-Saharan Africa" in the wake of the Arab Spring uprisings as a key reason for the slowdown.

"The regional fallout from the 'Arab Spring' is taking a toll on investment and capacity growth," the IEA said.

Fracking

The sharp rise in US oil production is largely thanks to shale oil, a product many have hailed as the saviour of the US energy market.

Fracking, the process of blasting water at high pressure into shale rock to release oil (or gas) held within it, has become widespread in the US.

But critics of shale oil point to environmental concerns such as high water use and possible water contamination, the release of methane and, to a lesser extent, earth tremors caused by drilling.

The process has been banned in France, while the UK recently lifted a moratorium on drilling for shale gas.

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How Estonia became E-stonia

Ancient and modern: Estonia is preparing for a digital future

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In some countries, computer programming might be seen as the realm of the nerd.

But not in Estonia, where it is seen as fun, simple and cool.

This northernmost of the three Baltic states, a small corner of the Soviet Union until 1991, is now one of the most internet-dependent countries in the world.

And Estonian schools are teaching children as young as seven how to programme computers.

Estonia's e-revolution began in the 1990s, not long after independence. Toomas Hendrik Ilves, then the country's ambassador to the United States, now Estonia's president, takes some of the credit.

There's a story from his time in the US that he is fond of telling. He read a book whose "Luddite, neo-Marxist" thesis, he says, was that computerisation would be the death of work.

The book cited a Kentucky steel mill where several thousands of workers had been made redundant, because after automatisation, the new owners could produce the same amount of steel with only 100 employees.

"This may be bad if you are an American," he says. "But from an Estonian point of view, where you have this existential angst about your small size - we were at that time only 1.4 million people - I said this is exactly what we need.

"We need to really computerise, in every possible way, to massively increase our functional size."

Online schools

So Estonia became E-stonia - a neat Ilves joke. And with the help of a government-backed technology investment body, called the Tiger Leap Foundation, all Estonian schools were online by the late 1990s.

President Ilves saw the online economy as an opportunity for a small country

Through Tiger Leap, they have been teaching programming at secondary level for some time. But their latest project is to introduce the concept to children earlier, when they enter at the age of seven. So far, they have trained 60 teachers to teach the first four year groups.

"By next September, when the new school year begins, I hope every school finds it to be important to integrate programming in their classes," says Tiger Leap's Ave Lauringson, who is in charge of the project.

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EDUCATION IN ESTONIA

• Ranked 9th in most recent Pisa tests for science, 16th for maths and 13th for reading
• This places Estonia alongside countries such as Norway, Switzerland and Iceland, ranked 5th in Europe for reading
• Historically high attainment levels in secondary education, but not rising
• 88% of three year olds in pre-primary education, which is above average
• Pupils have some of the lowest numbers of hours in the classroom each year among developed countries
• Teachers' pay is relatively low compared with other graduates and OECD average
• Expenditure on education rose sharply between 2000 and 2009, but restricted by recession
• 6.3% GDP spent on education, marginally above OECD average
• Unemployment has risen with recession

Source: OECD 2012 Education at a Glance

In a newly-built, yellow-painted school in Lagedi, outside the Estonian capital, Tallinn, this can already be seen taking shape. A class of 10-year-olds are designing their own computer games, supervised by information and communications technology (ICT) teacher Hannes Raimets, a slight, quietly-spoken 24-year-old, a child of the first e-generation.

"I think teaching them to program has lots of benefits. It helps the children develop their creativity and logical thinking," he says. "Also, it's fun, building your own game. "I think it's their favourite subject at school," says Ms Raimets.

What is also evident is that computer programming, at least at a basic level, just isn't that hard.

President Ilves makes the same point. Born in Stockholm of Estonian parents, he grew up and attended high school in the US. He learned programming at 13, as part of an experimental maths class, and says it helped him to pay his way through college.

"I don't think programming computers is such a deep, dark secret. I think it's strictly logic," he says.

"Here in Estonia, we begin foreign language education either in Grade One or Grade Two. If you're learning the rules of grammar at seven or eight, then how's that different from the rules of programming? In fact, programming is far more logical than any language."

Folk digital

President Ilves argues that education reforms take 15 or 20 years to show an effect. He feels this point is proved by the large number of technology start-ups for which Estonia today is attracting attention.

