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Blog Day 2005 · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Blog Day 2005 is making waves throughout the global blogosphere. The one-day celebration, which encourages bloggers to introduce their readers to five new weblogs from other cultures or perspectives, has been adding nearly a page of relevant posts to Technorati every hour.
Romanian blogger, Carmen Holotescu asks her readers to consider each of the over-300 weblogs in her Romanian Weblog Collection as part of her Blog Day recommendations, but then goes on to obey rules by listing five specific blogs (two in Romanian and three in English) focusing on photography and design. Ethan Zuckerman, a connoisseur of international weblogs, also linked to blogs written in Romanian, but from the neighboring country of Moldova.
Yzabel, a 26-year-old graphic designer and tech writer in France lists her five recommendations in both English and French. Elvira Black, writing from New York City, in turn, links to Yzabel as one of her five Blog Day links. Also included are bloggers from the UK, Australia, and even Texas.
Venezuelan blogger, Iria Puyosa, has chosen two blogs in English and two in Spanish written from the U.S.A., Norway, Chile, as well as one by a Panamanian living in the Middle East. Alvaro Ramirez Ospina, a film professor from Norway who writes in Spanish, linked back to Iria as one of his five links and left a comment thanking her for extending an important bridge. Another Venezuelan, Leonel Sanchez chose to link to bloggers in Peru, Chile, Spain, and a Colombian living in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Steven of Singabloodypore linked to bloggers from the U.S., Hong Kong, Zimbabwe, India, and Burma. Fábio of Caryorker, a Brazilian living in New York pointed his readers to three weblogs in Portuguese and two in English. Lucia Lai, meanwhile, notes that much of the Malaysian blogosphere has ignored Blog Day while focusing on the Merdeka Blogger Project, but she offers her five links nonetheless.
Not everyone is so enthusiastic about the project however. Arzan, who splits his time between Mumbai and New York City, says that every day should be Blog Day and that “the actual naming of a day for blogging, demeans it a little.” Then, however, as Desi Pundit notes, “he goes ahead and lists few of his favorite blogs and even the one he doesn’t want you to read.”
Besides the seemingly infinite amount of hyperlinks spreading themselves across our planet today, many groups of local bloggers have been meeting up to commemorate the occasion. Bernard DeCarroux scheduled a bloggers reunion in Paris, France, while, Spanish bloggers are currently at Starbucks Plaza de España in Madrid and in Strousbourg non-Parisian French bloggers are getting together at the Lanterne micro-brewery.
It's wonderful to see so much cross-country, cross-cultural, and cross-language interaction throughout the blogosphere today and we hope the tradition is preserved for years to come. You can find more bloggers from around the globe participating in Blog Day 2005 at Technorati, IceRocket, Feedster, and BlogPulse. Or if you've participated yourself, tell us about it by leaving a comment linking to your recommendations.


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Bolivia: Fall of the Frente Amplio · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Eduardo of Barrio Flores jokingly suggests that presidential candidate Samuel Doria Medina better find himself a cutesy nickname if he wants any chance of staying in the race.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: David Sasaki


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Bolivia: Negative Effects of Petrol Industry · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Nick Buxton has a long post on Open Veins examining the neocolonial effects of the petrol industry in Bolivia.


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Bolivia, South Africa: Microlending · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Miguel of MABB points to some positive coverage of Bolivia's microlending industry from South Africa.


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Brazil: Tropeiros · Global Voices
David Sasaki

South American Journal writes a post about the famed Tropeiros of Brazil accompanied by the impressive photography of Tatiana Cardeal.


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Cambodia: Bridging digital divide · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

The Panos and Global Knowledge Partnership is  inviting submissions for 2005 “Reporting on the Information Society” awards. ThaRum highlights projects targetting at bridging digital divide in Cambodia so that Cambodian working journalists could use them to take part in the competition.

author: Jeff Ooi


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Cambodia: CamboKids · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Johnny Crook reports that community work at CamboKids is about reintroducing Khmer traditional culture and heritage which were almost destroyed during the past war and using activities that might help ensure children grow up and develop with stable mental health.


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Cuba: 1929 Havana Travel Ad · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Havana Journal finds an old Cuban travel advertisement from a 1929 issue of National Geographic, which describes the island as “so near at hand – so easily reached – that no American need suppress his desire for foreign travel.”


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Ecuador: Eduardo Ochoa’s New Blog · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Famed Ecuadorean blogger, Eduardo Ochoa has started a new, not quite work safe blog focusing on cyber-culture.


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Ecuador: Finding Pallatanga · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Pastor Larry uses Google Earth to find the location of his next mission trip to Ecuador.


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El Salvador: Yellow alert for Santa Ana volcano · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Tim writes that “Salvadoran authorities have put the areas around the Santa Ana volcano on yellow alert after a recent rise in activity at the volcano.” With links to helpful resources.


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Ethiopia: The president reacts · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Nazret.com's Ethioblog posts the response of Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi to criticisms of the country's elections by EU monitors.

author: Luisetta Mudie


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Guatemala: Expats in Europe · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Chapines en Europa is a web portal for
Guatemalans living in Europe to share their experiences. The most popular post, as of late, links to live video feeds from Guatemala.


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Guatemala: Reasons to Visit · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Chapinadas notes that Chapines (Guatemalans) often take the beauty of their country for granted until it's seen from a visitor's perspective.


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Guinea: Private broadcasters allowed · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

The West African state of Guinea has become the last in the region to allow private broadcasters to operate, reports Black Star Journal.


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India: Blog Reviews · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

An entire blog devoted to (mostly Indian) blog reviews and interviews with bloggers! The first feature is a review of the blog Nerve Endings Firing Away.

author: Neha Viswanathan


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India: Thinking of buying that saree? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Child labour in India isn't new. Sepia Mutiny has a post on one more industry that makes money by cutting down on labour costs (use children!).


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Indonesia: Dutch scholarship · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

A. Fatih Syuhud highlights StuNed (Studeren in Nederland), a scholarship programme that aims to contribute to the development of Indonesia through the strengthening of human resources in Indonesian organisations. Some 200 full scholarships are offered for professionals to follow master programmes, short courses or tailor made training, all conducted in English.


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Inside The Japanese Blogosphere · Global Voices
Nevin Thompson

Blogging in Iraq
Japanese photojournalist Hiroshi Okamoto, who travelled to Iraq on assignment in 2004 and spent one month in Samawa, has produced a food blog of his experiences. Although Okamoto says he hopes to introduce Iraqi cuisine to his readers, his blog also provides a rare glimpse of life at a Japanese Self Defense Force outpost in Iraq.
About 1,000 Japanese troops are stationed in Iraq, and, on the 20th day of his stay in Iraq, Okamoto is invited to lunch to eat Japanese food – food he hasn't eaten since arriving in Iraq and misses dearly – with some of them:
The food had arrived, and something seemed a little strange. Paper plates of cooked white rice, cans of non-alcohol beer and little plastic packets of pre-cooked food were placed on the table. Strange. There wasn't any little bits of fried tempura. Where had the sushi gone?? And how about buckwheat noodles (soba) that was supposed to be on the menu???
It turns out the dining hall (for the SDF base) wasn't set up yet, so, for yet another day, the Japanese soldiers stationed in Samawa had to eat in a temporary mess tent, and we were unable to eat a proper Japanese meal.
We all said a toast over our cans of non-alcohol Budweiser beer. The troops are given only one can to drink a day – our press team had long since finished the liquor we had brought with us to Iraq. Nonetheless, in the 40+ degree heat of midday the body craves beer, and near-beer or not,   I was extremely happy with my can of non-alcohol beer…
We opened our plastic packs of food to find a dinner of broiled mackeral. Of course, once we finished our food there would be no second helpings.
Okamoto isn't actually a reporter; he's a sports photographer who was persuaded into going to Iraq by an editor, who cited Okamoto's combination of “talent and experience.” With a writing style both witty and relaxed, Okamoto clearly has genuine affection for everyone he meets in Iraq.
Learning Swahili in Tanzania
At least one Japanese person is blogging about Tanzania. Ninablog documents the life of Lulu, a grad student who's taking a break as she spends a year in Tanzania studying Swahili. “Lulu”, which means “pearl” in Swahili, is not her real name, but she reckons her nickname is easier for non-Japanese speakers to remember and pronounce.
In Shanghai
Shanghai Kuma blogs (on Sony's So-Net blogging tool) about the four years he's spent living in China. Shanghai Kuma's genial way of writing, combined with his use of whimsical Japanese emoticons, makes the blog a compelling read.
Although his wife remains in Japan, Shanghai Kuma seems to enjoy his life in China, but there are some things about his native country he seems to miss. On a recent visit home to Japan he remarks he was able to drink plenty of milk coffee, something that they just don't sell in China.”I drank an entire liter carton yesterday,” he blogs. Once he starts drinking, he just can't stop.
From Korea
While not exactly part of the Anti-Korean Wave, the popular blog Now's the time…to deflate Korea takes aim at “the tremendous amount of unbelievable things” one can encounter during everyday life in Korea. Intended for “those who like Korea, those who don't like Korea…and those  riding the Korean wave,” the blog describes  the life of “Christopher,” who teaches Japanese in Seoul.
In many ways, Christopher's observations resemble those made by foreign English teachers in Japan. However, Christopher is articulate and prolific, and his posts tend to lack the vitriol commonly found in so many Japanese blogs about Korea. However, Christopher does take care to poke and prod at what he considers to be the national Korean character. In a recent post he discusses what some Japanese consider to be the Korean tendency to copy or filch Japanese products and ideas. Even worse, Christopher says, these “stolen” products are then claimed to be Korean “originals.”
A case in point according to Christopher, is an online game produced in Korea called “Crazy Racing Cart Rider” that is clearly a copy of Nintendo's Super Mario Cart. A taste of things to come in an increasingly wired society, perhaps.
Blogs as a favorite consumer item
The Mainichi Daily News reports that “blogs top list of favorite consumer items in Japan.”
Dentsu asked 1,000 people from 15 to 69 years of age around Japan to choose their favorite things by citing some 150 products.
Weblogs, or personal websites, topped the list of the 10 most popular items selected by consumers in Japan during the first half of 2005, advertising giant Dentsu Inc. has said.
Japan Election Update:
‘Archaic’ Japanese election laws are affecting blogging in that country:
(Takafumi Horie, who's a candidate in the September 11 election) has stopped updating his popular Internet blog — which was registering over 50,000 hits a day — since Aug. 18, the day before he announced his candidacy.
Livedoor, his Internet services company, has also stopped carrying news stories on its Web portal site that mention specific election candidates, spokesman Kazuyoshi Omura said. The site plans to run an election special as soon as the elections are over.

author: Nevin Thompson


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Jamaica: Thoughts on Katrina · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Fyr, writing from Jamaica, is heartbroken over Katrina's destruction of New Orleans, which he says has always held a special place in his heart.


