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Global Links, Global Influence – a Global Voices update · Global Voices
Ethan Zuckerman

“This is why I read Global Voices Online. It’s the best place to find local stories from around the world blogged by people actually experiencing it.”
– Mike Cohen, /dev/random, from a post titled “We Won't Hear About This in the Mainstream Media”
I spent yesterday taking a close look at the blogs that have linked to Global Voices over the past month, from July 10th – August 9th. This is an unusually interesting slice of time for our site – our new design, which radically increased the number of posts we put up per day – went live on July 12th. And it's been one of our highest traffic periods, including the end of the debate over the Muslim blogosphere's reaction to the 7/7 bombings and our reblogging of the Committee to Protect Blogger's story on the BBC and death threats to an Afghan blogger.
The bottom line: Intelliseek's Blogpulse service sees 1029 links to http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/globalvoices, 259 of which (25.2%) have been posted in the past month. Blogpulse sees an additional 37 links to https://www.globalvoicesonline.org, 23 of which (62.2%) were posted this past month. In total, 26.5% of links to Global Voices have been posted in the past month. That's interesting, as 36.7% of our traffic since inception occurred in July. One interpretation is that we got a lot of traffic in July to comment threads, but fewer people linking to the site than we might have expected.
These 282 links come from 152 different blogs – the average blogger who links to us does so 1.86 times in a month. Showing us lots of love over the past month: Beth Kanter, with seven posts (I linked seven times as well); Fons Tunistra's China Herald has five posts; David “El Oso” Sakasi and David Weinberger, with four posts; heterotopias.org, Le Chialeux de Salon and Desipundit with three. Instapundit linked to us twice in this time interval, but those links drove a disproportiate number of additional linkers.
Blogpulse believes that Global Voices is currently the 186th most cited blog in existence. What's more extraordinary about this is that they seem to believe we were as high as the 91st most cited blog around July 30th, when the BBC/Afghan blogger story got so much attention.
By way of comparison, our friends at Worldchanging.com have 2252 citations over a much longer lifespan. Blogpulse sees them as ranking 96th in terms of citations and generally experiencing a rank between 72nd and 95th… Our buddy and great supporter Joi Ito ranks 114th, ranging between 102 and 146 over the past month. In other words, we're now getting as many monthly citations as a well-respected A-list blogger. Not bad for seven months online.
It's unsurprising that most posts linking to an English-language blog would be in English. And, indeed, 83.4% of the posts that link to a Global Voices post are solely in English. (Many post are in another language, but include English excerpts or phrases.) But there are also posts in Chinese, Danish, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Persian, Portuguese, Spanish and Taiwanese. Spanish is our leading alternative language, with nine posts; Chinese follows with seven.
I've attempted to identify the nation a blogger is either posting from or focusing on. This isn't always possible – in about 25 cases, I have nothing to go on, other than the language of the posting individual. But most bloggers identify themselves, either on a bio page or with a badge proclaiming membership in a local blogosphere. Using this information, I'm able to make the guess that we have bloggers in the following countries linking to us over the past month: Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belgium, Brazil, Bolivia, Cambodia, Canada, China, Cuba (probably blogging from the US), Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, India, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Malaysia, Mexico, Nepal, The Phillipines, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Taiwan, Trinidad and Tobago, the UK and the USA. Of 211 posts examined, 38.4% were apparently from the US, 48.8% apparently from outside the US, and 12.8% unclassified.
A couple of weeks back, Rebecca and I both noticed a number of links from blogs that self-identified as conservative. This raised a question for us: were we getting linked disproportionately from the right side of the political spectrum? This proves to be a harder question to answer than the location of a blogger – I ended up deciding that I wouldn't use any personal knowledge I had of a blogger's politics, just indications they made on their sites or profiles. (Fortunately, David Weinberger's “Americans Against Bush” button allowed me to identify him as representing the left, while “Right Wing Hate Machine” made it pretty easy for me to characterize him as representing the right.) Over the period I was considering, we recieved 10 links from 9 self-described “right” blogs, and 10 links from 5 self-described “left” blogs. (Self-described is a key word here – Jeff Jarvis is responsible for two of those links, and he acknowledges that leftists don't always accept his self-characterization as a “liberal”.) Three linking bloggers identified themselves as moderates, or linked extensively to popular political blogs on the left and right. While there were more individual right-wing bloggers than leftists, the posts from folks on the right were concentrated around July 29th and 30th, and primarily focused on bashing the BBC, while posts from the left were more diverse in timing and topic.
(Before anyone draws any conclusions like “Conservatives are more global than liberals”, let me say two things. One, this is a small sample – 20 data points in total. Two, it's quite likely that the “self-identification” rule is skewing the results. I know many of the people who've linked to us and would characterize them as belonging to the “left” even if there's no indication on their blogs. A better method to answer this question would be a reader survey that asked readers to self-identify their politics. We may try this in the next month or so. One way or another, though, these results challenge my assumption (as an avowed liberal) that our content would appeal primarily to readers on the left. Very interesting, and worth further thought.)
We've also been tracking traffic on the Global Voices site by analyzing server records for the past few months. Growth has been explosive, from an average of 400 visits a day shortly after our launch at the start of the year, to an average of 7,000 unique visitors a day in July and August. In July, we broke the quarter million visitor mark and expect to do so again in August. A good deal of our traffic is to the Bridge Blog Index, and to online documents like the Anonymous Blogging Guide hosted on the wiki, complementing traffic to the Global Voices weblog.
I come out of my day's worth of research with a sense that Global Voices is working, in a deep, profound way. Two of our major goals when we started the project this past December: create a space for global conversation, and have an influence on the existing blogosphere, ensuring that blogs aren't just about US politics and technology. That blogs from 35+ countries and almost a dozen languages are pointing to us suggests that we're starting to create a global space; that Blogpulse thinks we're one of 200 of the most cited blogs suggests that we're starting to have that influence on the blogosphere. It's not unreasonable to image that we might be one of the hundred most cited blogs by the end of 2005, a goal that would probably have a truly transformative effect on the blogosphere as a whole.
Thanks to everyone who's linked to, read or been influenced by the links Global Voices has posted over the past six months. Please keep tuning in. We really do intend to change the world of blogging to make it more global, more interconnected and more diverse… and so far, we're doing it.
-Ethan Zuckerman
A slightly different version of this document, including links to materials I used to make the calculations is available on my personal weblog.


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India: Mirror, mirror etc. · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

The obsession with fair skin in Asian communities and the consequent branding games on Charu's blog.

source: news-globalvoices

license: Creative Commons - Attribution - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

author: Neha Viswanathan


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Israel: ISM activist’s killer sentenced to eight years in prison · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

International Solidarity Movement (ISM) reports that over two years after he killed British Peace activist Tom Hurndall in Gaza, Ex-sergeant Taysir Hayb was sentenced to eight years in prison by an Israeli military court.

author: Haitham Sabbah


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Jordan:  Jordanian clock · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Ibrahim Owais from Ocean Creep Blog thinks that Jordanians are creative people and hardworkers because 46% of Jordanians consider the 15 minutes late on appointments don't counts as late.


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Launch of the Mobcasting Developers Forum · Global Voices
Andy Carvin

Because of the positive feedback I've received around the creation of a low-cost, open source strategy for recording and receiving podcasts over mobile phones, I've set up a new email list and Web community for people interested in making this happen. There are already free tools like audioblogger and audlink that will let you post podcasts from your phone, but both require a long-distance phone call to the US, and neither let you listen to podcasts from your phone. I want to develop a tool that can be installed anywhere in the world, so all of this can be done on a local phone call.
To learn more about mobcasting, please visit this blog entry I wrote last January, entitled When Mobile Podcasting Leads to Mobcasting to see where this all got started.
The email list will be focused solely on this project; people who join the list should be interested in mobile phone podcasting and be willing to help us make this project happen.
To join the list, please send an email to , with the spaces and brackets removed. Or, you can visit the Mobcasting list homepage.
Meanwhile, I've also created a DDN community that we can use as a workspace. The workspace has bulletin boards, document sharing and blog posting. Group members are welcome to post web resources, blog entries or files to this public page. We can also add news, events and feature stories to the site if they become useful at some point.
Looking forward to making this happen! -andy

author: Andy Carvin


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Nepal: Long live the Radio! · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

After the silence, the news is back on the radio. International Nepal Solidarity Network links to an article on the revival of communication.


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Niger: Tanja fiddles while Niger burns · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

President Tanja Mamadou of Niger has denied that there's a famine in his country, stating instead that it's only a “food emergency”, reports Black Star Journal.

author: Paul Frankenstein


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Pakistan: Street children · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

12 years, financing his own education and working nights. The story of Shabbir on Metroblogging Lahore.


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Saudi Arabia: Khamis Mushayt Girl · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

The much-missed Saudi blogger behind The Religious Policeman is back. Amongst other things, he had this observation on the Saudi Justice System: The 26-year-old mother of three, called the ‘Khamis Mushayt Girl’, convicted of murdering a man six years ago is scheduled to be executed next Thursday… The details are uncertain, because all Saudi trials are conducted in secret, without reporters, and without independent defense lawyers, so there's no-one around to give an objective account.


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Singapore: A protest in sunny Singapore · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

Omeka Na Huria posts a first-hand account from a peaceful political protestor in Singapore. The four protestors were met by more than a dozen of Singapore's finest riot police in full riot gear.


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Sri Lanka: Minister assasinated · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

The Sri Lankan Foreign Minister, Mr Lakshman Kadirgamar has been shot dead. He was shot near his home in Colombo. A last minute job has a post profiling the man. Sepia Mutiny provides more details.


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Sudan: More AU Troops coming? · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

Humanitarian Hijinks on the mixed reaction that the arrival of more African Union troops in Darfur engenders.


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Trinidad and Tobago: Two New Podcasts · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Two new podcast shows coming out of Trinidad and Tobago today including the 29th installment of Caribbean Free Radio and the second of the Trinidad and Tobago Computer Society.

author: David Sasaki


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Trinidad & Tobago: Bombing Suspect in Custody · Global Voices
Andy Carvin

Taran Rampersad posts an update about this week's bombing in Trinidad. “It seems that a suspect has been held in the explosion on George St. here in Trinidad, but with so many copycats in Trinidad and Tobago, it's difficult to say that this is also a suspect for the initial bombing,” he writes.


