MediACT (Korea)

MediACT's motto is “Act through media, a new window to the world.” It is a public local media access center located in Seoul, South Korea. It was started in 2002 to support alternative and participatory media activities, including (a) independent film making, (b) the establishment of public access structures in tandem with media policy development, [Page 328]and (c) activation of systematic media education and its continuation as a lifelong process.

MediACT emerged as a public institution whose facilities are funded by the Korean Film Council, which is an organization the central government funds to promote Korean cinema within the country and overseas, and an independent activist organization managed by the Association of Korean Independent Film & Video. MediACT provides an infrastructure for media activism. Its strategy focuses on the potential to create a new public media sector based on both shifting media access possibilities and the ongoing political democratization in South Korea.

MediACT is located within a history of Korean movements for media democracy that emerged in the late 1980s in efforts to overcome censorship and the broadcasting monopoly. Some of those movements have included activists involved in alternative film and video, a citizens' media monitoring movement, and a trade union movement inside the media. A first phase for public access was made possible through these struggles.

After the 1996 abolition of censorship and the passing of the 2000 Broadcasting Act, a second phase of public access support emerged. This legislation included the requirement that the Korean Broadcasting System broadcast viewer-produced programs, that cable and satellite operators do the same via a regional or a public access channel, and that public funds should support these productions.

As a result, the fight to extend the terrain of public media began to be shaped by several issues. Securing funding and integrating public access more broadly into public media policy was a major one. But others included contending with a rise in corporate media power, engaging with the introduction of new information and communication technologies and broadband technologies, and countering neoliberal policies and their attendant social crises and attacks on basic human rights. This platform took concrete shape through the establishment of local media access centers, the introduction of media education in and out of schools, lobbying for detailed public access policies, and training and organizing local media activists in a national network.

In short, within less than two decades of struggle, South Korea's media landscape became distinguished by real public access to terrestrial, cable, and satellite channels; funding for media education; a vibrant network of access centers; and growing Internet activism, including both Internet uses for social change and Internet democracy advocacy.

MediACT is located in the hub of Seoul downtown and within its 600-m2 space houses an auditorium, an audio recording room, seminar rooms, and a wide array of low-and high-end multimedia production and post-production facilities. The basic concept includes a notion of universal service to the public, including undocumented migrant workers, and selective services targeting minoritized groups, communities, or constituencies working for social change. As of 2009, 15 full-time staff were working vigorously to make these projects possible with broad participation from other activists and citizens.

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