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Japan: Geisha goof · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Japundit says the movie version of Arthur Golden’s Memoirs of a Geisha, scheduled for Christmas release, is a goof. Apparently, the American producers had cast Chinese actresses in the roles of the Japanese characters, and the dialogues are in English. Bottomline: So un-authentic.


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Jordan: IbrahimOwais · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Ibrahim Owais says that the Royal Film Commission (RFC) in Jordan continues its search for a script or an idea for a script to produce a Jordanian feature film of high international standards.

author: Haitham Sabbah


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Kenya: Imagine you are a girl · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Arjen Westra (AfrikaReporter) hopes that the rights of women will be better protected in Kenya's new constitution.


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Labanon: APSA 2005 · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Abu Aardvark is on his way to to Washington for the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, where he will be presenting his “Anti-Americanisms in Arab Politics” paper.


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Mexico, Cuba: Blog of the Week · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Blogs Mexico has chosen SABROSON, written in Spanish by a witty Cuban immigrant who has been living in Mexico City since 1990, as blog of the week.


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Myanmar: HIV/AIDS agencies leaving · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Corporate Social Responsibility in Asia is concerned over media report which said many HIV/AIDS agencies are leaving Myanmar as it has proved so difficult to work within the military rules and regulations. Currently, there are an estimated 170,000 to 620,000 people living with HIV in Myanmar. Infection rate among its 50 million people is 1.3%, second in South-east Asia only to Cambodia, which has infection rates of over 2%.


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Nepal: Creative Dissent at work · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

A vibrant and telling post at Samudaya.org on creative dissent in Khatmandu. Performances, art, lamps, people and democracy.


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Nigeria: No problem with China textiles · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Chippla echoes a view also seen elsewhere in the African blogosphere; why does the West have a problem with the flood of cheap Chinese textiles to hit world ports since the beginning of the year? “If trade is meant to be free, then let it be.”


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North Korea: Massive festivals · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

North Koreans are flocking to Pyongyang for a massive festival marking the August 15 Liberation Day and the 60th anniversary of the Workers Party. Migukin blog editor Shelton Bumgarner echoes doubts whether Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) can ill afford the resources given its troubled economy.


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North Korea: Unhappy, negotiations delayed · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Intelligence Watch records a media report which said North Korea has declared a two-week delay to September 12 before it would resume its nuclear program negotiations in Beijing. Probably reason: North Korea is unhappy with plans for a joint United States-South Korea military exercise.


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Palestine: Palestinian Lyrical Front · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Yazan Malakha shares with us some links for Palestinian rappers and their lyrical hip hop resistance.


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Panama: The Web Industry · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Jorge Arango reflects on the Internet in Panama over the last 10 years.


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Philippines: Economy refocus · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

If it succeeds, Philippines will be one of the beneficiaries including the other 99 heavily indebted countries. Jose de Venecia’s program called “debt-for-equity-in-investments” has won Kofi Annan’s endorsement “as a creative way of approaching the issue”, as well as from the Italian and German governments. The JDV’s proposal also sparked the interest of the Paris Club, the British Treasury, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, Latin American Bank, and the Asian Development Bank.


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Romania: News from Baton Rouge · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Romanian blogger George Popescu posts an account from a former fellow student of her experiences as Hurricane Katrina hit Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the town where she now studies.


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Russia: Cultural imperialism rivals Disney · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Neeka ponders Russia's answer to Walt Disney after seeing a girl in Turkey sporting a T-shirt emblazoned with the cartoon character Masyanya.


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Sri Lanka: Cops, Cops! · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Cops, confusion and courts. Days go by.. has a story on a recent run-in with cops and has some comments on the police situation in Sri Lanka.


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Turkmenistan: All your base? · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Registan speculates that the U.S. government is now trying Turkmenistan as a possible location for a Central Asian airbase, after being evicted from Uzbekistan.


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Uganda: Forced into prostitution · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

NGO worker Stephen Okello blogs about a conversation with a woman who was forced into prostitution to keep her children alive in war-torn northern Uganda. Many others share her fate, she says.


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Ukraine: Materialist dialectic · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Blog de Connard oozes sarcasm at attempts by Belgian singer-songwriter Michel Querriere to “avoid the materialist West” in the Ukrainian capital.


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United Arab Emirates:  Translating Arabic Newspapers · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Aqoul started translating some news clips from what is published in one of the big Lebanese newspapers that doesn't have an English edition already on line. He didn't find that an easy job!


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Uzbekistan cuts off gas to Kyrgyzstan · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Uzbekistan has cut off contracted supplies of natural gas to Kyrgyzstan, blogs Laurence at Registan, a move Kyrgyz officials see as motivated by their government's rescue of 439 Uzbek refugees following violence in the Uzbek city of Andijan in late July. A comment on this post offers another perspective.


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Venezuela: Pat Robertson and Jesse Jackson · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Daniel of Venezuela News and Views compares Pat Robertson and Jesse Jackson after the latter visits his country.


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Venezuelan: Measuring Poverty In the USA · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Tomas Sancio of Baruta, Venezuela, criticizes Chavez's accusation of widespread poverty in the United States.


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Vietnam: English blooming · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Vietnam is discarding its Francophone past. English is the language of business and travel in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City now. Every child is now taught English from the time they start school, while schools teaching English to adults are everywhere. Via Richard McKinnon.


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Zimbabwe: Totalitarian dream · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Under constitutional changes just signed into law by President Robert Mugabe, Zimbabweans will not be allowed to travel freely if they are deemed “a threat to national security”, laments Zimpundit.


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Armenia: Part-time water · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Life in Armenia‘s post about an improvement in the piped water supply sparks a flurry in the comments section.


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Azerbaijan: Mountain Jews · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Carpetblogger visits the home town of the Mountain Jews of Azerbaijan, and discovers that most of them live in Moscow, Tel Aviv and New York.


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Bangladesh: More on the blasts · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

moodlogic on who is to blame for the blasts in Bangladesh.


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Bolivia: Prefecture elections? · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Miguel Centallas offers the original English version of an editorial he wrote for the Bolivian daily, La Razón.


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Brazil: Baile Funk · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Atari in Rio recounts his her first Baile Funk, a type of dance party in Rio de Janeiro's favelas.


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China: Dragon rising · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Has the World Trade Organization (WTO) failed to restrain the Rising Dragon now that China is also having problems with exporting to the world? The Vagabond Society blog says with assistance rather than insistence, China can grow and advance to be a partner power rather than a balancing power.


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China:  · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Just as U.N. high commissioner for human rights, Louise Arbour, was making a 5-day visit to China, a group of AIDS patients from Shangcai county had traveled to Beijing  to make an official complaint over their plight. AIDS activist Hu Jia was beaten twice by national security police near Beijing, reports RFA's Mandarin service. Meanwhile, activist Hou Wenzhuo's home also came under tight police surveillance.


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Colombia: 2001 Chengue Massacre Aftermath · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Plan Colombia and Beyond translates an article focusing on the Chengue massacre of 2001 and how its aftermath relates to the new Peace and Justice Law.


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Ethiopia: Angry of Addis Ababa · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Meskel Square reports on a 13,287-word letter to the state-owned  Ethiopian Herald newspaper from the Ethiopia's prime minister, wondering if this is the longest ever letter-to-the-editor ever.


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Freedom of Speech News · Global Voices
Julien Pain

The latest developments on threats to Freedom of Speech over the past week.
With Reporters sans frontières
China: Two cyber-dissidents put under surveillance during UN human rights visit
The Chinese authorities put Liu Di, a young Internet user who was imprisoned for a year in 2002-2003, and Liu Xiaobo, a leading figure in the Chinese pro-democracy movement, under surveillance on 29 August while receiving a visit from Louise Arbour, the UN high commissioner for human rights.
Vietnam : Government urged to pardon three cyber-dissidents
Reporters Without Borders called on justice minister Uong Chu Luu and on president Tran Duc Luong to include Pham Hong Son, Nguyen Khac Toan and Nguyen Vu Binh in the list of prisoners who will be pardoned on the 60th anniversary of Vietnam's independence on 2 September. More details.
Deutsche Welle blogs contest
Bloggers invited to compete in freedom of expression category sponsored by Reporters sans frontières
Deutsche Welle launched its second Best Of The Blogs – or BOBS – competition on 1 September. Reporters Without Borders is sponsoring a special category for blogs that defend freedom of expression. Internet users are invited to use an online form to propose their favourite blog (in any of nine languages).
The BOBS site
Propose a blog
Attention: To propose a blog that defends freedom of expression, click on “Special Reporters Without Borders Award” in the Nomination Category menu.

author: Julien Pain


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India: Gaming Industry Podcast · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

TalknewsIndia has a podcast interview with Rajesh Rao, CEO of Dhruva. The podcast has Rao's opinions on the gaming industry in India.