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United Arab Emirates:  Peaceful Journey · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

On his return from London to Dubai, The Secret Blog Of Arabia hopes not to get followed by the police, MI5 , MI6 , CIA , etc., on the Underground or in the Heathrow Airport, or by Dubai Police for writing blogs about the UAE or for holding a British passport while being of Muslim origin.


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USA: Should Public Libraries be English-Only? · Global Voices
Andy Carvin

In the city of Denver, Colorado, there's an ugly fight breaking out over whether public libraries should provide books and other materials in Spanish. Anti-immigration groups argue that publicly funded libraries should be English-only, while library supporters retort that curtailing Spanish-language content is discriminatory and doesn't reflect the ever-changing population demographics of the United States.


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Zimbabwe: Isn’t it ironic? · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

The Zimbabwean Pundit on the irony that Zimbabwean leader Robert Mugabe refuses to engage his fellow Africans and will only speak with Tony Blair.


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News from Chinese Blogosphere(Aug7th-13th) · Global Voices
Frank Dai

1. The Yahoo-Alibaba Deal: The largest merger in Chinese Internet took place on August 11. Alibaba.com, a leading Chinese e-commerce company, which featured online auction and trade, acquired Yahoo China. According to the official announcement, Alibaba would have all assets of Yahoo China, including email and searching services. It also obtained one billion US dollars of investment from Yahoo.
2. Suicide Bomber: A suicide bomb exploded on a bus in FuZhou, capital of FuJian Province, Southeast China on August 8, killing 2 people including the bomber and injuring more than 30 people. After less than half an hour, the news has already appeared on some BBS. Many bloggers, especially those who live in the city rushed to blog about the explosion. ESWN has some photos of the scene.
3. Typhoon: Typhoon Matsa hit coastal area of Eastern China, including major cities like Shanghai and Beijing. According to WangJianshuo, faced with the threat of typhoon, people have different opinion in Shanghai. ZhangRui posted some nice photos of typhoon's arriving and XinHaiguang, a journalist, has a detailed roundup in what newspaper in Beijing reacted to typhoon.
4. 6 million Chinese blogger: International Herald Tribute reported that number of Chinese Bloggers grow up to 6 million, from 5 million only 3 weeks ago, which Blogherald has counted. But Fons Tuinstra pointed out that the figure may be not very reliable.
5. Hacker Attack on BSP: From August 9  to 11th, unknown hacker attacked Donews.com and Blogbus.com separately, both of which are leading in Blog Hosting. It was still not very clear that the two websites were hacked by the same person or group but the technique used was the same called DDOS. Hengge, The CEO of Blogbus, told on his blog that their service has been suspended for about 5 hours but no user's data was lost.
6. Chinese Valentine's Day: August 11 was also the “Chinese Valentine's Day” according to traditional Chinese calendar. But young people didn't seemed to be enthusiastic toward it. Keepwalking gave some inspiring tips on how to promote the holiday.
7. Rave party on Greatwall: An annual rave party held in the Greatwall, has been criticized by netizens and became a controversy. They accused the party organizers and participants pay no attention to environment and such activities are not respectful to historical heritage.  Heterotopias defended  that critics didn't understand the nature of rave culture.

author: Frank Dai


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Bus Fares Protested in Yerevan · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Onnik Krikorian writes that Yerevan citizens protested and refused to pay fares on minibuses after they were raised from 100 to 130 drams.

author: Nathan Hamm


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Egypt: Islam must change · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

The Big Pharaoh says that Islam must change just as Christianity and Judaism changed. Religious reform cannot be separated from political reform. In fact, he consider it to be much more important.


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Egypt: Islamic video games · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

The Sandmonkey writes that there seems to be a number of video-game developers who, in an attempt to counter the Christian video-game revolution, are developing Islamic video-games.


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South Asian Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Rezwan

A quick glimpse at some of the blogs in South Asia.
Bangladesh:
- Tazzy writes more episodes about a typical South Asian arranged marriage. Stay tuned for the rest of the story.
- ‘Allah hafiz’ or ‘Khuda hafiz’- Asif discusses the controversial Indo-Islamic phrases for “good bye” used in Bangladesh.
- Ishtiaque writes a series of posts about his recent trip to Cox's Bazaar, the longest natural sea beach of the world.
- Robin posts pictures of an unique car sculpture in Dhaka, which is made out of bicycle chains, car parts and other scrap metal.
Bhutan:
- Bhutani cable operators stopped telecasting of some Indian news and entertainment channels, which were accused of undermining Bhutanese cultural values, besides distracting students from their studies.
India:
- Preetam Rai posts a tribute to India's Independence Day.
- Manish of ‘Sepia Mutiny’ reports that the new Oxford Dictionary of English has a Desi flavor.
- ‘Even the Indian Gods are now being outsourced from China’ – discovers Amit of  ‘India Uncut’.
- Kozhikode is the first litter free city in India – via ‘The scientific Indian’.
- Nitin of  ‘The Acorn’ predicts the name of the next Pakistani ballistic missile.
Nepal:
- Dinesh Wagle of ‘United We Blog’ interviews Miss Nepal 2005 contestants and asks about their dreams.
- Vishnu discusses the Nepali government sponsored vigilante groups which according to him will worsen the bloody situation in Nepal.
Pakistan:
- KO pleads to UK to extradite the most wanted terrorist of Pakistan, Altaf Hussain, whom UK granted asylum.
- Pakistani Perspective links to an article which says that the Pakistan military took up four percent of the country GDP and a Maj General of the armed forces is worth a staggering Rs 300 million.
- The Glass House harshly criticises Pakistani president Gen. Musharrof's pledges, which are yet to be fulfilled.
Sri Lanka:
- Sri Lankan blogosphere is mourning the death of Mr. L. Kadirgamar, the foreign Minister of Sri Lanka assassinated by the alleged LTTE terrorists. Prabhath writes “they silenced the most eloquent voice of Sri Lanka that fearlessly spoke against terrorism.” Selvarajah suspects that because of the declaration of emergency, the authorities can harass Tamils by detaining as suspect. Mahangu prays that this doesn’t mean another war.

author: Rezwan


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A track less travelled for bloggers? · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

After blogging for close to three years, I thought I should start to give blogs and bloggers a fresh context in Malaysia.
Last month, with the help of US-based friends who run the Malaysian Forum, I had a roundtable with a group of dynamic knowledge workers in Palo Alto, California to share my thoughts about blogging within the Malaysian context. It was an honour and a  great experience engaging in frank conversations with my fellow countrymen and women who are scholars from Stanford and San Francisco universities, and those who had graduated and established their professional practice in the Bay Area.
Today, back home, I will give an evening talk to the Malaysian Chapter of the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA), themed: Blogging: Freedom of Speech vs Social Accountability. Perhaps I'll to touch on the issue of the Personal Data Protection Bill which remains stranded three years after its second reading  in the Parliament.
September 8, I will have another evening talk with a group of young PR consultants as a part of the Public Relations Consultants Association of Malaysia’s (PRCAM) SpeakEasy programme. The theme: Blogging, Beyond the Politics.
Mr Tang Hangwu, who is now in Cambridge University in UK, has also planned for me to hold a joint faculty seminar at the Law Faculty, National University of Singapore (NUS), themed: Blogging and freedom of expression sometime in September.
Tang presented  a paper, Let a Hundred Flowers Bloom: A Malaysian Case Study on Blogging Towards a Democratic Culture, at BILETA (British & Irish Law, Education and Technology Association) early this year,
Perhaps, bloggers should outreach to the communities of practice to give blogs a relevant context in a knowledge-based economy. There are critical thinkers who should be networked together to influence change in society and national economy.

author: Jeff Ooi


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African Bullets and Honey on the trials of Kenyan athletes · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

MMK, over at African Bullets and Honey, decries  the attitude of the Kenyan government to its athletes in the wake of the World Championships in Helsinki.

author: Luisetta Mudie


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Argentina: 20th Century Intellectual Journals · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Jeff Barry gives a brief history of early 20th century intellectual magazines from Buenos Aires.


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Argentina: Buenos Aires Photoblog · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Robert Wright from line of sight, with the help of Marcelo Metayer, has added a photoblog of Buenos Aires to complement his excellent, -licensed online walking tour of the city.


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Azerbaijan: Rumors of plots at election time · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Marianna Idrisova Gurtovnik, in her blog dedicated to the Azerbaijan elections, details allegations of a coup conspiracy leveled against opposition supporters.


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Bahrain: Imam suspended · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Mahmood asks if anyone can shed some light on GDN's article (PDF) about a Bahraini mosque preacher (Imam) in Muharraq, who has been suspended due to a sermon he preached about Zionism and “Sectarian Issues”.


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Bangladesh: Discrimination · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Discrimination in Bangladesh has many manifestations says Imtiaz.


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Bringing out the dead in Harare · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Flame Lily writes on the Sokwanele Civic Action Support Group blog how she saw Zimbabwean police drag a body out of a ditch where those made homeless by the government's mass demolitions of shanty-towns had been sleeping.


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Colombia: Why mycoherbicides are still a stupid idea · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Plan Colombia and Beyond makes its case against the spraying of spores and fungi over Colombia’s coca-growing zones. With links to data about health and environmental impacts.


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E-mails about peacekeepers in Darfur · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Aid worker Sleepless in Sudan shares some e-mails she has received from researchers and other aid-workers in the troubled region of Darfur, as African Union peacekeepers begin their mission.


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Egypt: New Explosion in Sinai? · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

The Sandmonkey is getting a little bit confused. He says that according to News Filbalad (an Egyptian news website), the Multinational Force and Observers declared that no explosion took place at Sinai, and that there are no people injured or killed. That all that happened that a car driven by 2 people- who sustained no injuries- got “destroyed”. On the Other hand, Al Jazeera confirms the explosion story and states that it was informed by sources inside the Egyptian National security apparatus.


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Grassroots movement seeks to change the politics of Poland · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Pol-Blog gets behind a grass-roots, citizen-based political initiative aimed at communicating directly with EU institutions, and being run by the European Citizen Action Service.


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Grenada: Carnival Review · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Richard says this year's Grenada Carnival was a slight disappointment compared to last year's.