One of these is Frostnova, whose chief executive, Mikk Melder, is 25. His company has designed a game specifically for the Tiger Leap project for primary school children. It's called Ennemuistne and it draws heavily on local folklore and myth.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon using Skype, an Estonian invention

Mr Melder says he visited local museums to make sure the architecture depicted is strictly accurate. Players can dress their characters in traditional costume and make them dance a uniquely Estonian jig.

"This is the ultimate purpose of the game," he says. "To bring something old, preserved and traditional into today's world, into the digital age."

Rather better known is Skype, an Estonian start-up long since gone global.

Skype was bought by Microsoft in 2011 for a cool $8.5bn, but still employs 450 people at its local headquarters on the outskirts of Tallinn, roughly a quarter of its total workforce. Tiit Paananen, from Skype, says they are passionate about education and that it works closely with Estonian universities and secondary schools.

"Your capability not only to use, but also to create IT components will give you a competitive edge," says Mr Paananen. He is happy to hear that they are now starting even younger.

"Skype has kicked off a wave of technological innovations in Estonia and all these knowledge-rich, highly-paid jobs will need those bright heads for the future."

Online voting

Estonians today vote online and pay tax online. Their health records are online and, using what President Ilves likes to call a "personal access key" - others refer to it as an ID card - they can pick up prescriptions at the pharmacy. The card offers access to a wide range of other services.

All this will be second nature to the youngest generation of E-stonians. They encounter electronic communication as soon as they enter school through the eKool (e-school) system. Exam marks, homework assignments and attendance in class are all available to parents at the click of a mouse.

The Baltic country sees technology as part of its cultural independence

"For most kids in Estonia, eKool is their first connection to ICT," says eKool's chief executive, Sander Kasak.

"They will be at school for 10 to 12 years, so they'll be learning about technological improvements all the time. So you could say eKool is not only a technological partner, but also an educational partner."

For Mairi Tonsiver, whose 11-year-old son Uku is a student at Lagedi School, eKool is a life-saver. He has just spent three school days at home because of sickness, but by checking online, his mother can find out exactly what he has missed and needs to catch up on.

"It was much more difficult and much more time-consuming when we didn't have eKool," she says.

"And your kids can't now make the excuse that they didn't write down what homework they have to do, because now you can just go to the computer and check it."

Uku says he wants to be a cosmonaut. Designing computer games is probably not a bad way to start.

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Digital product placement creates adverts out of thin air

Now you see it: Spot anything out of place? No? Look more closely at the bus shelter. The structure and advert were added in post-production.

One of the great dilemmas facing the TV and film industry is just how to make money out of a cheapskate audience, who are often not willing to pay for programming or watch adverts.

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Viewers have many more options than just nipping off for a cup of tea during ad breaks these days.

They can record programmes and then skip the adverts - or far too often simply download them illegally.

Banner ads and pop ups online tend to be annoying and are often ignored.

But if you, the viewer, won't watch adverts voluntarily then beleaguered TV, movie and advertising executives need to find a way of taking that choice away.

You can call me KITT: US television show Knight Rider helped Pontiac sell many more Trans Ams

One emerging technology that could be a solution is digital product placement.

Of course, product placement isn't new; Pontiac would not have sold nearly as many Trans Ams if that had not been David Hasselhoff's crime-fighting car of choice in the 1980s phenomenon, Knight Rider.

Recently Heineken scored a coup by persuading James Bond to choose its beer over a vodka martini in Skyfall.

However, digital placement is fundamentally different in that the product you see on screen was never there in the first place.

Editors can drop whatever they like, wherever they like, into programmes or films during the post-production process.

Places please

Digital placement firm MirriAd has taken advantage of the growing appetite for this service, having just raised £3.6m from investors led by Indian media tycoon Subhash Chandra.

In the original scene from Australian soap Home and Away the bus shelter is missing

"These are not just logos, they can be video, signage and products, even cars," explains Mark Popkiewicz, the company's chief executive.

"When brands are integrated they are placed in such a way so it is clear to the audience that they were always there and are part of the scene.

"For example beverages are placed as open cans or bottles with glasses containing the beverage alongside - that way they look like they are being consumed.

"The technology is capable of placing or replacing moving objects and even replacing products being handled by actors like mobile phones," he says.

Mr Popkiewicz believes there is a key psychological reason his solution could cheer up impecunious film and advertising executives.

"Early trials show almost double the engagements of traditional campaigns," he says.

"This is because when a consumer watches a show they are not 'defensive' against advertising as they might be with advertising online or commercials on TV - they are in 'receive mode' and are not blocking."