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India: Recycling in Mumbai · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Tired of the garbage in the drains? Stop shouting yourself hoarse and start Recycling   says Patrix.


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Indonesia: “Dollarization” · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

American economist, Steven Hanke of Johns Hopkins University, has a harsh prescription to cure Indonesia's economic woes: “The only way Indonesia can stabilize the currency is to take all discretion away from the Bank Indonesia… it has no credibility whatsoever.” He wants the “dollarization of Indonesia” to take over.


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Indonesia: Swapping lives · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Dewi, a 23-year old from Jogjakarta from Central Java, will swap life with Violet, a 19-year old from Sydney for 10 weeks. Violet explored issues ranging from sexuality to the rise of terrorism, besides testing the perception that Muslims are dangerous and unpredictable people. Simultaneously, Dewi documents in Sydney the impact of swapping her Muslim culture, family and friends with Violet. Their blogs have entered Week I and Week 2. TV station SBS Australia will air a special documentary on October 6.


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Kenya: Catholic insurance · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Bankelele flags a financial services tidbit with a twist; the Nairobi Catholic Church has been licensed to start an insurance company.


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Malaysia: Gagging airwaves & cyberspace · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Malaysia is gaining harsh perception over its governance of the airwaves and cyberspace. Indonesia-based blogger Indcoup links to a story on Malaysia's newly launched crackdown on porn stored on mobile phones – police are authorised to carry out random spot checks to catch culprits. Quoting Anonymous Blogging, he says Malaysia now ranks alongside Iran, China, Peninsular Arabia (Saudi Arabia, Syria, Bahrain) and Zimbabwe as “the most risky countries to blog from”.


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Mama Africa Film Fest · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Black Looks misses London, as she casts a wistful eye over the line-up for the British Film Institute's Mama Africa Film Fest, which aims to “champion the growing strength of African female actors and film-makers”.


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Pakistan: Conspiracy Theory? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Ahmed Bilal links to the Martian Anthropologist, and offers his own views on disasters, gas prices and politics.


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Pakistan: morality, etc. · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Notes on religion, pornography and the internet on It is write.


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Puerto Rico: Rating Talent · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Gil C. Schmidt from Cabo Rojo asks, on scale of 1 to 100, how talented are the people of the island of Puerto Rico?


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Rwanda: Blog Day  · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Rwanda-based George Conard shares his Blog Day selection.


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Sept 2, 2005: International Blogging for Disaster Relief Day · Global Voices
Andy Carvin

Tomorrow, Friday September 2, is International Blogging for Disaster Relief Day.  Why? Because it needs to be done.
If you have a blog, here's what you can do. Sometime tomorrow, take a break from whatever it is you usually blog about, and post something constructive related to disaster relief. You can keep it topical to your blog; or, you can just dedicate blog space to listing websites where people can donate money (maybe even challenge people to match your donation). Or, share a story of a hurricane survivor. This goes for photo bloggers, podcasters and video bloggers as well – there's no reason why this should be text-only.
Though this is inspired by Hurricane Katrina, the goal is to deal with disaster relief efforts worldwide, posting about a disaster relevant to your community.  Post lists of supplies needed for victims of yesterday's stampede in Baghdad. Post an update on how your family is recovering from the tsunami. Post multi-lingual resources for African families in Paris displaced by the recent apartment fires. Blog about whatever you choose, as long as it supports some kind of disaster assistance in a constructive way.
When you've posted to your blog, be sure to include a link to this Technorati tag: International Blogging for Disaster Relief Day. That way, when people follow that link, they'll be able to find a collection of all relevant postings published throughout the blogosphere. There will also be an RSS feed on that page, which can be used to aggregate all of the postings and display them on a single webpage. I plan to aggregate them on my Katrina Aftermath blog; you can do the same. (Later, I'll post a javascript on my Katrina blog to make it easy for anyone to do this – more soon.) One collection of disaster relief resources, countless bloggers. That's the power of the blogosphere.
So please join me tomorrow and participate in International Blogging for Disaster Relief Day. Take a break from whatever it is you normally blog about – even if it's just for one post – and give back to the Net.

author: Andy Carvin


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Singapore: Blogger wins poetry awards · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Lawyer/blogger Gilbert KohChin Wang won the Golden Point Award 2005 for English Poetry. The Awards is the only national creative writing competition which welcomes entries in the four official languages in Singapore, namely English, Chinese, Malay and Tamil.


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Singapore metablog Tomorrow.sg and a discussion on Linking Policies · Global Voices
mrbrown

Lately there has been a flurry of debates online about Singapore metablog, Tomorrow.sg‘s linking policy, and its policy of not asking for permission before linking people's blog posts.
Some of the debates go right to the heart of  issues like whether it is an accepted practice to link to blogs without the need for asking for permission, whether is is morally acceptable, and privacy issues.
The post has attracted high readership and a great deal of participation in the comments section. There are also many spillover posts in other Singapore blogs on this matter. Try Geekazoid who is very upset at having been linked without permission (very strong language).
Idle Days, one of Tomorrow‘s editors, posts some reaction to the controversy. An excerpt:
All I can say that this ‘debate’ has been of much interesting and in some ways slightly baffling one to me (for all the reasons I have stated here) and of course when you look at metablogs like boing boing, Slashdot, Metafilter, etc, you hardly see cries of foul play in their comments. If readers and those bloggers whose posts have appeared in these metablogs demanded permission, they would have gone the way of the dinosaur by now. Perhaps as Singaporean bloggers, we simply don’t get blogging after all.
Adrian Loo at A Life Uncommon finds such reactions arrogant:
Tomorrow, in propounding its linking policy appears to have been caught up in its own expectations of its own rights, without due regard to the rights of others, many of whom provide the substance from which Tomorrow draws its breath.
An anonymous commenter at Adrian Loo's blog disagrees:
Pray tell, how could it be that they are advocating an absolute rights model which theirs triumph over all others when the very tag (“tomorrow I’m not free”) that they respect is created by a blogger, not themselves? If that’s not acceptance and respect of bloggers who do not want to be linked, I don’t know what is.
“tomorrow I’m not free” is a logo some bloggers use to indicate that they do not wish to be linked to by Tomorrow.sg.
The trackbacks beneath Tomorrow.sg's linking policy post show just some of the Singapore blogs and forums discussing this topic (with passionate comments and debates igniting at these places as well). There are other Singapore blogs that discuss this issue, but because those blog owners have indicated that they do not wish to be linked by Tomorrow.sg, they are not linked to.
What do bloggers around the world think of this debate? Are similar problems cropping up in other countries? Please hit the “comments” button and let us know!!

author: mrbrown


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Singapore: New anti-terrorist tactics · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Singapore tightens anti-terrorist procedure. Trucks carrying petrol and other flammable materials will be  limited to three entry points into the central business district effective October1. Besides, satellite guided tracking devices have been fitted to the trucks and alarm will be triggered if the driver strays from the approved routes.


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South Korea: Internationalised TV · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

The Korean emergence now takes the form of internationalized television. After making waves in Southeast Asia, Korean TV serial Daejangeum looks set to conquer stations in the United States, broadcasting under the English title, “Jewel in the Palace”. The Korean government has created an official English website devoted to these TV programs.


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Sudan: Spotlight on Darfur · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Congo Watch is one of a few blogs to highlight Spotlight on Darfur 1, a blogging initiative by Catez Stevens in New Zealand.


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Sudan: Student tortured · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

The Passion of the Present reports on the kidnapping and torture of a student at Sudan's Alahlia University by security guards and student militia members after he called for the re-establishment of the student union.


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Taiwan: Investors beware · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Scholars and experts warned Taiwanese investors and businesses about the credibility of China's official statistics regarding economic growth. One of them said China's economic growth rate did not tally with unemployment that ran as high as 130 million people nationwide.


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Ukraine: Courtroom drama · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Abdymok posts about anti-semitism and Jewish activist Alexander Naiman in the Ukraine.


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Uzbekistan: Independence Day Blogs · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Disillusioned Kid rounds up a wide range of blogs relating to Uzbekistan, which celebrates its independence day on Sept. 1.


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Uzbekistan: Orphanage horrors · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Registan guest-blogger David Walther's eyewitness account of starvation, abuse and deprivation in Uzbekistan government orphanages makes harrowing reading, and backs up his argument for an embargo on Uzbek cotton.


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Armenia: Rock festival · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Oneworld Multimedia previews two rock bands from Georgia who will be taking part in tomorrow's music festival in the Armenian capital of Yerevan.


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Barbados: Speechless Over Katrina · Global Voices
David Sasaki

this, that, & whatever, written from Barbados, has a difficult time reflecting on Hurricane Katrina and “the apparent ceaselessness and inevitability of the terrible … tragedy of the human condition.”


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Bolivia: Alvaro Garcia Linera and Indymedia · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Anarchogeek discusses vice-presidential candidate, Alvaro Garcia Linera's connection with Indymedia Bolivia.


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Bolivia: Presidential Candidate Bios · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Miguel of MABB has translated short bios of each of the presidential candidates from the Bolivian daily, La Razon.


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Central Asia: India joins the fray · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Nathan Hamm writes on Registan about India's attempts to compete for Central Asian energy resources.


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Chile: Phil Collins in the Metro · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Quemar las Naves pleads that they stop playing Phil Collins in the Santiago Metro. Beck and The Strokes are suggested replacements.


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China: Guanxi in job placement · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Guanxi (personal contacts) still features prominently in job placement in Shanghai. Applicants in China find the same frustration with job posting services such as Monster and Hotjobs in the US: they just aren’t effective.