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India: Ban on Hand Pulled Rickshaws · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Sepia Mutiny has a post on the Government's decision to ban hand-pulled rickshaws in Calcutta.


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India: Independence Day · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Links for Indian Independence Day (15 Aug) – Arun on the contexts of Independence. Thoughts on the flag at Caferati.


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Iran: Censorship of Blog Host · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Hoder reports that Iran's Telecom company has ordered all ISPs to filter blogrolling.com.


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Iran:  Creation of Hate · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Omid Memarian says that Islamists groups in Iran creates hate against the west between the youth generation. He gives an example of that by yesterday's Iranian Students protest against the UK embassy in Tehran to show their hate about what this country and the other western countries have done during the war between Iran and Iraq (1980-1989).


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Israel: Disengagement · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

In israpundit, Daniel Pipes writes that the Israeli government's removal of its own citizens from Gaza ranks as one of the worst errors ever made by a democracy. Imshin says that there are reports that settlers have smuggled hundreds of army and police uniforms into the Gaza Strip and that they intend to wear them when the evacuators arrive so as to create confusion. Andrew Schamess writes Thinking Beyond the Disengagement and comes to a conclusion “I don't think Sharon has any respect for the Palestinians, and I don't think he's the man to make peace with them. But, we can hope.” Shiloh Musings points to the propaganda program in favor of Disengagement and against the “fanatic, extremist Jews”.


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Kabul residents struggle for daily water · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Afghan blogger Sohrab Kabuli has a photo of people, including children, in a poor district of the capital city, struggling with buckets on carrying poles (the luckier ones have donkeys) to get their daily supply of water.


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Malaysia: Haze-haters collect evidence online · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Blogger Koh Lay Chin blew her own cover one week after setting up Haze Haters In Malaysia  as a repository of images of Malaysia shrouded in smog and haze. She has originally blogged behind anonymity – an effort she calls a pictorial petition – to protest against Indonesia for allowing open burning in plantations that caused  hazardous air pollutants to blow across the Malacca Straits, plunging Malaysia in emergency… until mainstream New Sunday Times invited her to write a story in first-person.


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Malaysia: The 21’s who blog from across the world · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

The Cicak (lizard in Malay) is climbing up the wall. San Francisco-based student Poh Si Tang leads a virtual world of young Malaysians scattered across the world to blog on politics, society, education, media and business back home. She takes the role of managing editor, besides toiling her busy schedule as a student and reporter at a community newspaper in the Bay Area.
Her team members have just turned 21: Ng Khai Lee, Kristel Leow (Seattle), Brian Ong (New York), Rachel Leow (UK, who wrote for International Herald Tribune when she was 16), Nurjehan, Lee Hui Huang, Audery Tang (San Francisco), Ana A (Silicon Valley), Jason Lim (London) and The Marquis (so-named due to work-hazard related constraints). They share Poh Si's belief in her search of free speech and expression.


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Nepal: Internet and Mass Media · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

United We Blog! has a post weighing the pros and cons of the Internet as a medium.


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Pakistan: Independence Day · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Independence Day in Pakistan. Leaders make pledges , reflections on Partition and notes for the country's future.


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Palestine: Disengagement · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Rafah Pundits writes that disengagement is official and that there’s so much information, and disinformation. Watch for more links at their del.icio.us. Laila describes this day and says it's like a zoo there, and reminds her of the fall of the Berlin Wall. With thousands of journalists flown in from around the world, spread across every inch of Gaza, every settlement, refugee camp, border crossing, with satellite link-up, Internet, radio, you name it. A new article by Uri Avnery is published at Gush Shalom. He writes, A Miracle of Rare Device: This week, a great event will take place: for the first time, settlements in Palestine are being removed. The Settlement enterprise, which has always moved forward, is for the first time moving backwards. On the other hand, ninathedog reports that Settlers declare independent ‘Gaza state’. In a ceremony held Sunday evening at the Gaza Strip settlement of Shirat HaYam, several dozen settlers declared the establishment of the “Independent Jewish Authority in the Gaza Region.


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Palestine: International Women in Black · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

International Solidarity Movement posting a press release stating that hundreds of women to participate in the International Women in Black Conference in Jerusalem will travel today to the village of Bil’in to participate with village women in a vigil against construction of Israel’s illegal annexation wall that will cut 60 percent of Bil'in’s farmland from its people so that nearby settlers can take over the land.


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Peru: President Toledo’s Low Approval Ratings · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Boz has the story on Peruvian president, Alejandro Toledo's fall from grace.


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Sri Lanka: Blogs react to the assasination · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Lakshman Kadirgamar was assasinated by snipers in Colombo. indi.ca posts that it has to be LTTE that killed Kadirgamar. Nidahas makes a similar assertion. LankaBuzz has a story on what the Army Intelligence agencies picked up on radio. Morquendi responds by saying that the LTTE cannot be blamed till it is proven so by the Government, or claimed by LTTE. He has another post which attempts at understanding who would gain what from this assasination, and if it was political afterall.
Arvind doesn't think that negotiations with LTTE will work. One one things is bothered by some of the reactions to the assasination. Days Go By laments the loss of a leader.


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Sri Lanka: Post-Tsunami Corruption · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Point Pedro Institute of Development has an article on the corruption in Sri Lanka that has compounded the misery of those who lost lives and livelihoods due to the Tsunami.


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Trinidad and Tobago: Tobago Jazz Festival · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Small Island Girl has two long posts summarizing the Tobago Jazz Festival.


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Aruba: Election Madness · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Lost in Smallness says that in Aruba, “by law, every voter must get four continous hours free from work.


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Bangladesh: How we change · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Perceived changes and generalizations about the Bangladeshi Society by PseudoArab.


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Black Looks blogs about Ugandan women held in UK · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Black Looks (“An African Fem Rocking the Boat”) details the plight of a number of hunger-striking Ugandan women held in a U.K. detention center awaiting deportation after their asylum applications failed. The women say they have had difficulty finding legal help and that rape victims among them have been barred from contacting women's support groups.


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Blog Maps · Global Voices
David Sasaki

eGrupos, an online social networking site based in Sunnyvale, California has developed El BlogoMapa Hispano, an online directory of weblogs in Spanish, which shows the bloggers’ locations using the Google Maps API. If you have a weblog written in Spanish and it is not included on the map, you may submit it. There is also a plugin for Google Earth.
This is an exciting addition to other efforts of mapping out bloggers by location. Gustavo Diaz Salazar of Tampico, Tamaulipas, Mexico has made a similar blog map which focuses on Mexico. GeoURL is probably the most well known and largest database of bloggers’ locations and offers RSS feeds of new blogs in specific regions. Mikel Maron, who has created a free Google Maps-alternative for making blog maps, developed The World as a Blog, which synidacates feeds based on location in real time. Blogwise is also trying to collect geo data to map out bloggers and Chandu Thota is hard at work on feedmap, which so far, organizes blogs using tags and offers local blogrolls based on location.
These are great visual tools to explore other countries and cultures without ever leaving your laptop.


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Bolivia: Failed States Index Map · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Newley Purnell wants to know why Bolivia isn't on the Foreign Policy Failed States Index Map while Ecuador and Peru are.


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Cambodia: Blog services · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

With some help, there is a possibility to launch a blog service that incorporates Khmer Unicode fonts, Khmer language software and blog tools. Can we find them a Cambodian Hoder?


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Cambodia: Blogging beyond the norms · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Wired News featured Cambodian blogger Bun Tharum, as a new voice who has ventured into uncharted course in the emerging democracy: government corruption and the problem of domestic violence.  Today, Bun Tharum talks about
arranged marriage in Cambodia, in response to an article he read in Global Voices Online.


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China: Hitch in the Alibaba deal? · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

China Herald comments on an article pointing out that many of the goods for sale on Alibaba, the Chinese internet portal that Yahoo! is heavily investing in, are counterfit.


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China: how returned overseas chinese viewed by locals? · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

In response to a reader query, Bingfeng Teahouse writes about how returning overseas Chinese are viewed by locals.


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China: PLA Wanted ads · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

Hong Kong-based blog Simon World looks at the PLA's policy towards marriage and co-habitiation in the ranks.


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Darfur: A blogger’s background notes · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Ingrid at Sudan Watch has posted a series of background notes on the troubled Sudanese region of Darfur, including a summary of views of the Arab militia leader Musa Hilal, who is suspected of being behind many of the recent ethnic-cleansing style attacks on African villages.


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Ecuador: Against Recruiting of Mercenaries · Global Voices
David Sasaki

The Ecuadorean government has expressed reservations about the recruitment of mercenary soldiers out of the port city of Manta. Concern rose over this job posting offering ex-Colombian soldiers as private security workers in Iraq.


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Egypt: Update on Sinai Terrorist Attack  · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

The Sandmonkey update on Sinai Terrorist Attack and says that the international media is ignoring it for some strange reason. Claims of responsbility for Yesterdays Sinai Terrorist attack have been made by a group called the Mujahedeen of Egypt. It's worth noting that this is one of the three groups that claimed responsibility for the Sharm El Sheikh attacks as well.


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El Salvador: Remittance Investment · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Juanson World is disillusioned that more Salvadoran immigrants in the U.S. aren't investing money in development back home.


