Commentary
Jim Murphy
The harrowing story of his uncle’s narrow escape from a Salvadoran death squad led Jim Murphy from Silicon Valley to Human Rights Watch. In his eight years as Human Rights Watch’s Senior Online Editor, Murphy has sought to amplify the reach of the global human rights organization via new technologies and social media. He's been at the helm of the organization's Twitter feed, guiding it towards one million followers, and has conducted numerous Twitter trainings as more than 150 staff members tweet their respective beats. Murphy previously owned a San Francisco-based website development company specializing in the non-profit sector (among his projects, Time Magazine named the Ecological Footprint Quiz one of the top 50 websites of 2007). In 1996 Murphy practiced economic development at the most micro of levels living in the small village of Ellacuría, El Salvador, building fences, harvesting crops and raising the funds to purchase livestock in this rural, post-conflict setting.