Cambridge, Mass. - Over 400 workers, activists and community leaders converged upon the Le Meridien Cambridge-MIT Hotel last Thursday to renew their call for hotel workers to be allowed a fair process to decide on unionization.

The protest, part of national week of action spanning both coasts, marked the latest event in a fight that has been going on for over a year.

“(The majority of the workers at Le Meridien Hotel) presented a petition and said they wanted a fair process to form a union, free of harassment, intimidation and threats,” said Brian Lang, President of Local 26 Unite Here, a Boston-based hospitality workers union. “Since then, the workers have been organizing support ... The support has only grown.”

BOSTON/Faneuil Hall - As part of a coordinated effort to push Congress in the direction of progressive immigration reform, the Service Employees International held a rally and march in Boston on Saturday. The event is one of many to be held across the country in support of reform beneficial to an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Rep. Joseph Kennedy III (D-Mass. 4th District) addressed approximately 500 supporters at a packed Faneuil Hall.

BOSTON/Downtown Crossing - US House of Representatives Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi hit the hub on Monday to mark the 20th anniversary of the Family and Medical Leave Act at the West Street headquarters of the Service Employees International Union Local 615.

The former Speaker of the House, joined by Rep. Mike Capuano (D-Mass.), also took the opportunity to applaud local efforts to win paid sick time for workers, blast the Defense of Marriage Act as unconstitutional and lay blame on the US Senate for striking down a key piece of President Obama’s landmark health care bill.

Cambridge, Mass. - The free software movement—based on the idea that computer programs should be available for anyone to use or modify—is in some ways at the top of its game, and in others facing its most difficult challenges.

For example, free programs like Firefox and mostly free Android are highly popular. And collaborative software projects are tackling serious, global issues like improving health care in developing countries. But activists are still struggling to gain broad support, and to stay relevant in the face of increasingly proprietary devices.

These advances and obstacles were the subject of LibrePlanet 2013, an annual conference put on by the Free Software Foundation, a leading organization working to protect the freedom of computer users.

BOSTON/Copley Square - Over 100 people gathered in Copley Square on Saturday to commemorate the second anniversary of the Syrian uprising and ask for international support for their struggle. Supporters of the Syrian National Council, the rebel opposition coalition fighting President Bashar Hafez al-Assad’s Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party gathered to demand justice for the Syrian people in a three-hour rally and march on a bitterly cold day.

BOSTON/South Boston - Viewed by hundreds of thousands of spectators in South Boston, the St. Patrick's Day parade hit the city Sunday. As expected, organizers of the parade the Allied War Veterans Council excluded peace groups and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender groups from the event. In response Veterans for Peace organized their own Peace Parade for the third year in a row, including LGBT groups and coalition of social, religious, and peace groups. While most of the revellers were unaware of the Peace Parade or its messages, it was well-received, and there was significant support for Veterans For Peace and LGBT groups.

Transcript of the Tate Williams interview with Boston Phoenix Editor Carly Carioli for Open Media Boston. Transcribed by Tate Williams.

Carly Carioli: It’s been a roller coaster. Yesterday was pretty rough but I think we’re all incredibly proud of the work that we were able to do, in my case for the past 20 years, but even for people who had been here a much shorter time.

We all felt that we were really going out at the top of our game.

BOSTON - When the Boston Phoenix announced it was shutting down Thursday afternoon—after nearly 50 years of often being at the cutting edge of alternative media—the response was a mix of utter shock and resigned acceptance.

After all, while it had been a staple publication for the city for decades, there was general awareness that it was struggling in a world where classified ads are all online, and “alternative media” has fractured and bled into every corner of the Internet.

But mostly, when the Phoenix sent out that not-a-bang-but-a-whimper tweet (“Thank you Boston. Good night and good luck.”), the response was sadness.

For the third year in a row there will be two St. Patrick's Day parades in the city this March 17th. The celebration of Ireland's patron saint has for over a decade been a divisive issue over who gets to march across South Boston. Veterans for Peace and other groups have taken it upon themselves again to organize an alternative parade, which they say is inclusive of all groups. Organizers of the official Patty's Day parade the Allied War Veterans Council have previously refused peace groups and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) groups from taking part in their event. Following a Supreme Court ruling in the Hurley decision in 1995, the Veterans Council won the right to control who gets to take part in the parade based on the right to freedom of speech.

Cambridge, Mass. - Members of the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers (HUCTW) have been working without a new contract since the end of June 2012 as negotiations with the university have gotten nowhere. The unions says that wage increases offered by the university are not enough to maintain decent living standards given the cost of living, health care, and local rental markets. Harvard meanwhile says its offers are based on current labor market conditions, its proposals are above inflation rates, and that finances are suffering due to the Great Recession. The union held a rally on Harvard's main campus on Thursday to highlight the issue.