He insists there is no element of subliminal influence, which can be both legally and socially unacceptable, saying the whole point is the images are "present and impactful" to make them work.

Blanket coverage

Being digital, you won't be surprised to hear the process doesn't stop with merely showing you an image.

Car manufacturer Lancia recently ran a campaign to support the launch of its new Ypsilon Methane in Italy.

Viewers of Cerco Casa Disperatamente, a house hunting show, might have noticed the car appearing on signage, PC monitors, and magazines - all of which was added in post production.

But if they also had the dedicated 'Lancia INTERACT TV' app on their smartphone an inaudible soundtrack from the TV would activate the device offering promotions related to the car.

In this scene from Cerco Casa Disperatamente the advertisement on the grass to the left has been added later

Maurizio Sala, creative director at Bitmama, led the project.

"Recent data shows that the majority of viewers (aged 18-44) use a second screen, either a tablet or smartphone, while watching TV," he says.

"This use is mainly for activities related to the programme, such as voting and purchasing of products, or to social media activities.

"Our aim was to provide the viewer with an integrated two-screen experience to qualify brands through real-time content experience."

Of course these days viewers not only want something for nothing, they increasingly want content tailored to them.

This could mean that if you and your neighbour are watching the same programme, different items might be embedded on the same show to suit your individual tastes.

"In principle this is possible today, but the costs of creating and personalising the adverts would outweigh potential gains in terms of effectiveness," says Adam Fulford, strategy and planning director at digital branding consultancy Rufus Leonard.

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The time will come though when the adverts inserted could be as personalised as a piece of direct mail”

Adam FulfordRufus Leonard

"The time will come though when the adverts inserted could be as personalised as a piece of direct mail.

"Whether this adds value for consumers and improves effectiveness remains to be seen and depends entirely on how it is deployed."

Reality bites

A more benign regulatory environment across the world has helped the industry.

One of the latest markets to allow it is the UK, which only deregulated in spring 2011.

MirriAd now operates in 20 markets, with particular interest from those with higher GDP growth, including Brazil and India.

Philip Hughes, associate at the media, brands and technology team at lawyers Lewis Silkin, warns different territories still have very different rules

"Ensuring legal compliance across multiple jurisdictions can be expensive, risky and time-consuming," he says.

"The expense of ensuring compliance may far outweigh the benefit of such activity, so contractually avoiding responsibility and liability for such clearance should be considered."

All of which begs the question: can we trust our eyes any more?

Mr Popkiewicz points out that 'brand integration' is not used in news and current affairs or in children's programming.

He also points out that sitcoms, reality TV, games shows and music videos are, at the end of the day, designed to entertain.

"Entertainment content on TV, like film and online content is produced," he argues.

"It is story-telling and is supported by a range of standard industry processes such as editing and visual effects which create the required visual impact the director requires.

"It is real in so far as the audience is immersed in the content, the brands playing an important part in making the content more real."

Reality, it seems, is all relative.

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Oil company offices raided in EU pricing probe

The offices of several firms involved in the oil market have been raided by European Commission officials.

The investigation relates to oil, refined products and biofuels

The commission said it had concerns that "the companies may have colluded in reporting distorted prices".

It did not name the firms, and said the raids did not mean the companies were guilty of any charges.

BP, Royal Dutch Shell, Norway's Statoil and the pricing agency Platts confirmed that they were working with the authorities in their inquiries.

The investigation relates to the pricing of oil, refined products and biofuels.

"Even small distortions of assessed prices may have a huge impact on the prices of crude oil, refined oil products and biofuels purchases and sales, potentially harming final consumers,'" the Commission said.

As part of the investigation, the Commission said it was examining whether the companies may have prevented others from participating in the pricing process "with a view to distorting published prices".

It added: "Any such behaviour, if established, may amount to violations of European antitrust rules that prohibit cartels and restrictive business practices and abuses of a dominant market position."

The EU called the raids "unannounced inspections". They are seen as a preliminary step in an investigation into suspected anti-competitive practices.

Statoil, which confirmed its Norwegian headquarters had been inspected, said the suspected violations "related to the Platts' Market-On-Close (MOC) price assessment process" and "may have been on-going since 2002".

Platts, which compiles prices for energy markets, said the European Commission had visited its London operations on Tuesday. "Platts is co-operating fully with the European Commission's review," it added.