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China: Hu’s first visit to U.S. · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

President Hu Jintao of the People's Republic of China will make his first visit the United States of America since his ascension to the top leadership post in China. Visiting President Bush, Microsoft and Boeing are listed in his itinerary,


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China: No. 1 in car audio · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

China has become the world's car audio manufacturing centre, reports Research and Market 2005.


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Echoes from the Tunisian blogosphere · Global Voices
Mohamed Marwen Meddah

Zizou from Djerba wonders why there is a lack of information and news about cities and towns other than the capital in Tunisia, saying that the traditional media is not covering these places enough and that he hopes blogs will take over this mission.
Adib   and MMM talk about FIFAK 2005, the International Amateur Film Festival that is being held in Kelibia, from August 27 until September 3. Adib attended and provides reviews of the festival and the best movies here and here.
Yamen will be visiting the USA in a special program organized by the U.S. Department of State and The White House, through which leaders, politicians and academics from around the world will be present and meet together; He will be representing Tunisia.
Karim writes about the shock he and others got when they witnessed a topless photo shoot at a public beach in Gammarth.
The Brunette talks about how her aunt gave her a Tunisian cooking book because she thinks she's old enough for marriage and will certainly need it soon. She goes on about how many weird recipes there are and how complicated it all seems.

author: Mohamed Marwen Meddah


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Egypt: Sadat Assassination Investigates · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Mamduh Shawqi is asking to sign a petition to the United Nations urging it to start investigating Sadat's assassination as it investigates El-Hariri's.


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El Salvador: Troops Offered for Katrina Aid · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Tim's El Salvador Blog notes that the Salvadoran “National Assembly passed a measure Wednesday night recommending that the government send a contingent of troops to the region affected by Hurricane Katrina.”


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Georgia: Commuter chaos · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Sueandnotu rants about the apparently arbitrary changes to public transport and the road network in the Georgian capital, Tblisi.


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Hungary: Who stole Big Brother · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Among the offerings from Pestiside are a lawsuit by the license-holders for Big Brother against a Hungarian reality-TV show, and special regulations to limit damage done by boozy Brits on overseas binges.


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India: Our flood and their flood · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

“Our Flood & Their Flood” on Cloudburst Mumbai . Fresh from the memory of the deluge in Bombay, come reflections on the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina.


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India, Pakistan: Dukhtaran-e-Milat · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

DialogNow links to a story on Dukhtaran-e-Milat in Kashmir. Comprising of women, the group has been issuing social diktats against those who do not toe their moral lines.


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Israel: Divest from Palestine · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Smooth Stone is asking people to join the Campaign to Divest from “Palestine”, which goal is to pressure the entity calling itself “Palestine” to respect the human rights of the Israeli people, Smooth Stone says.


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Jordan:  Comment Contest · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Yazan Malakha is giving a $25 USD Amazon gift certificate to whoever comes up with the most humorous comment on a picture of Ronald McDonald.


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lebanon: If Katrina Were Lebanese · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Mustapha of The Beirut Spring says: “If the Americans were as politically centered as us Lebanese, they would have quickly skipped the terrible humanitarian disaster caused by Katrina and jumped straight into the politics.”


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Libya: Revolution Day · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

September 1st is the Revolution Day of Libya. Sheren (a Libyan blogger) wonders; how important this date is to the Libyan people. Why? Because this is the day when Col. Muammar Al-Qaddafi overthrew King Idris. Libya's Independence Day is celebrated on the eve of Christmas Day. She asks, which date is of more importance?


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Nepal: Football and Politics · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Football and Politics. Nepal sees interesting turns in leadership in both realms says United We Blog!.


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Nepal: International Day of the Disappeared · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

30 Aug was International Day of the Disappeared. International Nepal Solidary Network has a post on what Ian Martin, the Representative of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Nepal had to say about the current situation in Nepal.


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Pakistan: First contact with Israel · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

More on Israel-Pakistan relations at A journey to the end of Time. Intentions, motivations and why Israel is a friend Pakistan needs.


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Pakistan: Meeting Israel · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

pakistani perspective on the diplomatic breakthrough – foreign ministers of Pakistan and Israel finally meet!


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Peru: Coverage of Pucallpa Plane Crash · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Diana Zorrilla Ríos asks why so few Peruvian blogs mentioned the recent plane crash in the Amazonion town of Pucallpa [es] and concludes that practically all Peruvian blogs are concentrated in the capitol of Lima, where they focus on. She also links to the five bloggers who did mention the crash.


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Peru: Internet and Transparency · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Marcia Koth de Paredes writes that “civil society organizations in Peru are increasingly active in the use of Internet to promote ‘transparency’ of democratic processes.”


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Russia: Meet the National Bolsheviks · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Neeka's Backlog takes us on an introductory tour of the muscular posters and uncompromising ideology that are offered by Russia's National Bolshevik Party to attract support.


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Saudi Arabia: Emotionally Mute · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Ritzy says that Egyptians should learn from Saudi Arabia, where 80 percent of the households are emotionally mute.


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Somaliland: Election fever · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Inside Somaliland reports on the beginning of campaigning for the Sept. 26 parliamentary elections.


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Sudan: Spotlight shifts to Sept. 5 · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

You may have read an item in this column about the Spotlight on Darfur blogging campaign. Well, as Congo Watch reports, and as Catez Stevens has informed us directly, the date has been moved to Sept. 5 to avoid a clash with Katrina-related efforts.


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Technical problems · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

Please excuse the temporary change in our appearance.  Our normal look will be restored as soon as possible.

author: Rebecca MacKinnon


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Uganda: Abducted girl found · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Uganda CAN reports on the reunion with her relatives of a 12 year-old Ugandan girl who went missing 18 months ago during a raid on her displaced persons’ camp by the Lord's Resistance Army.


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Venezuelan Politics: Unnatural Disasters · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Tomas Sancio compares the US reaction to Hurricane Katrina with the Venezuelan reaction to the 1999 La Guaira floods. He also points out that the US government has accepted aid offered by the Venezuelan government.


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West Africa: Cholera kills 500 · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

The Passion of the Present compiles reports on the deaths of more than 500 people in West African countries in an outbreak of cholera.


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Zimbabwe: Beauty contests · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Black Looks points out the incongruity of a televised beauty contest in Zimbabwe amid mass government-backed demolitions of shanty towns and other human rights abuses.


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From the Jordanian Blogosphere · Global Voices
Roba Al Assi

The Jordanian blogosphere reacts to the current disasters around the globe. Ahmad Humeid offers his condolences for Hurricane Katrina, criticizes the relief effort as being “miserable”, and notes that “what is really sad is that the affluent whites managed to escape while the poor blacks were left behind.” Jameed also emphasizes that human tragedy is human tragedy. Yazan Malakha reblogs a post on Via Roads to Iraq that remarks on the “signs of disregard for Arab life in the right-wing American press and the entire Israeli press are a small but unmistakable reminder that, for all the Western bluster about democracy and freedom, there doubtless remains a kind of global apartheid.”
Haitham of Sabbah's Blog notes how Muslims do not practice anti-semitism as the Westren media likes to advertise, and shares a bit of local news- “Bahrain Human Rights Society is now headed by Huda Azra Nono, a Jewish lady from the very tiny Bahraini Jewish community.”
Beisan, meanwhile, posts about how she had hoped that 2005 would be better than 2004 but that hope is proving to be futile with the Hariri assassination, the Iraqi Stampede, and Hurricane Katrina.
On the cultural front, Lina posts about the Arab Cultural Night that was held in Ireland as a part of a youth camp, and wonders “how long will this beautiful rich heritage endure and stand in the face of cultural erosion?” She also says that she is very pleased to find out that the 2nd International Cultural Forum is taking place in the Dead Sea. Lulu of CafeLulu discusses a TV show entitled “Pickles, Inc.”, whereas S.C. of Utopia mentions that this year will be the birth of Shashat's Women's Film Festival in Palestine, which aims to increase public awareness of women's creativity and the implications of representations of women. Madas contemplates a very interesting question- “When did we become Arabs?”, and says “the idea of an Arab identity is fresh of the over, it is that new.”
Meanwhile, two of the creative portion of the Jordanian blogosphere share some of their experiences. Amin Matalqa expresses his excitement for starting his first year at the American Film Institute and keeps us updated. Laith Majali, on the other hand, lets us in on how his career as an editor started and shares pictures of himself impersonating famous characters.
The 6th Jordan Planet blogger meet-up has also been announced for the 14th of September.

author: Roba Al Assi


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Images from the Dominican Republic: Looking to the Future · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Fachtopia, who works with Linux in the Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic has posted this photo with the title, “Looking to the Future” within the set, “Street Children.”


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Japan: Disaster drills · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

September 1 is annual Disaster Drills Day in Japan nationwide.  This year, over 1 million people took part, spurred in part by the increase in major earthquakes over the summer.


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Japan: Politics as pagenat · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Is politics a pagenat? Horie Takafumi, CEO of internet startup livedoor, plays Schwarzenegger-the-governor and runs as an independent candidate in the Hiroshima #6 district.


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Japan: Selling Lexus  · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

After making a roaring success in US automobile market, Lexus will finally be sold in Japan. But there are key issues in making market entry to its parental country.


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Malaysia: Medical blogs · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Medical doctors in Malaysia aren't exactly archaic as many do use email and quite a number of them have started blogging. Malaysian Medical Resources has a sampling of Malaysian Medical Doctor Blogs in the Doctor Weblog Aggregator. Medical students are following suit.


