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Iran: bloggers mull election results · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

With election authorities now ordering a partial recount and a run-off between Rafsanjani and the conservative Ahmadinejad scheduled for this coming Friday, bloggers continue to chew over the results and disagree about what to do next.
From Teheran, Hossein Derakhshan (Hoder) writes of “the coming coup.” He says: “
All non-fundamentalists are rallying behind Rafsanjani. Many are talking about a possible coup by Sepah [the Islamic Revolution's Guards Corps] and Basij [army and police] after Friday‘s second round results.
In another post he writes of one possible silver lining coming out of the elections:
One good thing about an Ahmadinejad term could be that it would end the apathy among the youth born after the Iran-Iraq war.
Hoder will probably stay in Iran for a couple more days, but says he probably can't stay longer and hints at concerns for his own safety.
Mr. Behi, now in Ahwaz on business with a lost cellphone, remains terribly upset.
“Windsteed” at Iran Votes 2005 writes:
I have received reports from a number of towns that Basij (Sepah's militia) are active there trying to encourage people to vote for Ahmadi Nejad on Friday. This is done in a variety of ways including offering poeple money and clothes and provoking their “sense of dignity”. These reports come from these Iranian towns: Klardasht, Lahijan, Asataneh, Birjand, Neyshabour, Garmsar, Varamin, and Zanjan. In one case, I am told, that Basijis personally approach peoples’ houses, asking for the ‘man/elder of the household’ to come to talk to them. Then, they go on to give advise to the men that if they feel responsibility towards their family members, especially their women (Namouss) they must vote for Ahmadi Nejad, who will, they claim, protect their honour.
Iranian expats discuss:
Little Black Fish, writing from Canada, calls for a boycott on Rafsanjani in Friday's upcoming runoff, despite the fact that he'll be facing off against the conservative hard-liner, Ahmadinejad:
Although I believe Ahmadi will ruin the country but this will be short time and the crisis will shoot them out of the power forever. Rafsanjani will not initiate any true reform and will constanslty but silently bite the soul of this land.
S'CAN IRANIC disagrees:
I am not sure if the situation gets worse fixing the present system or replacing it with a democratic regime will be easier, in fact it might become more difficult. Nor do I believe that Rafsanjani would necessarily heed the call for reforming the system fundamentally. I just propose that by considering him instead of Ahmadinejad, the reformists and the pro-referendum camps might be able to sit aback, regroup, and plan a better strategy as Iranians will have to go to the polls again for the municipal councils and parliamentary elections during the next three years.
Jafar Rezaei, guest author at Free Thoughts on Iran (a “collective project of a group of Iranian students” mainly living outside Iran) has a long analysis of the results and calls for boycott of the next election round:
…old excuses will be repeated again for certain in the coming days to justify this mistake. If we still insist on remaining blind, only worse kinds of defeat will await us in the future. By rejecting a total boycott democracy in Iran lost an important battle on Friday. There would not be another such an opportune moment in the near future. This chance was missed. There is now the time to cut the losses and begin the real grass-root struggle for a referendum. The first step must be the boycott of the second round of this “elections.” It is finally time to understand the simple fact that freedom is not free.
Yaser at Free Thoughts on Iran disagrees. He thinks an Ahmadinejad victory will mean “the return of facism.”
One lesson from the June 17th election is the failure of boycott strategy. People's civil disobedience in order to get to democracy is just a dream. Boycotting the upcoming run-off is nothing just helping Ahamdinejad to run the country toward Fascism. Those who want other than Fascism have no choice but voting the other candidate, whoever he is.


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Monday Global Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