BP said in statement: "We are co-operating fully with the investigation and are unable to comment further at this time."

A Shell spokesman added that it was "fully co-operating" with the investigation.

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Japan's Nikkei passes 15,000 for first time since 2008

Japanese shares have climbed past the 15,000 mark for the first time since January 2008, as the yen continues to weaken - boosting the earnings potential for exporters.

The Nikkei has jumped by more than 40% in 2013

The benchmark Nikkei index rose 2% to 15,096, with carmaker Toyota and consumer electronics giant Sony leading the gains.

The Nikkei is up 46% since the start of 2013.

Japan's central bank has embarked on an aggressive plan to weaken the yen.

A weaker Japanese currency translates into higher earnings for companies when the funds are repatriated back into the country. It also makes their products more competitive overseas.

The yen is at a four-and-a-half year low against the US dollar, trading at the 102 mark in Asia.

The currency has declined by more than 20% since Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe took office in December last year.

Mr Abe has backed the central bank's ultra easy monetary policy, which calls for pumping more money into the Japanese system.

The move is aimed at weakening the currency but also raising consumer prices in the hopes of boosting consumption at home.

Japan's economy has been battling nearly two decades of falling prices, known as deflation, which discourages spending by companies and consumers as they hold out for a better deal.

Shares of Isuzu Motors climbed 20% after it posted a record full year net profit of $946m (£621m), driven by strong overseas sales.

Sony shares are also surging after one of the company's biggest shareholders suggested the firm should spin off up to 20% of its entertainment business, and use the funds to shore up its struggling electronics arm.

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Boeing resumes deliveries of 787

Boeing said it had resumed delivery of its 787 Dreamliner, after two incidents involving the lithium ion batteries led to a worldwide grounding of the aircraft.

The delivery to ANA is the first handover of a modified 787 from Boeing factories

The jet was delivered to Japan's All Nippon Airways. It will restart commercial flights on 1 June.

Regulators halted all Dreamliners after ANA and Japan Airlines had incidents where the battery overheated.

Boeing has since modified jets with new batteries.

The US Federal Aviation Administration gave Boeing's redesigned battery system approval on 19 April. Boeing then modified existing fleets for airlines.

As well as new batteries which run at a cooler temperature, Boeing has also enclosed them in stainless steel boxes.

The system now has a ventilation pipe that leads directly outside the plane, which Boeing says will lower the chances of any future fire or smoke affecting the aircraft.

Ethiopian Airlines was the first to restart commercial flights on 27 April. Other airlines will begin service later in May or in June.

The delivery to ANA is the first handover of a modified 787 from Boeing factories.

Boeing had delivered 50 Dreamliners to airlines at the time of the grounding. The company said on Tuesday that it expects to achieve its target of delivering more than 60 Dreamliners this year.

The US National Transportation Safety Board is still looking into what caused the 787 battery to overheat and catch fire on a Japan Airlines plane in Boston in January.

About one week later another battery overheated on an ANA flight in Japan, causing an emergency landing and evacuation of the plane.

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EADS profits up on Airbus deliveries

The parent company of Airbus, EADS, has reported a sharp rise in profits for the first three months of the year.

Airbus sales have helped profits at EADS take off

Operating profits at the company rose by 56% to 741m euros ($963m; £629m) in the quarter.

Much of the rise was down to higher production at its Airbus subsidiary, where revenue climbed by 16%.

Last year, Airbus reclaimed the top slot in the civil aircraft industry in terms of deliveries, having fallen behind rival Boeing in 2011.

Airbus said it had delivered 144 aircraft between January and March, up from 131 in the same three months last year.

EADS restated its forecast that it would increase deliveries of commercial jets this year to between 600 and 610, as demand continues from airlines in the Middle East and Asia.

'Good start'

Net profits for the quarter nearly doubled compared with the same period in 2012, to 241m euros ($314m; £204m).

Chief executive Tom Enders said the company "had a rather good start into 2013" and remained focused on improving profitability "in 2013 and beyond".

However, EADS said that it had spent a significant amount of cash to boost its inventories for its new projects.

The aerospace giant beefed up the working capital at Airbus and its helicopter unit Eurocopter.

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Human rights activists taught online tactics

Mobile phones have brought information and images from conflict zones

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An international training institute to teach online tactics for human rights campaigners is being set up in the Italian city of Florence.

The first students, starting in the new year, will be drawn from human rights activists around the world - with the aim of arming them with the latest tools for digital dissent.

