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a secure online platform for community building
// LGBT Iranians need a secure platform over which to chat
with each other. This online platform would need to be supported by a core group of ‘trusted people’ and by well-known LGBT rights activists living outside Iran (for security reasons) who
maintain close ties to the LGBT community inside Iran. It would need to be hosted outside Iran and this hosting would need
to be both secure and flexible. The core group would add new
members from their own networks. This online platform could adapt and evolve upon the facilities offered by pre-existing technologies, such as the internal networking capabilities
available through Yammer for example. In order to ensure that members could trust each other there could be a star system (similar to the rating system on eBay) whereby users would
gain stars according to their ‘trustworthiness’ as recommended by their peers. In other words, the more people who ‘verify’ a
user, the more stars they get, the more they can be trusted and the more weighted the stars that they give other users be-
come. New members would need to be verified by pre-existing members to gain access to secure areas. The platform would need to be as secure and as resilient against filtering as pos-
sible. The personal data of members would need to be highly
protected and users should be encouraged to take tutorials in internet security, which are freely available online and can be
sourced by Small Media for inclusion on the platform as well. ‘coming out’ campaign
// There is a real need for a project that encourages people
for whom it is safe to do so to ‘come out’ and publicly discuss their sexuality or their support for the LGBT community.
LGBT Iranians in exile, who are beyond the reach of the repres-
sion of the Islamic Republic, and other well-known and famous
Iranians who may or may not be LGBT, should express solidarity