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Gaza disengagement first reaction · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

A day since the disengagement from Gaza started, this is some of what is going on the Israeli/Palestinian Blogsphere:
On the Israeli side:
Smooth Stone writes a  A message to the world and says:
Well, sadly, the evil deed is done. The Jewish men, women and children of Gush Katif have been deported from their homes. Their fate is sealed. And, mind you, so is everyone else's. This is a message to the Arabs, to Arab government leaders, and to Arab supporters and their apologists who are orgiastic that Jews have been deported from their homes. No nation, other than the ancient nation of Israel and later again with the rebirth of the nation of Israel, has ever ruled as a sovereign national entity on what you claim to be “Palestinian” land. Jews are indigenous to this land that your greed and terror has gained you. Arabs are not indigenous to the land. Palestinian Arabs are not indigenous to Palestine. They are leftover Arabs, residual of another age…
Chayyei Sarah posts this photo under the title No Words Required and writes:
This picture, which I downloaded from Reuters via Haaretz.com, will stay in my mind for a long time. It is a photo of a resident of Nissanit and two Israeli soldiers weeping as the community's synagogue is dismantled. May Hashem cause our strength as a nation to grow in proportion to the pain we feel at this moment.
Mystical Politics post titled The Other Uprooting is quoting Danny Rubinstein of Haaretz, writes:
While many Jews today are mourning the evacuation from Gaza, we should remember that during the course of the bloody conflicts of recent years, approximately 30,000 inhabitants of the Gaza Strip have been uprooted from their homes. Entire Palestinian neighborhoods along the Philadelphi route in Rafah, at the edges of the Khan Yunis refugee camp, along the route to Netzarim and in the north on the edges of Beit Hanun have been turned into heaps of ruins by the Israel Defense Forces. The reason was an Israeli security need.
On the Palestinian side:
umkhalil says War Criminal Gaza Colonists Compensated/Palestinians Ignored:
the illegal colonists will receive from 150,000- 400,000 in compensation from the Israeli government. Unfortunately, the indigenous inhabitants of Palestine don't receive any where near the amount of coverage, of, for example, fifty-nine year old Anita Tucker, the Brooklyn, New York native, and darling of the BBC's Hard Talk, also oft quoted in the prolific and sympathetic news stories about the war criminals. If only the fate of the indigenous people were portrayed on CNN and BBC, perhaps US taxpayers wouldn't be so quick to subsidize Israel's ongoing war crimes to the tune of three billion dollars annually.
While Laila (of A Mother from Gaza blog) publish this photo with title Leave my land:
“A young boy from the Siyafa village looks towards the soon-to-be evacuated settlement of Dugit”
She also writes under the title Disen-what-ment?:
I don't know how many times I've said that word today. What does that mean anyway…and have you ever though of how many sentenes you can use some derivative of it in…we no longer want to engage with you…you are not engaging enough for our company..er..occupation….sorry, but the line is engaged with protester's calls at the moment…and I got engaged to all this madness while covering disengagement. I feel like my speech has a become a series of edited and re-edited sentences with all the same buzzwords.
Disengagement…freedom…access…prison..anxiety…hope.
Under the title Disengagement Riddled with Uncertainty  Rafah Note says:
Jedallah Al Haut explains how he bought the machinery from the clothing factory where he used to work in the Gush Katif settlement. He plans to establish his own business in Gaza once the Israeli withdrawal is completed.


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India: A country growing old · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Is India really a young country as most people claim? Dilip uncovers the assumptions and presents cold facts.


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India: Pedestrians in Mumbai · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Vislumbres on the perils of being a pedestrian in Mumbai.


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Indonesia: Farewell to Arms · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

FAREWELL TO ARMS. August 15 marks the day of signing of the final Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the Indonesia government and Aceh Freedom Movement (GAM, Gerakan Aceh Merdeka), in which the separatists agree to disarm and accept amnesty, money and farmland. Ironically, peace finally dawned to replace the decades-old undeclared civil war after the tsunami which devastated Aceh on December 26 last year. Blogger, journalist and activist Allan Nairn of newsc.blogspot.com has been following the event.


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Indonesia: Mr Underground Movement · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Indonesian blogger Budi Rahardjo runs a blog called “Underground Movement”, or Gerakan Bawah Tanah in the Indonesian language, hence his nick Mr. GBT. He is actually the R&D director at Institut Teknologi Bandung (ITB) near Jakarta, a Canadian-trained network security expert and an administrator of IdCERT. He was featured in a Microsoft advertisement for the Indonesian market recently. Now he dreams of teaching his students programming with Perl.


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Inside Somaliland tracks AIDS explosion warning · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Yvette Lopez, at Taste of Africa, points to a worrying warning from the United Nations about an explosion of HIV/AIDS infections in Somalia.


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Iraq: Al-Qaeda’s threats · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Mohammed of Iraq The Model writes that the Sunni respond to Al-Qaeda's threats.


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Iraq: The New Constitution · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

New Deadline for the Iraqi Constitution, Raed Jarrar says that the Iraqi constitution shouldn’t be rushed through. Iraqis have the right to take as much time as they need to write their country’s constitution.


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Lebanon: Bin Laden’s book · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Abu Aardvark believes that publishing bin Laden's writings and speeches strikes is a positive thing and publishing the words of a mass murderer and terrorist is hard to defend normatively. But fighting against radical Islamism requires understanding it.


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Malaysia: English – Benglish Translator · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

The ever-intrepid Kenny Sia impressed by the variety and quality of machine translation on the web, has written the first ever English-to-Benglish translator.


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Israel: more disengagement reactions · Global Voices
Rachel Barenblat

Here are a few additions to Haitham's  excellent round-up of reactions to the disengagement:
Allison  talks about how many Israelis are focusing their attention elsewhere: “My point: this is a huge, historic big deal, this disengagement. But in order to really feel that it's happening, you have to be paying attention. And a lot of people are deciding not to pay attention. Which, considering how painful it is to watch, may not be such a bad decision.”
In contrast, though, Imshin asserts that “No Israeli has the right to turn his head away, to turn off the television, to pretend it isn’t happening. We must see it all. See without judgment.”
Lisa of On the Face tells  a vivid story about going into Bethlehem for an art exhibition, and the politics of choosing what language to speak to Palestinian cab drivers:
“On the way up, he asked us if we were Israelis. Upon hearing our confirmation he started to speak broken Hebrew, assuring us that it had been fluent once, before the checkpoints and the separation barrier were erected and Israelis could no longer visit the West Bank. I haven't spoken Hebrew for five years, he said, So I'm out of practice. He added that he had heard a few people speaking Hebrew very softly in the Bethlehem market. They're with your group, right? he said. Yes, I thought so. But they were afraid to be identified as Israelis, he said, laughing. Why are you all so afraid of us?”
Flickr has a ton of  photos tagged with “disengagement,” among them this one of people praying beside their car,  this one of the official roadblock closing the road into Gaza, and this one of a scene from a bus of settlers en route to a protest.
Orthodox Anarchist writes on being simultaneously pro- and anti-disengagement:
“what's going on right now is painful. i feel for the families yet find it difficult to fathom their shock and suprise as it's been shown in the news. this has been a year in the coming; they're acting like they didn't believe the day would come. their disbelief is staggering. israel's been terrorizing arabs, knocking down their houses, razing their villages, suppressing their rights, brutalizing and dehumanizing them for decades. they didn't think the government would do the same to them when they they no longer served the government's interests?”
Sha! writes about cognitive dissonance: “one of the most common sights in Neve Dekalim today is a house with a sign on the front door reading ‘We won't Move From this Place’ and a whole lot of packed boxes inside.”
Out of Step Jew  writes “Israel is life – it is not a toy or a game that you play with when you feel like it. It is not a vacation spot, not a place to find yourself, not a place to work out your life's problems and not a place to build your own utopia. Living in Israel is living reality. And reality demands compromise and ugliness.”
Bert (a.k.a. Yonathan) of  Dutchblog Israel posts  about settlers’ acts of violence and why these acts actually make the soldiers’ jobs easier, arguing that it is “less difficult for soldiers and policemen and -women to deal with violent than with truly non-violent resistance.”
Karen (of  Karen Alkalay-Gut's Tel Aviv Journal)  writes: “There is no way to see these days as joyous. Even though i have never ever believed in the justification of Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip, from the time of my own visits to Gaza in the early seventies, I could not help but feel today as a day of amputation.”
Ben (of Ben Chorin)  asks “Where is the line between legitimate protest and illegitimate havoc-wreaking? Not a simple question. If you believe, as I do, that the withdrawal from Azza will bring only harm and that, moreover, the process by which it has been carried out is not only flawed but corrupt (the individuals involved most directly in the decision-making process all have direct or indirect financial interests in the withdrawal), you might be inclined to push the boundary pretty far out there.”
On Jewschool,  a post about Amnesty International criticizing Israel for holding anti-disengagement activists without officially charging them with anything (and in the comments to that post, a debate about whether or not Amnesty is biased for or against Israel.)
And on a lighter note, Brian of  This Normal Life tells a sweet story about eyeglasses, optometrists, and romance in  A Different Disengagement.

author: Rachel Barenblat


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Nepal: Where are the people? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

International Nepal Solidarity Network has a post on the Government making information public on 90 people who were believed to be missing.


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Pakistan: No celebrations in India? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

An Indian TV channel blocked in Pakistan the same time it was broadcasting Indian Independence Day celebrations.


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Pakistan: The direction of the Economy · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Notes on Pakistani economy, disinvestment and privatization on pakistani perspective.


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South Korea: The Blog Blackout of 2005 · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

The Marmot’s Hole notes that TypePad and Blogspot were apparently blocked in South Korea over the weekend, apparently to honor that country's Independence Day.


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Taliban fighters killed, captured · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

AfghanWarrior reports on continued fighting between the Afghan National Army and Taliban insurgents.


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The Great Game heats up in Azerbaijan · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Many bloggers concerned with Azerbaijan are wondering if recent U.S. attempts to balance Russian influence in the country will split the government. Azeris have a general election coming up in November.


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The state of the African blogosphere · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

The Zimbabwean Pundit gives an overview of the African blogosphere at the Committee to Protect Bloggers.


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Time warp at the Romanian/Ukrainian border · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Working Definition takes a trip with a Romanian family to the country near the border with Ukraine, pondering patchy economic development the while.


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Too many democratic revolutions, Russia complains · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Registan takes issue with Russia's complaints about “forcible” democratization in former Soviet states.


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Tourists want more services in Czech town · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Tourists have complained to a Czech town government that there are not enough prostitutes, blogs Petr Bokuvka at The Daily Czech.


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Turkish scholar freed in Armenia · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Blogrel links to reports that Turkish scholar Yektan Turkyilmaz has been freed by the Armenian authorities and promises more details to come.


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Turkyilmaz’s Trial · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Oneworld Multimedia has been reporting on and photographing the trial of Yektan Turkyilmaz, a 33 year old Duke Ph.D. candidate and Turkish citizen of Kurdish descent accused of trying to take books over 50 years old out of Armenia.


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Afghanistan: Blogger at a U.S. hospital · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Sohrab Kabuli blogs about his visit to an American-run hospital in the Afghan capital, Kabul.


