Karen News website
Karen News is reported and written by Karen journalists to provide information on issues that shape Karen communities in Burma and around the world.
Karen News provides a window to Burma and the international community on what is happening in Karen state. Our journalists live and work in Karen communities, know the issues that affect Karen people and aim to bring those issues to the attention of people across Burma, in the diaspora, and to all readers interested in the struggles and triumphs of the Karen people.
Bordermedia was asked to design and build a new website for the Karen News team which would present a professional image to the outside world while enabling the Karen News team complete control over the content of their site. There was also a strong emphasis on ease of use so that the Karen journalists could post stories in a matter of minutes so that their time was spent concentrating on content rather than technical know-how.
Burmese Dreaming website
Burmese Dreaming is a creative non-fiction based upon stories from the life of a refugee, Say Say La. This narrative is supplemented by stories contributed by students of the English Immersion Program based in Umphiem Mai Refugee Camp.
The footage for the film has been shot throughout central and southern Burma and includes footage from pro-democracy demonstrations and the refugee camps on the Thailand-Burma border.
Bordermedia was asked to design and build a new website to help with the promotion of Burmese Dreaming. The site was built using the popular WordPress system – allowing the owner of the website to continually update news items, blog posts, current reports and maintain their photo gallery.
Mae Tao Clinic website
The Mae Tao Clinic (MTC), founded and directed by Dr. Cynthia Maung, provides free health care for refugees, migrant workers, and other individuals who cross the border from Burma to Thailand. People of all ethnicities and religions are welcome at the Clinic. Its origins go back to the student pro-democracy movement in Burma in 1988 and the brutal repression by the Burmese regime of that movement.
Bordermedia was asked to rebuild the current Mae Tao website using a content management system so that local staff were easily able to update news items, blog posts, current reports, photo gallery etc… without requiring outside assistance.
Women with a Mission website
Women With a Mission is a not for profit group working to make a positive difference in the lives of children living along the Thai/Burmese border and families in the region of Chonburi, Thailand. We subscribe to the belief that children have rights as human beings and also need special care and protection. WWM work to help to meet these basic needs and to expand the opportunities for children to reach their full potential.
Bordermedia was asked to rebuild the current Women with a Mission website using a content management system so that they were easily able to update news items, blog posts, current reports, photo gallery etc… without requiring outside assistance.
Bordermedia has been working hard to put together its new recording studio on the Thailand Burma border. The aim of this project is to record local artists originating from Burma. It is hoped that this will help to inspire further musicians musically, as well as provide a means of income generation by selling the music electronically via the web.
Weave website
WEAVE (Women’s Education for Advancement and Empowerment) was founded in 1990, with the intent to empower indigenous women and support their needs and basic human rights. The organization has evolved over the years, especially in the context of the influx of refugees from Burma.
Bordermedia was asked to design and build a new website for WEAVE, and follow this up with a day’s training in Chiang Mai. It was again decided that a modified WordPress system – traditionally a ‘blogging’ platform – would fulfil WEAVE’s requirements for an SEO-friendly and easily maneagable content management system that would not be too challenging for the non native English speaking employees to learn and use.
Borderline Collective
Borderline is a Café, Shop & Gallery based in Mae Sot, Thailand. Borderline began with three women’s organisations seeking to establish a shared marketing space for women from Burma (living along the Thai-Burma border) to sell their hand made items. The women’s groups also hoped that by having a collectively managed market they would build their capacity for running income generation projects with the communities with which they work. In May 2004, the Borderline Women’s Collective opened.
Bordermedia was asked to design and build a new website and online shop for Borderline, in such a way that it would only require 2-4 days training for the local staff in Mae Sot to be able to update the website themselves. It was decided that WordPress – traditionally a ‘blogging’ platform – would fulfil these requirements. WordPress is powerful enough to act as a simple Content Management System, and yet simple enough for people with little or no web design experience to be able to use to update the website themselves with the minimum of training.
FBR - Free Burma Rangers
The Free Burma Rangers (FBR) is a multi-ethnic humanitarian service movement bringing help, hope and love to people in the war zones of Burma. Ethnic pro-democracy groups send teams to be trained, supplied and sent into the areas under attack inside Burma to provide emergency assistance and human rights documentation.
Bordermedia was asked to provide some new page designs which, once approved, were built into a set of HTML templates along with accompanying CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) files. The Free Burma Rangers’ webmaster then used the files provided to ‘re-skin’ the website himself.
Burma study website
This website provides information for students from Burma on Studying abroad. It is intended to provide information on universities, exams, and international scholarships with the aim of helping Burmese students to choose where to continue their studies.
Bordermedia provided consultancy in a series of meetings, helping to organise the new website structure, before designing 2-3 page templates in Adobe Photoshop. Once approved by the client, these were built into HTML/Dreamweaver templates. Bordermedia then provided half a day’s training in using Dreamweaver with which internal staff can add to and update the website in future.
Bordermedia was approached by the organisation Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) in August 2006 about facilitating a series of computer training courses for Burma-related women and youth groups based in Thailand.
The courses would take place between October and December 2006, in three locations in Thailand; Mae Sot, Mae Hong Son and Chiang Mai.
It was agreed that the first courses would be focused on Basic Computer Maintenance and Security, with a view to introducing one or two key staff members from each of the approximately 35 organisations, to the main course topics listed below.
- Implementing preventive measures on PC components
- How to keep computers safe from humidity
- Basic Hardware troubleshooting
- Backups
- Windows XP System Restore functions
- Operating system updates
- Removing unwanted programs
- Disk Management
- Viruses
- Spyware/Malware
- Firewalls
- User accounts and security
- File security
- Browser and internet security
- Advanced topics (Computer & program freezes, Blue Screens, What to do when Windows XP won’t start)
The intention would then be that these key staff members would then take responsibility for securing and maintaining their office computers. The groups were kept small – 8 people per group – and were mainly comprised of students from the following ethic groups; Karen, Kayan, Palaung, Pa-O, Arakan, Karenni, Kachin, Lahu, Shan and Mon.