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What Chinese Bloggers Think of “Super Girls” · Global Voices
Frank Dai

Super Girls, a contest for female singers, has been the major entertainment event in China this summer. It was even evaluated to high level of social and political meaning. Chinese Bloggers also actively participated in the hot discussion, giving much valuable thoughts on what Super Girls affect Chinese society, business and culture.
The program begun last year by Hunan TV, a provincial television network. According to the organizer and producer Xia Qing, this program was inspired by the similar “American Idol” of FOX TV. The main feature of it was that everyone can take part, with almost no requirement of age, academic background and professional training. Its theme song was titled “Sing Whenever You Want to Sing”. Another prominent feature was that every audience can send SMS by mobile phone supporting the girl he or she likes. The SMS that a contestant received would be a important standard of judging whether she can stay into next round.
The popularity of Super Girls is incredible: Near 150,000 girls have signed up for a contestant; Baidu related group mailing system (BBS) has more than 10 million posts merely concerning with the Top 3 singers; The profit earned in sending SMS was said to be at least 30 million Yuan, about 2.5 million US dollar. It was estimated that 1/10 of Chinese population have watched the final round which took on Aug 26th
Chinese Bloggers are beginning to express their attitudes as soon as the event happened. As you can imagine, many fans of those girl stars rushed to their blogs to express admiration and enthusiasm. Their number can not be totally calculated. Even some of the contestants have their blogs, which can be found on Bokee.com, though it was not very clear that whether those blogs are written themselves. Here we can only picked up some rational ideas and opinions by Chinese Bloggers focusing on what and how Super Girls changed the way of entertainment and its relation to Chinese unique society and mass culture.
Lian Yue, a famed columnist, posted an entry on his blog that satirize the jealous CCTV, the largest TV network and official media of China Communist Party. CCTV has criticized Super Girls for its philistinism in artistic taste and called for more science and technology program on television. They declared that “audience rating is the origin of sin destroying program quality”. Many bloggers and netizens were very angry with this, debuting that Super Girls was the program that they loved and CCTV just used this as excuse to strike Hunan TV, who has been a competent rivalry of CCTV in entertainment field. They have organized a signup boycotting CCTV.
Anti, a veteran journalist, is the first blogger who connected Super Girls with democratic reform of China. He pointed out that every girl, who has dreamed of becoming a star, can realize her dream by the program with individual effort. He also spotted that every audience can determine the destiny their beloved girl star by sending SMS, which means the preliminary training of participatory democracy. The conclusion he made was that the unbelievable popularity of Super Girls was attributed to the urgent need of participation and transparency in society.
Zheng carefully observed how the fans are organized online and offline to support the super girls. He noted that those fans used instant massage and bulletin system to organize in order. They went out on the streets to show their passion and urge passerby to send SMS to vote for their favorite star. Zheng praised the fans for activism while worried about that government could supervise those BBS and forums because they are too “centralized” for expression.
Zhang Rui, told the common grounds existing between Super Girls and Blog: desires to realize dream and express opinion. Both of them are providing average individuals with easy way to achieve success. Hopesome gave a similar analogy between Super Girls and Podcast, saying that podcast gave everyone a platform. Interestingly the comment following his post has rose to more than 300, showing how crazy the fans are.
Super Girls has ended with the winner LiYuchun, a boyish-style girl.  We are very surprised to see that Chinese Bloggers did not only express their fancy toward their favorite star simply but also had some excellent thoughts on its impact on social motivation and internet participation. The program was not merely an entertainment event but a complex subject that need more insight and investigation and Chinese Bloggers are one of significant sources contributing to the discussion.

author: Frank Dai


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Images from Bhutan: Showtime · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

“Showtime” by Mick Yates
A traditional Bhutanese musician starts his solo.

author: Paul Frankenstein


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South Asian blog roundup · Global Voices
Rezwan

The main buzz of many South Asian blogs were about the Hurricane Katrina that  caused extensive and severe damage in much of the southeastern United States.
Bangladesh:
- British journalist Daniel Brett writes two interesting articles in his blog on Bangladesh. One is “what America can learn from Bangladesh” to tackle disasters like Katrina & “The Bangladeshi gas rush” where he suggests that Bangladesh should not rush to export gas to make up for losses sustained due to the abolition of textile quotas.
- Mezba, a Canadian Bangladeshi describes his thoughts on the Hurricane Katrina and the US government's failure.
- ‘Unheard voices’ thinks that the new generation Bangladeshis have a broader horizon, but a smaller view.
- Nashat of ‘the color of rain’ has some observations at Qatar Airport.
India:
- Sid from Patang.org has a great new social software in place. It is a car pool for the people of Mumbai.
- Manish at Sepia Mutiny is delighted over Indian tennis prodigy Sania Mirza's advancement in the US open. She has made India proud and apart from the play she is slowly transforming into an icon with her beauty & body piercing style and being lured by many advertising contracts. Go Sania go!
- Dina Mehta, one of the members of Tsunamihelp blog & wiki team has lots of links & news about Hurricane Katrina and how you can help. Uma has lots of links on Katrina too.
- Sunil Laxman of The Balancing Life hosts this week's Indian Blog Mela.
- The Greatbong writes about the luckiest dude in the world -The king of Swaziland.
Nepal:
- Suvecha, a former Kathmandu-based journalist who is currently studying in Australia tells about one of her crushes in a cafe in New Baneshwor, Kathmandu sometime in 2004.
Pakistan:
- Mudassir of the ‘Pakistani perspective’ informs that a Hindu, Justice Rana Bhagwandas, has been appointed as the acting chief justice of the Supreme Court.
- ‘The Glasshouse’ posts series of reports on the rape of Sonia Naz, a 23-year-old mother of two, on the order of Pakistan's police.
Sri Lanka:
-  ‘Indi.ca’ thinks that the American disaster response to the Hurricane Katrina is not better than the Sri Lankan.
- Nittewa is trying to understand the Lonely Planet Guide to LTTE Terrorism.
- BOYCY reports that there is an increase of women drivers on the streets of Sri Lanka.

author: Rezwan


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· Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Noted by TheDayStartsHere, Google has launched the beta version of Google Bendi (Bendi means “local” in Chinese) at bendi.google.com .


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Nigerian Blogging Scene · Global Voices
Edward Popoola

The Nigerian blogging scene
As the world is getting along well with blogging,the face of blogging in Nigeria is changing surely but slowly.   At the time of writing this piece there are not many  (home based) Nigerians blogging especially when looked at in relationship to  the number of people using the Internet in the country.
A few Notable ones are, Timbaland ,  Trae Days,  Chipplas Blog, Naija Jams Kazey's Journal.       Kayode Muyibi is the creator of the Nigerian Bloggers Aggregator.     As well as his personal blog, Timbaland created and manages  the Nigerian Weblog Ring (NWR).  However, most of the Nigerians on the blog ring are Nigerians based abroad.
A number of factors could be said to be responsible for why Nigerians resident in the country don't blog. The main factors are those relating to issues of  availability and cost of access.    However as internet use  is quite widespread I believe the lack of blogs has more to do with  poor awareness about what blogs are compared to the popular use of the email and chat amongst users.     Also it takes maybe  5 – 15 minutes to check email or have a brief chat with friends whilst blogging requires far more time and research online which is very costly in relation to the average earnings particularly amongst students and young graduates who the majority of internet users.
Because of the above  constraints,   active Nigerian bloggers are either very technical or web savvy individuals who can still afford to stay more on the internet.  Hence, its should not be surprising if you see a Nigerian blog talking about technology.    The same reason goes for why some Nigerians put their blogs on their personal domain names.  The other category of Nigerian bloggers are those living abroad ( Timbuktu Chronicles,  Dusky Thoughts who incidentally has just returned to Nigeria for one years National Youth Service, Black Looks and Soul on Ice)  and who do not have to contend with issues such as unstable electricity and phone lines like home based Nigerian bloggers have to.

author: Edward Popoola


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Argentina: New Photos · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Line of Sight has added an impressive collection of new photos from around Buenos Aires.


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Argentina: Thoughts on New Orleans · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Argentinian bridge-blogger, Jorge Gobbi conveys some demographics and says [ES], “it's difficult to not make the correlations and see how, in an area particularly populated by Blacks, many of them poor, federal government aid took an eternity to arrive.”


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Azerbaijan: Big-name lovers · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Omnik Krikorian takes us back to the Azeri roots of one of the world's biggest love stories, Layla and Majnun, and of Eric Clapton's rock anthem, Layla.


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Bolivia: A Day Without Cars · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Both Jim Shultz and Almada de Noche [ES] (who will soon be leaving for France) recap yesterday's “Pedestrian Day” in Cochabamba, Bolivia.


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Bolivia: Newspaper Info Graphics · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Miguel Centallas has a Flickr set of Bolivian Newspaper graphics from May 27 to August 05 of this year.


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Bolivia: Tuto’s VP Candidate · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Eduardo of Barrio Flores writes that conservative presidential candidate, Tuto Qurigoa has selected María René Duchén, from Santa Cruz, as his running-mate.


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Brazil: Blog Coverage of Katrina · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Brazilian blogger, André Lemos writes on the Best of the Blogs weblog about coverage of Katrina in the Brazilian blogosphere.


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Brazil: Tired of Being Sexy · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Atari in Rio is a fan of the São Paulo-based rock group, Cansei de Ser Sexy (“Tired of Being Sexy”) and links to two of their songs.


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Cambodia: Khlog & Clog · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Drupal, an open source content management system, will power the KhmerOS project and blogging tool that enables Cambodians to blog in own Khmer language based-weblog.  It's going to be Khlog and Clog – the former stands for Khmer Blog, weblog in Khmer language; and the latter for Cambodia blog, weblog about Cambodia.


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Cambodia: Land crisis · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

There is a major land crisis in Cambodia, a leading United Nations human rights official said. Rich and powerful interests were grabbing land, leaving thousands of people dispossessed.


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Chad: Dictator cronies out · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Black Star Journal reports the removal, finally, from the Chadian government of  officials suspected of torture and other human rights abuses during the regime of Hissène Habré in the 1980s.


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China: Naked web-chat · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

A Chinese researcher has warned of naked Internet chatting. Up to 20,000 Chinese Internet users log on to chatrooms each night in which users in various states of undress talk to each other with the help of Web cams.