New Mongols, under the guise of a complaint about a Chinese museum of Mongolian culture, takes a close look at patriarchal Chinese attitudes towards Mongolia.
An in-store McDonald’s ad has been accused of insulting all Chinese customers, reports Danwei. Like many similar stories that have come out of China, I suspect that there’s more to this story than meets the eye.
Bingfeng looks at the return of Confucius in modern China. Historically, the Chinese have turned to the old masters in times of change and crisis with mixed results.
After receiving publicity in Western press, two Chinese websites have been shut down by the authorities recently. EastSouthWestNorth wonders if there was a causal relationship…
Found on an message board: An eye-opening collection of Korean children’s anti-Japanese art.
Photograph by Janice Lo
The final round of voting for the Lebanese parliament has concluded, with the ultimate result being a solid majority for the anti-Syrian “opposition.” About Lebanon states that it’s time for differing factions to set aside their differences and work together, an idea strongly seconded by Pulse of Freedom.
The Beirut Spring has a great graphic breaking down the membership of the new parliament.
However, the Lebanese Political Journal asks some tough questions about voting irregularities.
More fallout from the Iranian Presidential election results: Mr.Behi calls on the forces of reform not to give up: “But this wall is our last to protection. If we show up little, they will cheat again and make the most logically impaired people to become the owners of our destiny and they will cut all the trees we raised in these years with our words and ideas so that under they shadow we can have better living and a more free society despite the barren desert of dictatorship around us.”
In addition, Hoder notes that election-related text-messaging (SMS) has been banned by the authorities.
The Big Pharaoh gets into a lengthy political conversation with some bookstore employees… and discovers that they didn’t complain once about Palestine or the USA. Perhaps the Egyptian political elite cannot deflect criticism with those two hot button topics anymore.
Egyptian Person comments on Farouk Kaddoumi’s recent statement calling on resistance groups to stop targeting Palestinian civilians: “But I think that Kaddoumi … did not have the courage, or perhaps enough wit, to include in his list of wrongdoings by the Palestinian groups other kinds of attacks against civilian Israeli targets …
Saudi Jeans on the rituals of the teenaged Saudi male:“During summer, large number of young men in Riyadh go to Jeddah to have a good time, because they are not allowed to enter entertainment places, such as shopping malls, in Riyadh, unlike Jeddah, which does not have this kind of boys-phobia.” Unfortunately, as the blog reports, some of the malls in Jeddah have been changing their policy on unaccompanied young men…
Mahmood’s Den has a simple explanation for why some Bahraini protesters were beaten badly by police:  “That’s because they protested in front of the Royal Court.”
In less political news, the recent Jordan blogger meetup “was one big success,” writes AquaCool. She says that “I enjoyed every moment, I didn’t feel like a stranger, I felt I’ve already met the bloggers before and having an interesting, and a fruitful conversation with all of them couldn’t be easier!”
Latin America
MTYBlogs.com has a great English-language roundup of blogs from Monterrey, including this great guide to podcasting in Spanish.
Exhausted from the excitement of the Bolivian presidential resignation and change of power, Barrio Flores settles for doing a roundup of the past week in Bolivian blogs.
Blog From Bolivia thoroughly disassembles an Economist article about Bolivia’s economic troubles.
Bolivian legislatures are attempting to collect compensation in the event that the Congress is dissolved; MABB is understandably outraged:  Never mind the 126 million dollars it would cost, how about the fact that they have been completely unable to deal with the crisis currently affecting the county.
South Asia
Kiruba Shankar, in the context of a podcasting meet-up,  needs to know what the best way to connect some remote visitors…
Rashmi Bansal  at Youth Curry uses the question—“So, when are you having another baby?”—as a starting point for an essay on the nature of the modern Indian family.
In sports news, a jubilant 3rd World View
is collecting news reports about Bangladesh’s massive upset cricket victory over Australia.
Photograph by Pyo
South-East Asia
Jeff Ooi writes about some positive press coverage that Malaysian blogs have been getting, and reminds his readers that there’s a Malaysian blogger meetup this week in Kuala Lumpur…
Jakartass is relieved to know that Indonesia’s antiquated foreign marriage laws will be reformed soon: “Er Indoors and I should be able to complete the marriage procedures started 15 years ago.”
Macam-Macam notes some interesting disparities in Indonesian drug penalties and concludes that, as in many things Indonesian, the rules for the haves and the rules for the have-nots aren't always the same.
Europe
It’s graduation season these days; colleges and high school seniors get dressed in robes and funny hats and face their future. San Francisco-based Irish expatriate Dervala takes the occasion to reminisce about the Irish college entrance exam: “In Ireland, we didn’t get to prove our “scholastic aptitude” with a multiple-choice test of our parents’ ability to pay for Kaplan prep. Instead we faced the Leaving Certificate, a national examination that would, we sincerely believed, determine everything in our future except the color of the curtains.
In Hungary, Pesticide explains why turnout at a meeting celebrating 60 years of Russian-Hungarian brotherhood might have been a little low; it also details the link between nice weather and rising eviction rates in Budapest.
Africa
Ethiopundit write a long post about the government that rules Ethiopia: “Ethiopians are in the tragic position of being ruled by an undemocratic government that actively hinders their economic and social development and indeed values their suffering for the aid money it attracts.” The post also has a detailed roundup of blog posts about Ethiopia.
Apparently recovering from a back injury, the author of Black Looks uses her time to do a quick pan-African blog roundup.
Central Asia
The Carpetblogger discovers that mourning in Azerbaijan involves much more ritual than in the West.
From Registan.net, a report about a 20,000-strong opposition protest in Azerbaijan. Taking their cue from another former Soviet republic, the protestors have picked orange as the color to symbolize their fight.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Paul Frankenstein