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Bangladesh: Bomb Blasts · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Series of bomb blasts in Bangladesh. Over a 100 blasts in different places around the same time, and Jamatul Mujahideen Bangladesh has claimed that they carried out the attack.


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Bangladesh: Government Speak · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Unheard Voices compiles statements of the Government of Bangladesh regarding JMJB (the organisation that has claimed responsibility for the bombs).


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Blog-city Blocked in China? · Global Voices
Frank Dai

From yesterday afternoon, blog-city, a famous BSP is beginning to be blocked in China. Now it was still under filter by GFW, the project to detect key words and block websites . By using proxy blog-city is still accessible in mainland China.
Anti, a prominent blogger who was also a veteran journalist for international news, told on his blog hosted on blog-city that after he posted the protest in China Youth Daily his blog began to be inaccessible. Anti has been blogging about the wrongdoings of government for long time. So many Chinese bloggers are not very surprise to see his blog and blog-city blocked. Now he has shifted to his backup blog on MSN Space.
Gordon, who is working with blog-city supporting team, hopes that this blockage would be just temporary. He also invites other Blog City bloggers in China to contact him (Via Imagethief and The Peking Duck). He said that the blog-city team is now working to find a solution.
Now Chinese Bloggers are facing a serious problem of where to blog, especially those who want to speak freely. More and more foreign BSPs are being blocked, such as Blogsome, Typepad and Blogspot. Almost all the BSPs in Mainland China have a rigid system of censoring “bad words” which are considered to be politically or pornographically sensitive. If hosted on independent domain server, the blogger need to register their personal information. For bloggers who want to blog freely and securely, they can resort to “Adoptablog” program.
The Firewall is expanding. Who will be the next?


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BREAKING NEWS: BANGLADESH BOMB BLASTS · Global Voices
Rezwan

Today I was attending one seminar in Dhaka and the phones started to ring at around 11:30 AM. Keens were checking whether everyone was alright as a series of bombings were reported across the country. Some people who came in that moment were wondering why the busy streets and squares were so lean in traffic. We were hearing of some really confusing reports. But the scene looks like this as of now from reports of the private satellite TV channels:
* Around 100 bombs exploded in 58 different locations.
* The bombs appeared to be homemade and capable of causing only limited damage.  Sophisticated timing device were used to synchronized these explosions across the country to cause maximum panic .
* Blasts reported in 36 of the 64 districts in synchronization between 11:00 -11:30 AM today.
* There are some wild speculations about casualties but about 120 are reported injured. So far no deaths reported. More figures to come as the situation develops.
* Key installations like government offices (even the secretariat in Dhaka), high courts, press clubs, busy squares and universities targeted.
* Leaflets of a Islamic terrorist organization Jamayetul Mujahideen were found at blast sites in Dhaka, Chittagong, Sylhet and Mymensingh. The leaflet said:
“It is time to implement Islamic law in Bangladesh. There is no future with with man-made law. Bush and Blair be warned and get out of Muslim countries. Your days of ruling Muslim countries are over.”
* At least 45 people were arrested from different locations across the country.
It is the total failure of this government whose security forces were overpowered by the synchronized attack in many locations showing the might they possess. The government and the political parties politicized the investigations of the previous bomb blasts and hence let the perpetrators running lose. They still don't have a clue who did it. Now the general Bangladeshis are paying for it. Its time to tackle them with a cool mind. No need to panic which they want to inflict upon us. ‘We are not afraid’ – this is the message we should send to those bastards.


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China: 21mm · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

A picture speaks a thousand words. That's post-Mao China in 21mm.


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China: Hopes & Dreams · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

‘China Hopes and Dreams’ continue for the sake of little children twenty years from now. Commenters’ feedback is equally revealing as the bloggers’.


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China: Oral English · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

“Handling” at least 4 foreigner-colleagues at one go is a good outing for brushing up oral English. The downside is: You have to listen to them attentively and laugh even if the jokes weren't funny, says a  blogger from Qingdao, northeast China.


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Did Zimbabwean intelligence try to take over independent media groups? · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Zimpundit examines reports that the Zimbabwean government is attempting a covert takeover of some of the country's independent media organizations.


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Four years on, Eritreans remember Wia · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Amanuel “Emma” Isak, one of thousands of Asmara University students sent to compulsory summer labor camp by Eritrean President Isaias Afewerki’s government four years ago, remembers those who died in the desert.


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India: Brains, beauty and some more · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Rashmi Bansal questions the age old dichotomy posed between brains and beauty for women, and what the choices are.


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Indonesia: 6oth National day · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Indonesia celebrates its 60th National day today. Agam, a Thailand-based blogger who hails from the little town of Tapaktuan in Indonesia, wishes  all the best to Indonesians in building a truly democratic nation, and to the people of Aceh, who have suffered in the decades-long conflict and the recent tsunami catastrophy. Far too many of the people did not make it to see this day, he said.


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Iran: Hunger strike · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Farid Pouya reports on more political prisoners hunger strike in Iran.


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Kenya: Catholic land-rights activist freed · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Kenya Democracy Project reports on the freeing (on bond) of Father Gabriel Dolan and 23 other land-rights activists from the Rift Valley.


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Kyrgyzstan: An aftertaste of lemons · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Tim, in his on-line journal Kumys, tells how conspiracy theories about U.S. involvement left him feeling sour about his Peace Corps assignment in Kyrgyzstan.


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Mongolia: An exile writes · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Thomo's Hole posts an e-mail from a Mongolian woman now living in the United States about her feeling for the land she grew up in, saying she just about describes what it is to be Mongolian.


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Nepal: Slogans for a free Nepal · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Need slogans when you join the rally for Nepal? Read here!


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Oman:  Inappropriate name for a restaurant? · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

The Muscatis says that naming a restaurant as ‘Divine’ is a little dump!


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Palestine: Journalists “Disengaged” From Real Gaza Story · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

umkhalil is upset that journalists are not telling viewers of BBC and CNN that the The Fourth Geneva Convention, the primary document governing the OPT, stipulates in Article 49 that the transfer of the population of the occupying power into the occupied territory is in breach of international law. Hence, (she concludes) the colonists are war criminals!


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Peru: Last Night’s Lima Blogger Meetup · Global Voices
David Sasaki

BlogsPerú has links to the over 30 bloggers that attended last night's blogger meetup in Lima. Eduardo and Leuzor have photos.


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Philippines: A ‘Failed State’? · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Is the Philippines a ‘failed state'? Journalist-blogger Manuel L. Quezon III stares into the country's No. 56 position in the Failed State Index, pointing to determining criteria defined by…. right, the CIA. He also points to elaborations by the Global Policy Forum and John Robb a.k.a. Global Guerrillas.


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Russia: Press on Putin · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Moscow-based Lyndon Allin has translated Russian-language media reports on whether President Vladimir Putin will, or should, seek a third term in office.


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Russia: “The Flight of the Putin” · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Scraps of Moscow comments on local media coverage of Russian president Vladimir Putin's flight in a strategic bomber aircraft during military exercises, saying they can no longer tell the difference between a PR exercise and hard news.


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Russia: The lost universal language · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Russian language student Misha Tch at Joy de Vivre considers the possibility that the world's languages are mistaken forms of an original human language.


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Saudi Arabia: Livestrong, Saudi-style · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Muttawa of the Saudi ‘Religious Policeman’ blog talks about Livestrong, Saudi-style and says that while the Saud's and their related families think “Saudi Arabia” is a great name, the rest of us think it sucks, big-time.


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Sharm Relief · Global Voices
Karim Elsahy

Following the devastating terrorist attacks in the Egyptian tourist hub of Sharm Elshiekh, Pray4Peace.org (a Massachusetts incorporated non profit organization) set up a fundraiser called Sharm Relief at SharmReleif.com.
Word circulated quickly through a network of blogs comprising of both Egyptian and non Egyptian writers. Donations at SharmRelief.com have now exceeded 20,000 LE and a special account has recently been set up in Egypt through the Egyptian Red Crescent to collect local donations as well.
Donations have come from every corner of the globe and here is what a few of the donors had to say.
I rode my bicycle from Jerusalem to Cairo last autumn and spent a lot of time on the Sinai coast, as well as in the desert with Bedouin. I have nothing but happy memories of the kind people I met there, and feel terribly that they have to bear the brunt of this latest stupidity.
-Micah
It's the least I can do in these times for the people involved considering all the friendship they have shown me in my visits. Also coming from London, I appreciate the sense of loss, but understand the need to hold firm and resilient.
-Simon.
Why did I choose to donate? What the terrorists did was evil but there is not much that I can do about their acts. I can't do anything to ease the pain of those who lost a loved one to their evil acts. What I can do is provide a little help so that a poor family doesn't sink as far into poverty due to the loss of the breadwinner for their family.
-Richard
Many have donated time and skill as well. All of the legal advice comes from a New York attorney, Zoss from Zosome made the Banners (which are available here in HTML), renowned plastic surgeon Dr. Nabil Elsahy has signed on to perform three cases to be elected by the Red Crescent and dozens more have volunteered their time and effort to the organization of private fundraisers due in the coming weeks.
Bloggers from Orientalism and Nouri, Expats in Australia and New Haven respectively, to Miss Mabrouk and Athena proudly have the banners up linking to SharmReleif.com.
Karim Elsahy

author: Karim Elsahy


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Singapore: Flickr & graphic novels · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Daryl Sng, who newly gave in to Flickr, is a Singaporean blogger and a full-blown fan of Boston Red Sox who recollects fond memories of America in his e-space. Working in the Ministry of Law, he amazingly still finds time poring into graphic novels. He thinks Ethel & Ernest is a powerful nuanced personal history that describes social history vividly.