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Colombia: Comparing Bad Responses · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Plan Colombia and Beyond compares Bush's response to Hurricane Katrina with President Uribe's response to the besiegement of Toribío, Cauca by FARC guerrillas in April of this year.


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D.R. of Congo: A miner’s life · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Black Star‘s Brian also flags the plight of gold miners in the Democratic Republic of Congo as reported in the Christian Science Monitor.


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Ethiopia: Photo bloggers unite · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

See Ethiopia through the eyes of Ethiopians with digital cameras in this stunning photo-blog project.


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Ethiopia: Revolutionary lesson · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Ethiopundit has some deeply ironical suggestions for the government of Ethiopia as he examines the friendship between the Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez and the father of Cuban socialism, Fidel Castro.


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From the South Asian Blogworld · Global Voices
Uma MD

In South Asia, bloggers are up to whatever they usually do: which is, looking around them at the world, at everything great and small. On his flight back to Lahore, Karrvakarela wonders at how much small kindnesses can enrich our lives. He also writes about rediscovering his sohna shehr Karachi: the crows crowding the sky at dusk, the bookshops at Boat Basin, Dilpasand Chaat, and date milkshake at the Sialkot Milk House. At Metroblogging Lahore, for Shab-i-Miraj, Darwaish asks readers to pray for those they love, those they don't love and even those they hate.
In Delhi, Samit Basu, writer, columnist and favourite blogger of the Indian blogworld, writes about IWE (Indian Writing in English) spats and how they tend to come up for discussion every now and then. And how, when the dust has settled, it might be better to get back to writing some good books. Meanwhile, at Sepia Mutiny, Manish prepares us for a different match - the Sania Mirza -Maria Sharapova face-off.  For spunky Mirza, it was one of the biggest matches of her career. As Manish points out, she lost 6-2, 6-1, in 59 minutes, but we love Sania for trying, and getting so far – and we know she's going places!
Blogging from the road, Dilip D'Souza remembers New Orleans, Mardi Gras, and Preservation Hall and that mood, all its own.  Zigzackly writes on being really poor.  Locana points to all the blog anniversaries that Indian bloggers are marking this month. These include two years of Deeshaa and one year of Jabberwock. Amit Varma remarks that children are naturally more likely to be nervous about exams, which they see every few months, than about natural disasters. Speaking of children, Nancy Gandhi remembers sweet cigarettes and brings back a whole wave of nostalgia for me. Pets are part of family, too, and at Animal Rights India, Hurree blogs about animals and other family.
In Dhaka, Rezwan reflects on Katrina and Bangladesh.  In Sri Lanka, Morquendi of Nittewa muses on the journey from Buddhaputra to Bhoomiputra, and critiques what he calls Sri Lankan Buddhism.  In Nepal, Samudaya introduces Creative Dissent Nepal, towards supporting democratic ideals through non-violent activism. And finally, MsWorld, Diva Chinita, is on her way to someplace near us. Look at the places she has travelled to in one month: Osaka, Japan; Hong Kong; Bangkok, Thailand; Ventiane, Laos; Luang Prabang, Laos; Chiang Khong, Thailand; Chiang Mai, Thailand; Poipet, Cambodia; Phnon Penh, Cambodia. By plane and bus and slow boat. Where will the headliner on the Black Girls Rule World Tour hit next? Well, I've invited her to Mumbai, and she's promised to come here!

author: Uma MD


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Ghanaian music: A hip life · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Abocco at GhanaConscious blogs about a Ghanaian-led “hip-life” gig in Cambridge, Mass., and gives a feel for the genre.


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Images from Chile: Letter to the Government · Global Voices
David Sasaki

As we have previously written about, a group of Chilean bloggers is challenging their government to improve a program which hopes to make both computers and Internet access more affordable for the general population. The caption reads:
On a cold Monday morning (which are always colder than any other morning), a dozen of us met up to support Luis Riveros, Director of the Center of Diffusion of Free Software, in the delivery of a letter to President Lagos with critiques and proposals of the project, “My First PC,” sponsored by the government.

author: David Sasaki


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India: Once upon a Rock · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

No rock for Mumbai rules the police. Flotsam takes a trip down the rock lane to better days.


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India: Through a child’s eyes · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

charukesi links to a wonderful online photoblog project run by a school in rural Andhra Pradesh, and how children are posting to the photoblog, exploring their lives and village.


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Indonesia: Haze law suit · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Indonesia Environment Forum (Walhi), a leading Indonesian NGO, is set to file a class action lawsuit against 10 companies in connection with the August forest fires and choking haze in Riau, Sumatra. Eight of the companies are said to be Malaysian-owned.

author: Jeff Ooi


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Indonesia: Katrina Hurricane · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Indonesian blogger A. Fatih Syuhud appeals for alms for Americans affected by Katrina Hurricane. Singapore blogger Yuhui wonders if life will return toNew Orleans to the same level of its Mardi Gras-inspired madness.


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Iran: Nuke for Peace · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Mohammed of Iraq The Model wonders, why is Iran choosing to defy the world withal the present dangers of a military reaction if Iran kept pushing things to the edge? Does Iran want to develop nuclear power for peaceful utilization? If that was the case then the European offer is very reasonable and generous and it cannot be claimed that this offer doesn't meet the needs for a peaceful program.


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Jamaica, Bolivia: Costly Internet Access · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Yannick Laclau posts a reader's email about the price of internet access in Jamaica and Santa Cruz, Bolivia.


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Katrina: A view from Romania · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Romania-based Working Definition starts, and sustains, a debate about racism and poverty in the United States in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

author: Luisetta Mudie


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Katrina Help Lines from the KatrinaHelp.info team · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Several founders and members of the SEA EAT (South East Asian Earthquake And Tsunami) blog & wiki, which gained worldwide attention in the Tsunami of Dec 2004, have remobilized volunteers to do their bit for victims of Hurricane Katrina. The KatrinaHelp Wiki Network was initially conceived in many different people's minds at approximately the same time worldwide. It represents a clear and direct effort at helping coordination, communication, and cooperation for rescue, recovery, and relief efforts.
This is the button for people needing help to call in to the KatrinaHelp.info team from a Skype account. Please spread the word so people needing help can call in. They have volunteers and associates from shelters, ER and other Emergency services on the ground with resources to help.
Details on how to use the helplines are here. Or call them at +15042081564 with your request for help, and offers to help. (Please ensure you add the +1 to the number, even if you are in the USA. This is because the number is routed via Skype). If the line is busy, you wil be forwarded to voicemail. Please clearly state your name and contact details so they can get back to you.

author: Neha Viswanathan


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Kenya: The bicycle economy · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Timbuktu Chronicles reports on an initiative aimed at making load-carrying bicycles more available to ordinary Kenyans.


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Mongolia: Leaders’ mausoleum gone · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Mongolia Matters reports on the demolition of the Soviet-style mausoleum of two prominent Mongolian leaders, Choibalsan and Sukhbataar, whose bodies have now been removed and cremated.


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Nepal: Violence and unrest · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

United We Blog!  has a post on a protest that turned violent in Nepal. The photographs are a telling account of the unrest in the country.


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Nepal: With the king? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

International Nepal Solidarity Network reports that the Maoists are attempting to isolate the king, as opposed to helping the government.


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Oman:  How Hurricanes are Named? · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

WickeD made a little search and can tell us now how hurricanes are named.


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Palestine: Sport and Politics · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Phalasteen Blog shows some photos of protesters disrupting the Israel-Switzerland World Cup qualifying match in Basel on Sat. The protestors raised banners saying: “Free Palestine, and Boycott Apartheid.”


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Poland: State of disrepair · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Polblog has an audioblog and photos documenting the state of disrepair of the Polish capital, Warsaw.


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Puerto Rico: Grassroots Tech Innovation · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Kevin Shockey compares the lack of grassroots-level technological innovation in Puerto Rico with that of Ireland. He has planned a small conference in mid-October to “kick start [a] Web 2.0 economy.”


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Romania: The vampire tour · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Just before New Orleans stirred political passions over at Working Definition, the city shimmered briefly into focus in an earlier post about vampires, real and imagined, around the world. Not to be missed.


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Singapore: Writers Festival · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Singapore Writers Festival drew to a close September 4. Author Cory Doctorow was there to give a talk.


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Sudan: Foreign-focused news values · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Aid worker Sleepless in Sudan welcomes a report from Reuters about an attack on a foreign aid convoy in the troubled Sudanese region of Darfur, but reminds the world that mainstream media could “probably publish an article like this about incidents involving local people every day.”


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Syria: Blogging in Syria · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

The Syrian News Wire says that even Syria has one of the lowest number of blogs in the Arab world, but that's not stopping their rapid growth. Since the explosion of media attention on Syria in 2005, the number of Syrian blogs has leaped to about 50.


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Taiwan: Romanization · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Bogger ashaw cites a 1962 study as noting that Taiwan’s first periodical, a Presbyterian newsletter, was in romanized Taiwanese. Meanwhile, squabbling is underway over the romanization systems – the Tongyong Pinyin schemes – for Taiwanese dialects  (Minnan, Hoklo, Hokkien etc). In this case, the author is a backer of the Tongyong system for Taiwanese.


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Vietnam: Amnesty · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Pastor Quang was released on August 30 as part of the National Day amnesty, but evangelist Thach remains in prison


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Zimbabwe: Comparison with Hitler · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Cane Rat, writing on the Sokwanele Civic Action Support Group blog, likens Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe to Hitler just before he lost the war.


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Zimbabwe: Why Mugabe paid up · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Zimpundit analyses the decision by Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe to make a debt repayment to the International Monetary Fund.