As the Arab spring showed, protests are as likely to be about individuals using social networking as much as public demonstrations. Street protests have become Tweet protests.

And repressive regimes are as likely to be hunting through Facebook as they are raiding underground meetings.

There is a dangerous, high-stakes, hi-tech game of cat and mouse being played - with protesters needing to balance their secrecy and safety with their need to achieve the maximum public impact.

This training centre, being set up by the European wing of the US-based Robert Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights, wants to combine academic study with practical skills and training.

Screen secrets

With an appropriate symbolism, the training institute is based in a former prison building, donated by the city of Florence.

The formidable jail doors, with their hatches and bolts, are still visible.

A former prison building in Florence will be the base for the training institute

Federico Moro, the director of the project, says the intention is to use "technology to promote democracy, human rights and justice".

"The idea is that with social media you can achieve change," he says.

He says campaigners might have passion and belief in their struggles, but they also need practical knowledge.

"Human rights leaders might dedicate themselves to a cause, they might give their soul and their life - but you still need the skills to generate change," he says.

These students will be blog writers and campaigners, who will be able to study in Florence on scholarships provided by the Robert Kennedy Center. Recruiting will be complicated by the need to protect the privacy of people who might be put at risk even by applying.

Mr Moro says the institute will not be partisan in supporting either right- or left-wing causes - but will act in defence of individuals facing violations of their human rights, whether it is political oppression or domestic violence.

Beating the censor

As well as teaching individuals, the institute wants to provide information for organisations and businesses, advising on areas such as human rights legislation and ethical investment.

But what does a digital activist - or a so-called "smart dissident" - need to know?

Chris Michael, from the Brooklyn-based human rights group Witness, describes the practical steps that protesters are using to stay ahead.

Kerry Kennedy leads the human rights foundation set up in memory of her father, Robert Kennedy

There are websites that allow for anonymous internet access, allowing people to organise without revealing identities. There are also means of circumventing censors' attempts at blocking websites.

The Tor project software, an unexpected spin-off from military technology, is favoured by human rights campaigners.

Mr Michael says there are also "work arounds" to make online video and phone calls more secure from surveillance.

Another practical development is software that can easily pixellate faces in video footage, protecting bystanders who might be put at risk by identification.

In terms of posting videos of protests or repression, Witness is working with YouTube on a dedicated human rights channel.

It's already hosting hundreds of user-generated videos from a wide number of countries, at the moment including Syria, Pakistan, Libya, Burma, Chile, Spain, Russia, China and the United States. There's a daily update of video reports which include anything from student protests to forcible evictions.

Selecting and showcasing the most relevant videos is important to make an impact on YouTube's global audience, Mr Michael says.

"Very few people are going to watch for hours. You might be able to get their attention for 45 seconds, that's the world people live in," he says.

Mobile range

The spread of mobile phones means there is an unprecedented ability for recording and distributing evidence of violence against citizens. We're living in a global goldfish bowl.

But is this making the world a safer place? Can cheap video and social networking defrost dictatorships? To put it bluntly, could Hitler and Stalin have been exposed at an earlier stage by Twitter and YouTube?

The Arab Spring saw social networking becoming a forum for protest

Does a modern revolution really come from the lens of an iPhone rather than the barrel of a gun?

It's not that simple, cautions Mr Michael, speaking at an event in Pisa, Italy, debating the impact of digital activism.

"In one word, Syria," he says. There has been video evidence of wrongdoing and violence, but little sign that public scrutiny is acting as a deterrent.

"Just because you can document something, it doesn't meant that you change anything in real terms."

But he says the sheer scale of video and information - and the ability to keep in touch with those under attack - does make a difference.

"Because so many people are documenting, seeing is not only believing, we're also able to act and communicate with people who are affected - and that can be very powerful."

'Slacktivism'

But the question remains whether Facebook really enabled Arab revolutions, or whether it enabled the rest of the world to find out more about a revolution that was going to happen anyway.

Federico Moro, director of the training institute project, with a statue of Robert Kennedy

Stephen Bradberry, a community activist in New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, uses the word "slacktivism" - as a caution for the idea that clicking on a "like" button is a sufficient alternative to grassroots organisation.

He also makes the point that while the internet makes so much information accessible, the power to find it is handed over to the search engines and their algorithms.

Rana Husseini, a Jordanian activist and journalist who uncovered stories about honour killings, says the internet has given a voice to public opinion.