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Spotlight Bolivia · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Alexey writes, “these days I have been pleasantly surprised at the coverage that some blogs made about the bolivian political situation” and it's certainly hard to disagree with him. With Bolivian special elections scheduled for early December, the English speaking Bolivian blogosphere has been incredibly active and eloquent in presenting the nuances of their nation's politics.
Evo Morales (also here), the leader of  (Movement Towards Socialism) has been receiving the most attention from bloggers, the mainstream media, and Donald Rumsfeld. Alexey, in his latest post, explains:
When explaining the political situation to some of my friends, I said to them that I do not believe Evo Morales, candidate of MAS (Movimiento al Socialismo), is going to win. He is the leader of the main party that leads the alternative political groups (that is alternative to the ones traditionally in power). While previously he had good support from the people, he lost support because of the troubles that Bolivia had been in, some months ago. Initially he tried to portray himself more moderate than he was, but later, he became more extreme when he saw that the other alternative groups were accusing him of being too moderate and conciliatory. In the end he decided to go for the extreme proposals (nationalize gas) and extreme measures (block roads) losing the support that he previously had.
Last week Miguel of MABB predicted that Evo Morales would try to recruit the light-skinned intellectual, Alvaro Garcia Linera for vice-president as a way to unite the left. Prensa Latina confirmed exactly that today. Miguel has also been hard at work arguing that Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga has been trying to unify the right, which has resulted in a “blue state, red state” like divide throughout the country.
Blog from Bolivia blogged at length on how the former president, “Tuto” has had to reinvent his image to appeal to a new generation of voters after returning from a stint in the U.S. as a political consultant. Ph.D. candidate Miguel Centallas has just recently updated his excellent BoliviaWiki – an online notepad for his dissertation on Bolivian politics – with recent cabinet biographies.
There's also been plenty of blog noise about the alleged links between Evo Morales, Hugo Chavez, and Fidel Castro in what is jokingly (or not) being referred to as the Latin American “axis of evil.” Miguel Buitrago says the U.S. is foolishly giving more attention to Evo Morales when it accuses his campaign of being supported by Chavez and Castro. Miguel Centallas agrees and explains, “Sure, the US doesn't want Evo in office. But pointing this out only strengthens Evo's support among anti-American voters.” Boli-Nica, in a long and thorough post, tries to dissect the various motivations at play:
As for Chavez, he has all the motivation in the world to destabilize Bolivia. Why? First because its fun. Helping overthrow a pro-U.S. government like Sanchez De Lozada's creates headaches for the U.S. and it comes cheap. It has the added benefit of messing with neighbors like Peru and Colombia, who are scared of this type of instability. Plus, the Colonel gets “evidence” for all the B.S. he talks about the failure of neo-liberalism – the big Chavez bogeyman.
He is also unhappy about Morales’ announcement that he would nationalize the gas industry. Nathan of Trip Trap has written some on Bolivia as he travels around South American and, finally Eduardo Avila, currently traveling in Southern Africa, will surely have more to say about the upcoming elections when he returns.


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Sri Lanka: Culture and Identity · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Chandare on the search for the Sri Lankan identity and cross-cultural leaders.


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Sudan: Police raids on displaced persons · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Darfur-based aid worker Sleepless in Sudan hears news from the capital, Khartoum, of police raids on refugees from the troubled south.


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Syria: First private TV channel · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

The Syrian News Wire reports that international pressure group forces Syrian government to set up new radio station in Homs. Homs is set to get a new ststion, after an international media workshop took place in the city.


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Taiwan: A motorbiker’s journal · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

SChee is regarded as a pioneer blogger in Taiwan. He once traversed the Australian continent on a motorbike, hence calling his blog a motorbikers’ journal. A new media adventurer at heart, he started blogging in 2002, and brought in moblogs in 2003, where many of his pictures were picked up by international wire agencies. Today he talks about three new entrants in Taiwan's e-world: Y! 生活、Kijiji and Google Map.


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Tunisia:  News Roundup · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Traveling around Tunisia on train? MMM of Subzero Blue blog report that Tunisian national railway company is now providing Internet access on board its long distance trains. On the other hand, AquaCool is happy to see Mahmoud Darwish in Tunisia who participated in the Carthage Festival.


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United Arab Emirates:  UAE Roundup · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

IKE of Blogging from the UAE blog is happy that Friendster is back in the UAE after being blocked. While ‘Dubai's Drama Queen’ reports Dubai plans to build the world's first “rotating city” in DubaiLand. LOKI from Dubai To The Americas blog asks, where does cigarettes smoking addiction start… at what age?… under what circumstance?… at what cost? why does local kids run around with cigarettes in their mouth?


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Venezuela: World Youth Fest · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Chase me ladies, I'm in the cavalry, written by a traveling Brit, has a sarcastic if not offensive couple posts on the World Youth Fest in Caracas with plenty of photos of attendees. For more serious coverage, check out Venezuelan News and Views and The Devil's Excrement.


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Vietnam: See you all on the flip side · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

‘See you all on the flip side’. That's the parting shot from Vietnamese blogger, Toi La Nguoi. She (?) was forced to remove her blog in July because… “someone within my extended family has been relaying things he's read, in a very distorted fashion, to other members of my family. Nothing bad came of this but I had to remove the online journal to prevent further leaks. Older generation Vietnamese-Americans, particularly my parents, may not understand the experience. Least of all an experience that can be easily misinterpreted.”
Unfortunately, all archives are now gone except a forwarding email address.


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Korea: Made in China · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

How do North and South Korea commemorate their liberation from Japanese rule 60 years ago, and the 5-year-old joint North-South declaration? Joint-produce a line of wristwatches – manufactured in North Korea under the direction of a South Korean watchmaker. Symbols of Korean unity? Perhaps. Exhilaration? Wait a minute. According to Japundit, the manufacturer had forgotten to remove the ‘Made In China’ sticker on some of the watch cases.


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Argentina: Blogs Versus Journalism · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Jorge Gobbi of Buenos Aires offers an Argentinian perspective on the so called “blogs versus journalism debate.”


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Argentina: Living Carless and Loving It! · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Expat Argentina loves living carless in Buenos Aires.


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Argentina: Peace Doves bomb innocent passers-by · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Fernando Cassia writes in both English and Spanish about the dove invasion of one Buenos Aires neighborhood. He warns “that one has to be careful when walking around (or carry an open umbrella).”


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Armenia: Penal colony photos · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Oneworld Multimedia has posted photos taken at a penal colony for women and youths in Abovyan, Armenia.


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Armenia: Tough talk on Nagorno Karabakh · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Blogrel‘s Hovakim notes that Azeri President Ilham Aliyev has been “talking tough” again about possible military action over Nagorno Karabakh, a largely ethnic Armenian enclave which seceded from Azerbaijan in 1991, but says ordinary people on both sides are unlikely to want to go along with it.


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Bangladesh: Translation of the Pamphlet · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Imtiaz's WeBlog gives us the translated version of the pamphlets found on the site of the bombings.


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Bolivia: Responding to Rumsfeld · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Jim Shultz, responding to Donald Rumsfeld's accusations of Cuban and Venezuelan meddling in Bolivia, says what he believes to be the real foreign influences in modern Bolivian politics.


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Chile: Presidential Candidate’s Campaign Slogan · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Jeannette Jalil covers Chilean presidential candidate, Michelle Bachelet's new campaign slogan.


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China: Anti-blog blocked · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Anti-blog and all blogs on blog-city.com has been blocked by the Great Firewall. Readers from China may access it via mirror site available at MSN: http://spaces.msn.com/members/mranti/. Meanwhile, anti2 is coming soon.


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China: Wangjianshou among Feedster Top 500 · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

There was a scare that Wang Jianshuo's blog was blocked by the Great Firewall yesterday, but it reappears intact today. Kenlee reports that Wangjianshuo's blog is the only blog from China that is ranked on Feedster's TOP 500 Blogs, at the 356th placing this month. But Wang Jianshou couldn't see it beyond the blockade.


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Cuba: Open Source Radio · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Open Source Radio is looking for Cubans and/or Cuban Americans to discuss Cuba's underground economy on Monday's show.


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El Salvador: Gold Mining · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Tim covers foreign investment and gold mining in El Salvador.


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Ethiopia: U.S. defamation suit · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Ethiopundit comments on a defamation suit filed in a U.S. court by the Ethiopian government against four of its citizens in connection with allegations made by a U.S./German radio station and Web site.


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Ethiopia: Wake up, Zimbabwe · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Friends of Ethiopa posts extracts from a speech slamming Western inconsistencies on matters of human rights in African countries, among other things.


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Georgia: Dead horse burns · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Kaukasus posts a striking photograph entitled “Dead Horse Burns”, by Stefan Hostettler, and muses on the meaning of the horse in human culture.


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Guatemala: Negative Blog Coverage · Global Voices
David Sasaki

DesdeGuate.com complains that when Guatemala is finally covered on BoingBoing, it's for gang violence and not the fact that they were chosen “best cultural tourist destination” by the BBC.


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Guatemala: Prison Deaths · Global Voices
David Sasaki

El Canche writes about the recent prison deaths and gang fights in Escuintla as he gets ready to head back to Guatemala.


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Honduras: Human Rights · Global Voices
David Sasaki

James, currently volunteering in Talanga, gives a quick update on human rights in Honduras.


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Honduras: Presidential Election Platforms · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Boz takes another look at Porfirio Lobo Sosa's platform for Honduras’ upcoming presidential elections on November 27.


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India: Many Indias · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Country within the Nation. Uma explores the underlying tensions in relationships between Indians from different regions, and marginalization of some communities. The comments on her blog carry forward the discussion.


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India: Whatever happened to TOI? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

One more post on the abyssmal quality of India's leading daily, and how it has deteriorated over the years.


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Mongolia: Rabbi visits local Jews · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Nabetz at New Mongols posts (with a nod to Siberian Light) on Jews in Mongolia.


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NDI Azeri Staring Contest · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Former NDI-er and current Democracy Guy Tim Russo says that NDI is daring Azerbaijan's government to not let them observe upcoming parliamentary voting.


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Nepal: Leadership and Democracy · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

The crisis of leadership, and why leadership is important in the process of stability in Nepal on United We Blog!.


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Nepal: UNDP goes ahead · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

International Nepal Solidarity Network reports that the UN Development Programme plans to go ahead with development projects in the country without entering a partnership with King Gyanendra's Government.


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Paraguay: Rumsfeld’s Visit · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Upside Down Blog has a long, thorough post on Donald Rumsfeld's visit to Paraguay and the reaction it generated throughout South America.


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Philippines: ‘GloriaGate’? · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

The impeachment of the chief tenant at Malacanang Palace still hogs the blog headlines. There are two observations from Sassy Lawyer, one went to her column in Manila Standard Today, the other to three lawyers who jumped into the headlines behind the warrantless raid.