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Afghanistan: Women candidates struggle · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Afghan Warrior goes into more detail about the problems faced by prospective women candidates in the Sept. 18 parliamentary elections in Afghanistan.


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Argentina: Kevin Johansen · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Ana of Nivel 13 sums up a recent online chat [ES] with Alaskan-born, Argentine rock star, Kevin Johansen.


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Aruba: Natural Bridge Collapses · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Lost in Smallness reports that the same day a judge released all three suspects in the Natalee Holloway case, Aruba's famed Natural Bridge collapses.


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Azerbaijan: Voter registration drive · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Marianna Idrisova Gurtovnik writes about efforts to ensure widespread voter registration ahead of the Azerbaijan elections in November, especially in the mostly ethnic Armenian region of Nagorno Karabakh.


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Bangladesh: Banning adverts · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Culture lockdowns in Bangladesh, as the government bans innocuous advertisements. Rezwan wonders why more obvious “indecent” content isn't being filtered out.


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China: Crackdown on money laundering · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

In a bid to stop money flowing into the country as bets are mounting on further rises in the yuan, China will extend a one-year crackdown on money laundering in the securities and insurance industries.


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Ecuador: 600 Registered Blogs · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Eduardo Ochoa of Li-1 notes that Ecuablogs, which he helped set up just a few months ago, already has more than 600 registered bloggers. The 600th blog, from Quito, is dedicated to the soccer club  Emelec.


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Ecuador: Ecuadorian Soup · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Newley Purnell gives his impressions of a New Yorker piece on Ecuadorian soup.


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El Salvador: Police to monitor lawyers for gangs · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Tim's El Salvador Blog says the Salvadoran police will begin monitoring lawyers who represent gang members.


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Estonia: Tree cult · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Bonjour l'Estonie describes the custom in Estonia of setting aside large individual trees as landmarks and tourist attractions.


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Ethiopia: 21st century Maoism · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Ethiopundit dissects his country's ruling ideology, “Revolutionary democracy”, exposing language and concepts which would be strangely familiar to anyone raised on Mao Zedong Thought.


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Hong Kong: Hurricane email scams · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

These days when there is a disaster, hackers and virus propagators are taking full advantage of the situation. In the case of Katrina Hurricane, bogus e-mails are making the rounds to infect PCs in the guise of offering news updates about the New Orleans disaster.


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India: Calling Arundhati? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Varnam has a stinging reminder for Arundhati Roy. Cellphones are more than just tools for the rich – they can be lifechanging for others!


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India: Tsunami hit areas  · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

A volunteer working in the Tsunami hit areas reports that things are nowhere near finished. It's time to yell at the NGOs.


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Iranian bloggers in action to save Iran’s Heritage! · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

About 8 months ago Guardian journal published ” Dam is threat to Iranian Heritage”. In this article Iranian learned that “More than 100 of Iran's potentially most important but least examined archaeological sites, including fringes of Pasargadae, the city built by King Cyrus the Great, will be flooded in the next two years according to the UN, which appealed yesterday to international scientists to try to record what they can.
The flooding of the eight-mile Tang-e-Bolaghi gorge because of the construction of a dam will destroy ancient Persia's imperial road which ran from Persepolis to Pasargadae“.
Iranian Bloggers again before any Iranian site, journal or Iranian political group have started to moblize people in Iran & World. According to LogoMahi, who gave “Pasargadae Under Water”,  as title to his writing, first we must inform everybody about what is going on then protest movements will become reality. Izadbanou, another blogger says nobody has right to deprive us from our history.Izadbanou has given a link to a petition against dam project .Already more than 4000 signed that.Another blogger,Man Iraniam(means I am Iranian) says our silence about this event equals the death of our civilisation.
Iranian government continues dam construction.

author: Fred Petrossian


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Kenya: First birthday · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Kenyan blogger Mshairi celebrates one year in the blogosphere, looking back on 12 months of life, love, poetry, Africa and gender activism.


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Kenya: Halliburton contract · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Kenya-based Mental Acrobatics highlights the awarding of a multi-million dollar reconstruction contract in hurricane-hit Louisiana and Mississippi to Halliburton, a company with strong ties to U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney.


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Kenya: Katrina poetry · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Kenya Democracy Project posts a long poem and photos depicting the ravages of Katrina, and picks up on the infamous (white) “finders” and (black) “looters” captions on AFP photos out of New Orleans.


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Kyrgyzstan: Lunching on loam · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

If you've ever wondered what “geophagy” means, it happens in Kyrgyzstan, and it's explained on Registan.


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Malaysia: Katrina Help · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Wither universalism? An AFP story recounts pledges of aid and help to Katrina Hurricane victims coming from the rich and poor of Asian countries except Malaysia. Tech blogger LiewCF is calling all bloggers to help run a Red Cross donation ad on their blogs.


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Myanmar: Coca-Cola pressured · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

The Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) union has been pressing Coca-Cola Canada to stop sourcing Coke-branded garments produced under military dictatorship in Myanmar (Burma). Coca-Cola Ltd is accommodating the union's wish.


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Pakistan and India: Cricket without Borders · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

In what appears to be a rare feat, Indian and Pakistanis were together on the same side in a Cricket match in Bonn to celebrate their Independence Days.


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Pakistan: Remembering Heroes · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Metroblogging Lahore links to photographs that showcase the 1965 war, and wonders how they held up against the Indian troops.


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Peru: Bloggers and Online Radio · Global Voices
David Sasaki

As Diana Zorrilla Ríos notes, PeruBlogs is trying out an online radio station where listeners can send their requests via Instant Messenger. They are also looking for more volunteer DJ's, but do not specify whether one must be living in Peru.


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Puerto Rico: Media on Taino People · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Roberto Borrero says an article in El Nuevo Dia “perpetuates myths and writes a slanted, ugly story about the Taino people”


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Singapore: 8 reasons for liking thenation · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Despite the love-hate politics on both sides of the Singapore Causeway, journalist-blogger Eyeris has eight reasons for liking Singapore. Via Tomorrow.sg.


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Singapore: Godcasting · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Godcasting, anyone? “Religious and spiritually themed podcasts” are making their way into iPods, allowing those in hospitals, oversleepers, and others who can’t make it to their place of worship the opportunity to catch up on their time with God.


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Singapore: Tehelka reporter · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Aniruddha Bahal, the famous investigative journalist from India's online news site Tehelka.com, gave a talk at the Singapore National University in late August. An audio recording is now available.


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Singapore: Wiki for policy · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Wannabe Lawyer is using wikispaces to build a wiki for Singapore Policy. “We know we are capable of robust political debate without descending in chaos, rioting and a destruction of our society,” the blogger says.


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South Africa: Women in IT · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Thea Burger reports on bursaries aimed at getting South African women into careers in IT.


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South Asia: What kinda woman are you? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

AsianSmiles has a post which profiles stereotypes of women from all over the world. Pay close attention to the comments section!


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Southeast Asia: Conversion to Islam · Global Voices
Jeff Ooi

Professional Australian model Michelle Leslie embraces Islam but continues to model swimwear or underwear. “When should a person be considered to be part of a religion?” Brunei-born, Australia-based blogger raised a question that aroused many feedback.


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Sudan: Love and aid · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Sleepless in Sudan has found a man! and blogs hilariously about what can go wrong with a date in Darfur…


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Trinidad and Tobago: Podcast · Global Voices
David Sasaki

After a brief absence, Caribbean Free Radio's 30th podcast covers Hurricane Katrina, remembers the Martiniquans who died on a plane crash in Venezuela, and has plenty of good music from around the Caribbean.


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Uzbekistan: Avoiding isolation · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Registan revisits the argument that it would be a mistake for the United States entirely to cut off ties with Uzbekistan over its human rights record.


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Venezuela: Comparing Natural Disaster Responses · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Like Tomas Sancio did with the 1999 La Guaria floods, Oil Wars compares the US response to Katrina with the Venezuelan response to the February, 2005 floods of Vargas, Caracas.


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Venezuela: Prison Conditions · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Daniel of Venezuela News and Views writes of the prison conditions in Venezuela.


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Warning: Yahoo! won’t protect you. · Global Voices
Julien Pain

According to Reporters Sans Frontieres (Reporters Without Borders), Information supplied by Yahoo! helped Chinese journalist Shi Tao get 10 years in prison
The text of the verdict in the case of journalist Shi Tao – sentenced in April to 10 years in prison for “divulging state secrets abroad” – shows that Yahoo! Holdings (Hong Kong) Ltd. provided China’s state security authorities with details that helped to identify and convict him. It reveals that the company provided the Chinese investigating organs with detailed information that apparently enabled them to link Shi’s personal e-mail account (on the Chinese Yahoo! service at yahoo.com.cn) and the specific message containing information treated as a “state secret” to the IP address of his computer. More details from RSF here.
Shi Tao was jailed because he e-mailed sensitive political information to be posted on dissident websites hosted outside China. His case is a cautionary tale to bloggers around the world: If you are publicizing information and views that your government doesn't want exposed – even if you believe you have the right to do so under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – companies like Yahoo! will not shield you from your government.
Click here for the full text in both Chinese and English of the Shi Tao verdict (PDF document) courtesy of the Dui Hua Foundation, a San Francisco-based non-governmental organization.


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Anguilla: No More Late Night Ferry Service · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Bob Green's Anguilla News warns that late night ferry service has stopped between Anguilla and St. Martin.


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Armenia: A short history of rock · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Omnik Krikorian offers a brief history of rock music in the former Soviet Union in general, and in Armenia in particular.