She also shares concerns that digital technology can be used as tools for surveillance and control as well as openness and investigation.

But she speaks passionately about the way that ordinary people risk their lives to record video clips on their mobile phones in conflicts such as Syria.

"This couldn't have happened in the past - and probably this person will vanish."

But the act of documenting is an important statement in its own right, she says. The idea of so many individuals making their own video history in this way is "something new and important".

Outsiders' voices

As an educational project, the human rights training institute project in Florence is an unlikely collision of influences. It's a highly individual project.

Stephen Bradberry warns of the risk of relying on online campaigns instead of grassroots protests

Inside the sturdy medieval prison walls, in the birthplace of the European renaissance, there is this hi-tech centre for online civil rights, awaiting students from around the world.

Into this mix is added the legacy of Robert Kennedy's 1960s idealism. The foundation was set up in memory of the assassinated senator and is now headed by his daughter, Kerry Kennedy.

She recently had her own brush with the secret police when she headed a human rights delegation to the Western Sahara.

A trademark of Robert Kennedy's campaigning was to get information first hand, often from people excluded from the political mainstream.

And there is some kind of symmetry here - with social networking and blogging representing an instant electronic version of accumulating the authority of many individual voices.

They want to harness these new digital technologies to old causes.

Does online technology help to protect the rights of the individual?

It could be a double edged sword. I think it can work both ways sometimes. It could depend on how much access and material either side can upload against the other. Online messaging is useful for informing but cannot replace physical standing up, and challenging the situation. Though, overall, online media is certainly revolutionary for telling the story

Zaynab, Kano, Nigeria

It will allow messages to spread quickly across the world. People won't need to rely on news companies, as the 'word on the street' quickly starts trending. A key issue surrounding all of this will be censorship of the internet. Goverments will want to channel propaganda in whatever way suits them, and we then come onto freedom of speech and censorship. It could be similar to the banning of certain books/literature, but blocking websites. Unfortunately, as per wiki-leaks, this type of tactic could backfire; it's easy to close down a few printing houses, but the internet has no of switch for it's billions of users. Grassroots protests will still be necessary, as it is this which let sus connect more with protesters/creates stories (someone hacking/posting their opinion in Tiananmen square internet cafe isn't even comparable to the famous photos/video that spread around the world media)

Tim, Bury

Do people not realize how bizarre this is? Italy is a country right now considering a bizarre censorship tactic that would affect, among other sites (and it would affect a lot of them), Wikipedia. As usual, the Italians are trying to cover up their internal problems by playing it safe in the realm of international relations.

Nick, Brescia

The problem I've always had with this narrative is that the recent events have all taken place in countries where, admittedly, most of the middle class possess a feature phone, but almost nobody possesses a smartphone. What's happening in these countries may or may not be desirable - think of the way it's now back to "business as usual" in the first Magreb countries to eject their old rulers - but it would be a mistake to think that what got published on Western Internet sites last year was the vox populi in any meaningful sense of that phrase.

Ian, Biggleswade

One man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist - i just hope this centre doesn't provide the wrong people with the info required to make detection of some of their evil crimes impossible.

Blade, UK

Social media, at this stage, has not really caused complete change in defending the rights of an individual or protecting the human rights of the discriminated or opressed. It is true that in the 'Arab Spring', particularly in Libya, protesters were able to organise themselves into a mass movement, and at relatively short notice. This undoubtly helped them to force change in the regime, but it did not cause change by itself. There still needed to be people protesting out on the streets, facing bullets and bombs, in order to achieve what they wanted. Social media movements by themselves do not hold much credibility if they are not backed up by people willing to protest 'the old fashioned way'. 'Likes' on a Facebook page or angry Tweets can also be suppressed by a regime willing to do so. Social media is a tool for defending human rights and cannot cause change on its own.

Dan, UK

I do think this is the way to work and would like to participate!

Elisabeth, Balestrand, Norway

It will allow people to send their grievances directly without interference because some media houses or journalist will be bought and indeed they'll show half of the story due to corruption of government bureaucracy especially here in Kenya and other African countries

Joannes, Kenya

We all know of cases of digital technology infringing on privacy and reducing a person's rights. However groups who had little power to change the lives of people around the world have now so much potential to act for change. Teenagers and the elderly have often a wise and reckless desire to act for others without fear for self- what power in their keyboards now.

Fay, Taunton

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