1. Maidan: Volunteer
Crowdsourced Media
Ukrainian online
community formed
in 2000 by activists
united to protest
the murder of
independent
journalist Georgiy
Gongadze.
Maidan is a major
on-line platform for
and by activists
Since 2000 website “Maidan” operates as a civic initiative and is
community driven.
http://world.maidan.org.ua

2. Maidan’s Story
‘Maidan’ is a Ukrainian word for ‘square’ - an open area in a town.
Since the Orange Revolution on Independence Square in Kyiv in 2004 the
word acquired a broader meaning becoming a synonym for public protest.
We introduced this synonymic meaning on our website
http://maidan.org.ua in Dec 2000.
•Dec 2000 - Maidan was created as the official website of "Ukraine without
Kuchma" rallies on Maidan (Independence Square) in Kyiv, 250.000
publications since
•Many civic movements started on Maidan
•Since 2005 our community assumed a name Maidan Alliance and created
a formal association
Site gets 120.000+ visitors per month for the last 8 years.
Most of our visitors are dedicated activists. Our projects
traditionally involve hundreds of volunteers
http://world.maidan.org.ua

3. Not Just Another Site
Maidan operates under public website information policy adopted by
consensus of newsmakers. We cover:
Protests, lawsuits, campaigns against human rights and civil freedoms
violations and illegal actions of government
Citizens’ efforts to organize and cooperate
to defend their rights and civil freedoms
Illegal actions of government authorities
Freedom of information
History of dissent and movements
for independence
Presenting news of civic activism
in Ukraine to English speaking readers
Maidan is getting more and more recognition and credit
from the mainstream media.
http://world.maidan.org.ua

4. Crowdsourced News
2004 – Maidan - the main communication hub for Orange Revolution activists.
Volunteers reported more news than any information agency – up to 1500 a day.
Monitors aggregated election reports from 30 countries
70 cars patrolled election precincts in Kyiv and coordinated actions via site
Our news were used in the Supreme Court when settling election dispute
During this crucial time Maidan handled
immense amount of information. It was a
time of success and challenges alike. We
learned our lessons and gradually
developed and implemented strict rules
for verifying each piece of news prior to
publishing it.
Max traffic ever: 500.000 visitors a day 23 November 2004
30 editors were working with data flow
http://world.maidan.org.ua

5. Crowdsoursed Books
Maidan published 4 crowdsourced books,
dedicated to history of dissent during
USSR regime.
1.Books are created on our forum.
2.Topic is announced and people are starting
asking questions. Anyone could participate.
3.We find the experts.
4.Experts provide the answers on forum.
5.Further discussion allows to word the answers
in more interesting and persuasive way.
6.The final text and photos are published in a
book.
7.We finance the publications ourselves.
Latest book is “Underground church in totalitarian state”.
http://world.maidan.org.ua

6. Maidan Monitoring
Interactive crowd-sourced Map of Violations of Electoral law – our most recent
success. Citizen reports are added to the map when accompanied by photo and/or
video evidence and after verification by law experts of Maidan
Citizens submit
reports since
July 9th 2012.
There were only 4
refuted reports, 1 of
which was removed,
1 was corrected and
2 were closed with
conflict of sides
settled.
822 complaints regarding violations of the electoral law added to the interactive map
http://maidanua.org/vybory2012/main?l=en_US as of September 29th 2012.
The total number of violations reported to
the project team is 3011.
Parliamentary election in Ukraine will
be held on October 28, 2012.

7. Involvement
140.000 readers of our website monthly
300 dedicated activists (newsmakers)
contributing continuously
70 communicators who are checking
information and keeping community alive
10 core members – editors and speakers
60 NGOs contributing continuously
8000 activists coming occasionally for
particular campaigns
340 NGOs contributing occasionally for
particular campaigns
Contributors from all regions of Ukraine +
12 countries of Europe, Americas and
Australia
50% of our community joined in 2004. Recent growth of civic
activity reflected in broadening of our community.
20% stay with us since 2000.
http://world.maidan.org.ua

8. Maidan’s Mission
Protection, promotion, and expansion of human rights and
civil freedoms
We fulfill our mission by means of:
•Sharing of Information – via popular website, books, movies,
press conferences, seminars
•Strictly verifying each piece of information for accuracy and
legality
•Civic lobbying
•Monitoring of the government activities
•Legal defense of constitutional rights
Because of our dedication to verifying all reports and news,
our organization is unique on an international scale.
http://world.maidan.org.ua

9. Our Strategic Goals
 To encourage proactive access to information by citizens
 To increase citizens’ intolerance to violations of human
rights and civil freedoms
 To involve citizens into the crowd-sourced monitoring of
observance of political rights and civil freedoms
 To encourage citizens’ participation in active forms of
peaceful protest actions
 To encourage responsible, trustworthy, persuasive citizen
journalism
We provide expertise and perspective on Ukraine and the
unique threats to democracy in Ukraine.
http://world.maidan.org.ua

10. What's Next?
Our future projects will aim to involve the general public to report and document
violations of the political rights of Ukrainian citizens and get engaged into their
defense. So far we focus on freedom of expression and freedom of assembly.
We will continue to focus on the freedom of speech especially considering
new threats to the freedom of expression that emerged recently.
We encourage you to :
Consider our reports and data in your evaluation of level of democracy in
Ukraine
Provide assistance to project teams in spreading awareness on Maidan's
efficiency in carrying out a large scale crowd-sourced monitoring and
information projects
Involve our experts into discussions, round-tables and experts meetings
dedicated to freedom of speech, human rights and civil freedoms
monitoring.
Currently our long-term partners include the International
Renaissance Foundation and the Kharkiv Human Rights
Protection Group
http://world.maidan.org.ua

11. More Info
Contact Maidan
Natalka Zubar, Kharkiv, Ukraine
Phone: +380 50 401 23 83
Email: pani@maidan.org.ua Skype: nelliza111
Our site in English http://world.maidan.org.ua
Our site in Ukrainian http://maidan.org.ua
The Maidan” projects are supported by contributions of
members and the International Renaissance Foundation.
http://world.maidan.org.ua