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Bahrain: Missing Condolences · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Arab states sent deep condolences and regret to the U.S. administration over the effect of Hurricane Katrina. moodz wonders why none of the Arab Leaders sent a cable of “deep condolences and regret” to Ibrahim AlJafaari (The Prime Minister of Iraq) over the dreadful incident of AlKhademia where the lives of more than 1,000 Iraqis were lost in a shocking accident, why would Spain and other countries send their condolences while the Arab/Muslim countries not say a word?!

author: Haitham Sabbah


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Bangladesh: Education as Control · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Imtiaz's weBlog on the cause and effect of Madrasa Education in Bangladesh, and how it impacts existing class barriers.


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Bangladesh: How did extremism get here? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

The 3rd World View links to and comments on David Montero's article on Extremism in Bangladesh.


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Barbados: Ironic Sugar Shortage · Global Voices
David Sasaki

this, that, & whatever writes about an apparent raw sugar shortage in Barbados’ supermarkets and notes the irony that the island “produces about 50,000 tonnes of the commodity a year.”


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China: Beijing Signs, Shanghai Slums · Global Voices
Jose Manuel Tesoro

Danwei observes that Olympic Beijing is correcting the public English on its signs, e.g. “Racist Park,” while down in Shanghai, Bingfeng Teahouse thinks his city ought to mimic Beijing another way: by building slums for migrant workers.

author: Jose Manuel Tesoro


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Cuba: Youth Club of Electronics and Computation · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Steven of Steve's Gallery visited the Joven Club de Electronica y Computacion in Matanzas, Cuba, where they are transitioning from Windows to Linux.


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Egypt: Sowtona – Our Voice · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Sowtona – Our Voice – (English and Arabic) is a new blog for and about Egyptian citizens. A team of journalists interviewed more than 1,000 ordinary Egyptians to find out about their problems. These voices were the basis for a special voter guide about today presidential election.


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Ghana: Renewable energy · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Timbuktu Chronicles blogs about the difficulty of stimulating e-commerce in Ghana in the absence of a reliable power supply.


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Hungary: Airport sell-off · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Pestiside examines Hungarian government plans for the sell-off of Budapest Airport, advising potential investors to fasten their seat-belts and prepare for turbulence.


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India: Cow, goat or girl? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

A tale of courage, forced relationships, and braving the odds. Sepia Mutiny has a post on a girl who is daring to defy her community's norms.


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India: Heights of sexual harassment · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

The heights of sexual harassment? It could be 35,000 feet as Vislumbres discovers. Air hostesses get harassed by a group of guys, no one can really do anything about it.


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Israel: Educational System · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Ze'ev Orenstein of  Israel Perspectives blog writes that the greatest threat being posed to the Jewish State of Israel today are not only “Palestinians”, demography and a nuclear Iran, but the inability of its educational system to produce proud, caring and knowledgeable Jews. Jews. A system where the average Jewish child graduates high school without understanding what it means to be a Jew, what it means to have a Jewish State, and why both are worth fighting, sacrificing and even dying for.


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Jamaica: Reprieve from Protests · Global Voices
David Sasaki

FYR looks for some humorous distraction as protests continue on outside his workplace. He also says Bruce Golding, who called for the protests, has definitely lost his vote.


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Jordan: MAD Show Advertising · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Clips and views from MAD Show Advertising of Zara Expo in Jabal Amman – Jordan, by Roba.


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Malaysia: Corporate Ladder · Global Voices
Jose Manuel Tesoro

Mack Zulkifli of Brand New Malaysian praises his PM for advocating a more innovative business culture, particularly in state-run firms, but recounts his skepticism that much will change among Malaysia's corporate ladder-climbers.


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Palestine: Land Ownership, 1945 · Global Voices
Haitham Sabbah

Umkahlil lists Israeli and Palestinian landownership in percentages by subdistrict, 1945 as United Nations map published in August 1950.


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Philippines: Gloria Survives · Global Voices
Jose Manuel Tesoro

In Manila, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's comfortable escape from impeachment charges in Congress has provoked much commentary about politicians and popular representation.


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Russia: Maybe he won’t · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Siberian Light‘s Andy, sitting in a Burger King in Glasgow Airport, wonders if Russian President Vladimir Putin will indeed step down at the end of his second term, as is required by the constitution.


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Russia: Old flame · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Neeka hangs out with a former love, beautiful but terribly damaged, and is relieved to discover she can recover the good memories but doesn't have to go back to old times.


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Singapore: Culture and Exclusion · Global Voices
Jose Manuel Tesoro

Mister Wang's interview with local gay poet Cyril Wong leads Xeno Boy to thoughts on creativity from exclusion.


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South Asia: Responding to Hurricane Katrina · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Hurricane Katrina has provoked a lot of reaction in the blogosphere. A lot of South Asian blogs are seeing this disaster in the light of the Indian Ocean Tsunami disaster in Dec 2004 and the Mumbai Flood.
Chapati Mystery has a post on reactions to disasters in the US.  Post-Katrina, Taz Ahmed has a lot to say – from television, Oprah to grassroots efforts. A post on Intentblog wonders if the Bush Administration has adopted God's policy of watching and waiting. Samudaya.org has a say on “Accountability and Katrina“. Zoostation outlines more excuses from the government and lashes out at the reaction of Rev. Bill Shanks.
Ahmed Bilal asks questions on race, looting and links to other blogs exploring the same issues. Dilip has some memories of New Orleans and questions why there is a competition to establish who suffers more. Amardeep Singh evokes poignant images of the 1927 Mississippi Flood, by quoting Robert Frost.
Flotsam has a post on BoingBoing's ill timed sarcasm. POV questions the breakdown of security in the hurricane hit area comparing it to the flood in Mumbai, and links to Maitri, an Indian blogger from New Orleans. the olive ream has a post questioning the efficacy of FEMA in the “the fema-nuchurian candidate”. indi.ca compares disaster response of the Tsunami and Katrina. Days go by.. has a post on the aftermath of the disaster and recovery. Rezwan takes a look at the online discussions on the situation and lessons it holds for us, and another post on what Bangladesh is doing for the victims.


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South Korea: Typhoon Names · Global Voices
Jose Manuel Tesoro

As typhoon Nabi glides into Busan, The Asia Pages muses on how, since 2000, typhoons have been given local Asian names so that “by having a name people could relate to, death would be avoided.”


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Spotlight Guatemala · Global Voices
David Sasaki

As the U.S. and Guatemalan mens soccer teams prepare for tonight's match in Guatemala City, it appears that the Guatemalan blogging community is beginning to reach out more to English-language readers. On a post about the promotion of Guatemala's world heritage sites, Guate360 writes, “it is not uncommon for us at Guate360 to post bilingual entries. When we do; it is done with the awareness that we have a global audience.” Chapinadas is another Guatemalan blog with posts in both English and Spanish. Today's post covers both the good and bad of the upcoming fall series of Survivor: The Maya Empire, which starts September 15th and anticipates 20 million viewers in the US:
In Guatemala there are a lot of mixed opinions about this topic. On the one hand, you have people glad that this is happening to Guatemala in the hope that our beautiful country gets to the place it deserves with regards to tourism.
On the other hand, there are a lot of people unhappy with the fact that this series is taken place in a Maya city that has not been excavated and investigated properly. There could be a lot of damage to its temples, murals, stelaes, and other things around it. There is also the fact, that in order for this series to be filmed there is a need for a lot of people to be there. Also, another factor is that a lot of trees have been cut to make the sets, and to make room for the filming.
The weblog Survivor.com, however, seems to be less concerned with the show's impact on Guatemalans compared to highlighting the “blistering heat … torrential rain and … all kinds of biting, stinging creatures.”
Rob Mercatante is back in Guatemala City, but explains, “one of the final reasons that I haven't been filling this journal full of Guatemala news is that I, like the rest of the world, have been watching in horror as the devastating events have unfolded in New Orleans.”
Oscar from DesdeGuate.com says that just 15 days after the Guatemalan wireless provider, Comcel announced EDGE based wireless service, competitor Telefonica announced their own new 1x-EVDO based service which allows roaming internet access in all major parts of Guatemala City for $50 a month plus tax.
Christian Van Der Henst notes that Project EnRed, which encourages students throughout Guatemala to start blogs and use the internet, will be in the city of Quetzaltenango this week and then Antigua next Monday. Christian was also invited by elsalvador.com to discuss strategies for their new program, Operación Red, which encourages more digital participation in El Salvador.
If your Guatemalan curiosity is somehow not satisfied, Guate360 has a great collection of last week's posts from around the blogging community.


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Sri Lanka: Peace- The Blog Way · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Bloggers’ Peace Plan. Nittewa comes up with an interesting outline of how peace can be achieved in Sri Lanka, and invites other bloggers to comment on the process, and suggest their own measures.


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Sudan: AIDS-related deaths · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Sleepless in Sudan reports on local reactions to the deaths of two African Union peacekeeping soldiers in Darfur from complications related to HIV/AIDS.


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Sudan: Execution of minors · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

The Sudanese government has executed people who were minors at the time of the crimes they were accused of, and denied a fair trial to others sentenced to death, according to a recent statement posted on Human Rights Watch.


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Turkmenistan: Baseless rumours · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Nathan at Registan rounds up his reasons for not believing rumours that the U.S. is talking to Turkmenistan about a potential location for a military base.


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Uganda: Sexual politics · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Black Star Journal examines the relationship between a severe shortage of condoms in Uganda and the abstinence policies favoured by the Bush administration.


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Vietnam: A Part of the World · Global Voices
Jose Manuel Tesoro

Noodlepie translates a few entries in the contest for Vietnamtourism's new slogan, which is on until Sept. 30.  One of them: “Vietnam – A Part of the World.”


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Zimbabwe: Free market advocate · Global Voices
Luisetta Mudie

Zimpundit points out that the Zimbabwean finance minister is a proponent of free-market economic policies, and is trying to persuade President Robert Mugabe to try freeing prices.


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Bangladesh: Development and Extremism? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Trademark sarcasm and wit at Sepia Mutiny they analyse Christian Science Monitor's article on Bangladesh's ‘success story’.