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Puerto Rico: Economics & Prosperity II · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Gil C. Schmidt, writing from Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico says that the findings of Peruvian economist, Hernando de Soto are equally applicable throughout Puerto Rico.


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Russia: Suicide in the military · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Every month, around 20 people in the Russian armed forces commit suicide, according to a Russian newspaper article translated by Scraps of Moscow.


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Singapore: Artsy blog · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

What will become when a young Singaporean lawyer turns blogger? An artsy Reader's Eye… and poems by Gilbert Koh that got published from Singapore to Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom, the Philippines, New Zealand and Hong Kong.


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Singapore: Mother of all freedoms · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

To some, politics is the pursuit of happiness: “… political freedoms are important only because without them, we can’t secure the other freedoms–because we would have to count upon the benevolence of our liberal and enlightened overlords, which is basically madness.” That's from a Singapore Angle.


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South Africa: The Zuma Crisis · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Laurence Caromba writes on commentary.co.za about the choices facing South Africa's ruling elite. Will the rule of law prevail, or the rule of men? he asks.


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Sudan: Rains bring threat of disease · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Heavy rains which have hit the troubled Sudanese region of Darfur in recent days have increased the threat of waterborne disease, blogs aid worker Sleepless in Sudan.


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Ukraine: Memories of Soviet youth camps · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

For Ukrainian blogger Veronica Khokhlova, the 80th anniversary of the former Soviet Communist Pioneers youth camp at Artek brings back memories of her own experiences.


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Video Blogs & Cambodia · Global Voices
Beth Kanter

Eath Chhnon (otherwise known as “Village Girl“)  is a Cambodian “video blogger” or vlogger.  She grew up in a small village in Cambodia near Angkor Wat, one of country’s cultural treasures.  Two years ago, at age 20, she came to New York City.   Eath is video blogging her life story.
1.  Why did you start vlogging?
I think vlogging is an interesting way to express yourself and the right medium for my voice.  It has changed my life in many ways.  I can communicate with new people who share an interest in my country.  Also, I’ve met people who I would not otherwise meet.
2.  How did you learn vlogging?
I had never seen or touched a computer when I lived in Cambodia – my family lives in a small village – they’re farmers and don’t have electricity.  When I came to the US, I taught myself how to use a computer.   I was lucky enough to meet Ryanne Hodson  who showed me how to do it.  It took me about a day.  Ryanne has her tutorials online, so anyone can learn as easily as I did.
3.  What type of responses do you get from Cambodians viewing your vlog?
My vlog has been linked to from a lot of the Cambodian portals so I have a lot of Cambodian people viewing my vlog and commenting.  They get so excited.  I get lots of emails telling me  “I love your movies!”  They ask me a lot of questions about where I grew up in Cambodia.  They are inspired that I grew up in a small village in Cambodia and live in Manhattan.
I had a very good friend from my village who was a driver for tourists and immigrated to Europe.  By chance, he found my blog and left a comment. I was so surprised to reconnect with an old friend.
4.  Why do you think people should vlog?
There are many Cambodians who leave Cambodia and they can’t connect with their family in a visual way.  Phone calls are expensive and if they're lucky they can exchange email.   But the vlog is almost like being face-to-face and great way to connect back to your culture.  Of course, not everyone in Cambodia has Internet access.  For example, my family can’t view my vlog – they don’t speak English and they don’t have computers or Internet access or even electricity.
5.  What can vlogging do for Cambodians?
I think that Cambodians whether still in Cambodia or in other places in the world should express themselves – and tell the world about their ideas, culture, and experience.   Not many Cambodians are doing vlogs yet and there are some good reasons for that (equipment, lack of Internet access, language barriers, skills, etc.)  That aside, I want to encourage Cambodians to vlog.  That’s why I started a listserv to help people from Cambodia to learn how to do it.
(Note: And judging by the discussion on the list, expect to see some vlog posts from Cambodians in the near future.)
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author: Beth Kanter


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What a difference a braid makes · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Independent traveler Maria Argyropoulos gets a full head of African-style braids, and discovers something about cross-cultural perceptions during her travels in the continent.


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Philippines: An Angry Letter · Global Voices
Jose Manuel Tesoro

Frustrated by the descent into yet another political scandal, a.k.a. Gloriagate, Manila tour guide Carlos Celdran points accusingly at the older generation.

author: Jose Manuel Tesoro


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· Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

The e-community for Thai translators has a website at www.wanakam.com (wanakam means literature). It has an excellent link to the collection of Thai literature that had been translated to English, and world literature that had been translated to Thai. Blogger Jeep points us to interpretative translation of Thai poets.


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· Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Counter-culture blog IndCoup touches on Asian values and feels that the Malaysian government is control-obsessed. One of the old tricks seeing new spin is the “pernicious influence of corrupt Western culture“, this time manifesting itself in worm eating common in reality TV.


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Myanmar: Science & Space · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

A blog from Myanmar by Kyaw oo. Not on Aung Sang Suu Kyi, but it's about science, space and astronomy.


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Afghanistan: Bomb attack · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Afghan Warrior covers the death of an Afghan policeman in a remote-control bomb attack in the southern city of Kandahar.


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Afghanistan: Women need protection · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Human Rights Watch warns that the Afghan government and international monitors must take special measures to protect women from attacks and intimidation by the Taliban and regional warlords, ahead of the Sept. 18 elections in the country.


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Azerbaijan: On Melons · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Carpetblogger wonders if rumors about nitrites injected into Azeri watermelons are true, or if they make any difference, giving the levels of environmental toxins to be found in the country anyway.


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Bahrain: Blogging Danger · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Controversial discussion is going on between some bloggers and ‘Anonymous Blogging’ which lists Bahrain, Saudi and Syria in Top Five most dangerous countries for bloggers. The director of ‘Committee to Protect Bloggers’ has been criticized and accused of being an Arab-hating secret agent in Jewish pay, as he says. The unhappy bloggers are asking why Iraq and Israel are not in the list, although some bloggers in Iraq where killed and two where detained in Israel.


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Bangladesh: Identity and Abroad · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Identities, countries and what it means to be Bangladeshi on A sunshine too brief.


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Breaking News: Katyusha Rocket Attack on Aqaba and Eilat · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Katyusha rocket  explosion has occurred in the Jordanian Red Sea port of Aqaba, and authorities said that explosions were heard in a restricted US military zone of the Port of Aqaba in Jordan.
Dubai-based Al-Arabiya TV said a U.S. naval ship was in the vicinity of the blast in Aqaba, a Red Sea port 210 miles south of the Jordanian capital Amman.
Nearly at the same time, Israel official reported an blast on Eilat's. Officials confirm the rocket impact location was dangerously close to a runway in Eilat Airport, 50 meters (yards), also near a number of hotels.
There was no immediate report of damage.
1500 GMT-Update: Group With Al-Qaeda Ties Claims Responsibility for Rocket Attacks Open this result in new window
1100 GMT-Update: Jordanian officials said that the warehouse where the rockets were launched from, was rented by two Iraqis and two Egyptians. On the other hand one Syrian and two Iraqis are now being chased by Jordanian police.
1035 GMT-Update: Aljazeera reporter said that the dead and injured persons are both of Jordanian Army, where one of the rockets hit their training camp in Aqaba.
0910 GMT-Update: Aljazeera reporter said that three rockets where launched from the industrial area inside Aqaba. One of the rockets landed beside Princes Haya hospital in Aqaba, killing one and injuring another, both Jordanian.


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Dominican Republic: Closure of Factories · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Joanne Rodriguez mourns the loss of jobs in La Vega, Dominican Republic where her mother once worked.


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D.R. of Congo: Deaths and rapes · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Eugene at Coalition for Darfur points to a news item from Xinhua saying that 2,500 were killed and 1,500 raped in the D.R. of Congo in the first half of this year.


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Egypt: We’re Watching You Movement · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

The Arabist Network report the launched of a new movement in Egypt called Shayfeenkum-We're watching you. The movement will provide an avenue for citizens to report any human rights violations, electoral mishaps, and other problems to the media and Egyptian government ministries.


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Guatemala: Mob Justice · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Bjorn's Blog writes about mob rule in Guatemala.


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Hungary: Cryptic challenge · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Central Budapest challenges Hungarian speakers to come up with the untranslatable in their language for Wikipedia.


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India: Back from Gujarat · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Back with a heavy heart from Gujarat on Intentblog. The riots of 2002 are hard to forget, or understand.


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India: Sonagachi Documentary · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

GreatBong offers wonderful insight into a documentary made on Sonagachi – Calcutta's Red Light area.


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Inside the Japanese Blogosphere · Global Voices
Nevin Thompson

Japanese bloggers were able to offer almost realtime accounts of the recent earthquake in northern Japan.
Says one Japanese blogger:
The fridge door swung open, the goldfish bowl fell off the shelf, and it was just a terrible situation inside the house…There have been a lot of earthquakes here in recent years, which makes me a little worried. And it shook for such a long time…
Takafumi Horie, 32 year-old head of  Livedoor, which offers Japan's most popular blogging tool, may campaign for the governing Liberal Democratic Party as a star candidate in the upcoming Lower House elections, scheduled for September 11. A University of Tokyo graduate, Horie intends to run against the popular Shizuka Kamei, a former LDP heavyweight who was recently ousted from the party for opposing Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's postal reform bill.
Update: Horie will run as an independent candidate.
Besides offering free portable DVD players to new bloggers (only until September 30, and some restrictions apply!), Ameba Blog  holds a contest each month for the twenty most popular Japanese blogs, and prizes range from 5000 yen (about US$45.00), to 100,000 yen ($900.00). Blog popularity appears to be determined according to page hits.
Japan's Outrageous Asian Neighbours, previously highlighted on Global Voices Online, won 5000 yen at 12th place. Blogs about shopping and celebrities are among those that received 10,000 yen, while a blog devoted to flash games and other neat stuff was awarded 30,000 yen.
The number one blog for July won 100,000 yen, and its title can be loosely translated as I have an ogre for a wife! The blog, which features cartoon artwork, documents the blogger's oppressive life with his wife. The tone is humorous, and the blog has struck such a chord with its readers that it has been adapted into a manga series and a television show on Fuji Television, the network with close ties to Livedoor.
Livedoor and Cyberagent, Ameblog's parent company, often like to be seen to be working together.
There are also plans to turn I have an ogre for a wife! into a movie  in the near future as well.
Needless to say, Ameba Books, Ameblog's publishing unit, has wasted no time putting out two volumes of I have an ogre for a wife!, both of which can be bought on Amazon.

author: Nevin Thompson


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China: Mine Flood Coverup · Global Voices
Jose Manuel Tesoro

EastSouthWestNorth preserves a surprisingly frank account by a Chinese paper about how mine owners in Ruzhou smothered news about a mine disaster — by paying off both real and pretend reporters.


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Nepal: Democracy Wall · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

United We Blog! has a photo-post on a wall that came to be known as the Bulletin board of Democracy, and how the wall has come down.


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News from Chinese Blogosphere(Aug 14th-20th) · Global Voices
Frank Dai

1. 60 Anniversary Sino-Japanese War: August 20 was the 60 anniversary marking the end of Sino-Japanese War in World War Ⅱ, lasting from 1937 to 1945. Postshow, the “Boing Boing in China”, summed up the special reports on Chinese internet. Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi apologized for the misdeed done in the war. However, many Chinese blogger thought it was not very sincere because the Japanese government still allows rightist behavior in the country like visiting Yasukuni Shrine and publishing historical textbook. Wozy pointed out that Chinese official media focused their attention on who lead to the victory rather than what Japanese is apologizing.
2. DaYe Riot and Internet Cover-ups: DaYe, a city in the Hubei Province, experienced a general strike and protest involving 10,000 residents, due to dissatisfaction with the municipal government’s decision to annex. Local police adopted a cruel way to treat the peaceful demonstration, even calling dogs to bite and disperse the residents. Zheng said soon after the protest, all BBS discussing it are temporarily closed with a notice that “services is suspended” and all searching engines including Baidu and Google began to face failure when inquiring DaYe- related words.
3. Media coverage of Chinese Blogosphere: As blog was evolving in China and steadily gaining its popularity, traditional media is putting attention to Chinese Blogosphere. Shanghai Evening News talked about the teenager’s blog and its effect on family relationship (Translation by ESWN). The Economic Observer with another article dug into what the Chinese Bloggers are considering about blog. (Translation by Danwei, though they called the article “superficial”).
4. Rural Teachers Blogging: Li Jiahou, a professor in pedagogy in Shanghai wrote an entry on his blog about the emergence of teacher’s blog in rural area. In a program initiated by Ministry of Education and Microsoft aiming to provide rural teacher with modern teaching equipment, the participating teachers are encouraged to write blog to communicate and interact with blogging students. Blog specializing in educational field has already become a common phenomenon in China recently.
5. Protest at China Youth Daily: A veteran editor left China Youth Daily, the official newspaper of China Communist Youth League . He wrote an open letter to the newspaper to criticize over editing policy, which destroyed the independence of journalist. Blogger ShiNianKanChai and Anti, Whose blog is Just Blocked in China, wrote articles supporting the move.


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Nigeria: Sex, AIDS and coercion · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Women's Autonomy and Sexual Sovereignty Movements comments on an op-ed article by a New York Times contributor in Nigeria about women's vulnerability to HIV/AIDS and coercive sex, which is often seen as a cultural norm.


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Sudan: Intervention and genocide · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Sudan: The Passion of the Present blogs about a recent report on the effectiveness of military intervention in the case of genocide.


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Sudan: Money running out · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Sleepless in Sudan worries about what will happen if the African Union peacekeeping troops in the troubled region of Darfur don't get paid because of funding shortfalls.


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Thailand: English tests · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

“On an average score of English tests out of nine ASEAN countries, our Thai counterparts came in eighth – just one above the Cambodians”. TV shows don't help much…


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Japan: Tokyo Noon · Global Voices
Jose Manuel Tesoro

Japan's parliamentary election campaign is underway.  Japundit says ex-PM Junichiro Koizumi is coming out swinging.


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Uganda: Radio station warned · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

A Ugandan radio station gets a reprieve, but its outspoken chat-show host is still on bail for criticizing the government, Passion of the Present notes.


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Vietnam: Cottontimer · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Cottontimer is a Chinese-American who keeps two blogs to occupy her hours as full-time mum in Vietnam – one on her daily life call Cotton Picking Days (read: MSG poisoning), and the other on genetics and public health. She's  a former PhD epidemiologist.


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Western Sahara: Moroccan prisoners freed · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Black Star Journal comments on the release of Moroccan prisoners taken during the conflict in Western Sahara, giving concise background on this little-known story of post-colonialism and occupation.


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Bahrain: Bloggers in Danger · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Mahmood is afraid that Bahrain is about to become even a more dangerous place to blog from, specially that the Public Prosecutor is now looking into 46 websites, which they think might be transgressing various offences including the Press Law(in Arabic) .


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Egypt: Democracy Game · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Mohamed of From Cairo, with love, thanks Condoleezza Rice for pushing for democracy that far in Egypt, which is appearing in President Mubarak's democracy game, and mutating into a presidential candidate, as he says.


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Iran: Ganji’s Health Improvement · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Latest RSF report says that the health of the Iranian imprisoned journalist Akbar Ganji, who began a hunger strike on 11 June, is getting better as Farid Pouya of webgardian reports.


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Jordan: Jordanian Bloggers Response to Aqaba Rocket Attacks · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Jordanian bloggers said it in one voice. No To Terrorism!
madas expressed her feeling in one sentence:
We don't want any more death… No for Terrorism in all its different shapes.
While Ammar writes:
for those who think that they're fighting our freedom, please give me a break, it's just like playing back a low level IQ American’s comment after WTC attacks. Things happen for a reason, scratch your head, go to the basic facts and you'd figure it out.
Amin Matalqa hopes that they catch those guys and dip them in a pool of boiling olive oil upside down…slowly…head first.
As for Naseem Tarawnah of Black Iris he said:
the fact that it was rockets and not bombs suggests that this wasn't exactly Sharm Al-Sheik. Bombs require more planning; bombs require a lack of security to have them put together, to install them in their targets, to detonate. Bombs offer efficiency, the human flaws are low. Rockets suggest that our terrorists didn't exactly have the luxury of the above, which could say something about how tough it was to pull this off.
Hareega wonders what god they follow?
The terrorists who attacked Aqaba and previously hit other places definitely believe in a god which is not God. It's a god they made, a god they worship and a god they are willing to die for, but it's not God.
While Natasha says, to hell with them:
Those al-Qaeda blood suckers are now roaming freely In Jordan, intent on disrupting the security of the country and intimidating its people. I say to hell with them.
Isam asks:
why can't we just live peacefully.. What is it that they want to prove? Why Aqaba? Why Jordan?


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Khmer Dance · Global Voices
Andy Carvin

Video of a Cambodian dance troupe performing a blessing dance at the opening of the Lowell Water Festival, one of the largest Southeast Asian festivals in the US, organized jointly by the local Cambodian, Lao, Vietnamese and Thai communities.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | RSS


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Profile of Tunisian Blogosphere · Global Voices
Mohamed Marwen Meddah

The Tunisian blogosphere must be one of the most vibrant and fastest growing blogospheres in the Arab world. At the time being, there are over 70 active blogs, maintained by Tunisians in Tunisia, France, Canada, USA, Saudi Arabia and Romania.
TN-Blogs is a directory that  groups most of these blogs, and features an aggregator that collects and publishes posts from all these blogs.
Among these blogs, only 30% belong to female bloggers.
The ages of Tunisian bloggers range from 18 to the early 30's.
Most Tunisian blogs are in French, with only 11 in English and 2 in Arabic.
When it comes to hosting, most Tunisian blogs are hosted on free blogging services, mainly blogger, then hautetfort.
The topics discussed on these blogs mostly cover personal issues, social affairs, comments on news and various thoughts and opinions.
Most Tunisian bloggers link to each other and leave comments and carry discussions within the boundaries of the Tunisian blogosphere, creating a sort of community-like feeling that welcomes new bloggers and encourages them to keep on blogging.
Blogger meetups are being held on a monthly basis as an opportunity for bloggers to get to know each other, carry some online discussions into the real world, talk about blogging and how to spread it, and just have fun.

author: Mohamed Marwen Meddah


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Search Blogger Directory  · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Wondering how to search blogger.com directory for blogs by country? Here is a tip from Sabbah's Blog.


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African Women: No to sexual violence · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Black Looks reports on two conferences aimed at tacklingwidespread rape and sexual abuse of women and girls in African countries, and blames the problem on ingrained cultural attitudes.


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Central Asia: Book review · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Reuters correspondent Hugh Pope has a new book out about Turkic political cultures, which catches the eye of Laurence at Registan


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Czech Republic: Smoking ban eased · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

The Daily Czech reports that new legislation on smoking in public places is actually easier on smokers than the previous law.


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Georgia: Trip to Tusheti · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Kaukasus contributor Grijsz photoblogs his trip to the remote Georgian mountain region of Tusheti.


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Images From Nepal: Detergent Ad · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

Photograph by Indrani Soemardjan
A young boy sits next to a wall emblazoned with an advertisement for detergent.


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Kenya: Making an exit · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

M at Thinker's Room shares the trials and tribulations of Kenyan passport applications, in preparation for a trip to Botswana.


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Kosovo: Geopolitical flashpoint? · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Laurence Jarvik wonders if a U.S.-Russian conflict will come over the status of Kosovo, when the U.N. trusteeship expires in eight months.


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Lesotho: Musings on sexuality · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Rethabile Masilo at Sotho searches for an alternative to nurture vs. nature explanations for homosexuality in humans.


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Sudan: Darfur refugees appeal to UN · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Displaced people in the troubled Sudanese region of Darfur have written to the United Nations, calling on officials to prevent further delays in peace talks between government and rebel forces, writes aid-worker Sleepless in Sudan.


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Sudan: Is Darfur old news now? · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Eugene at the Coalition for Darfur cites an opinion piece in the Freelance Star which wonders if international attention is shifting from the crisis in the troubled Sudanese region to the famine in Niger. Can the world pay attention to more than one big African story at a time? the piece asks.