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Question to Iranian bloggers: What are the Persian blogs saying? · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

Global Voices invites a Persian-speaking blogger to help inform the world about what the Persian blogs are saying about Iran's election. Unfortunately we do not have a person on our team who reads Farsi.
If you would like to help, please post an English-language roundup on your blog – with summaries and maybe translations of key quotes, and links back to the original posts so that people with the language ability can see the original. Then please let us know in the comments section of this post that you have done so, and we'll link to it ASAP.
Also, if you don't have a blog but definitely have the language ability to help, please email us at: globalvoices DOT online AT gmail DOT org
Thanks!!

author: Rebecca MacKinnon


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How Iran filters the Internet · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

Microsoft is not the only U.S. company whose technology is assisting in blocking free speech, and China isn't the only country where it happens.
The OpenNet Initiative and Berkman Center have just released a new report: Internet Filtering in Iran (PDF).   The press release is here (also PDF..sorry).
Here is the executive summary:
Iran has adopted one of the world’s most substantial Internet censorship regimes. Iran, along with China, is among a small group of states with the most sophisticated state-mandated filtering systems in the world. Iran has adopted this extensive filtering regime at a time of extraordinary growth in Internet usage among its citizens and a burst of growth in writing online in the Farsi language. As this report demonstrates, Iran’s sophisticated Internet censorship regime is part of a trend that the OpenNet Initiative’s research has uncovered toward states focusing on blocking expression in local languages, such as Farsi, and with a particular view toward clamping down on what can be published through inexpensive
and popular applications, such as weblogs.
Iran is also one of a growing number of countries, particularly in the Middle East region, that rely upon commercial software developed by for-profit United States companies to carry out the core of its filtering regime. Iran has recently acknowledged, as our testing confirms, that it uses the commercial filtering package SmartFilter – made by the US-based company, Secure Computing – as the primary technical engine of its filtering system. This commercial software product is configured as part of the Iranian filtering system to block both internationally-hosted sites in English and sites in local languages.
SmartFilter, as with all commercial filtering software packages, is prone to over-blocking, errors, and a near-total lack of transparency. In effect, Iran outsources many of the decisions for what its citizens can access on the Internet to a United States company, which in turn profits from its complicity in such a regime.
Click below to continue reading…
Our testing showed that online content in the Farsi language is more likely to be blocked than is comparable content in the English language. We found 499 sites blocked out of 1477 tested (34%) in our November round of tests, and 623 sites of 2025 tested (31%) filtered in our December round. The Iranian state has effectively blocked access of its citizens to many pornographic online sites, most anonymizer tools (which allow users to surf the Internet without detection), a large number of sites with gay and lesbian content, some politically sensitive sites, women’s rights sites, and certain targeted Web logs (“blogs”), among other types of sites.
Iran’s filtering regime is backed up by an extensive series of laws that control the publication of
sensitive information. The press is restrained through a broad set of media-related laws, especially the Press Law of 1986, which includes licensing and substantive regulations. Individuals who subscribe to Internet service providers (ISPs) must promise in writing not to access “non-Islamic” sites. The law requires ISPs to install filtering mechanisms that cover access to both Web sites and e-mail. Punishment for violations of content-related laws can be harsh.
Iran’s filtering regime has certain hallmarks of similar programs across the Middle East region,
such as an emphasis on blocking a large number of pornographic Web sites. Some other aspects of Iran’s blocking – such as that which targets the growing number of Farsi language blogs – sets it apart from other states in the Middle East. Our testing at multiple time periods, including the data in this report and  data previously released in ONI work, show a net increase in the amount of blocking underway in Iran, including additional blocking in some content areas and reductions in blocking in others.


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Lebanon Skypecast #1: Blogger Gustave Cordahi · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

In the wake of an election victory for Lebanon's anti-Syrian alliance and the asassination of another anti-Syrian politician, I spoke to two Beirut-based bloggers who author the popular blog, Lebanese Political Journal.
My first interview was with blogger and journalist Gustave Cordahi, who blogs under the name “Cedar Guardian.” (Technical note: I called him from my computer using Skypeout to his cell phone, recorded the conversation live with Hotrecorder, then transfered to Audacity to trim and fix the sound levels before uploading onto our server.)
Cordahi talks about his reasons for blogging, the simplicity of the international media's coverage of Lebanon, and the murkiness of Lebanese politics.  My main take-away: Nothing is ever as it seems, everybody has an agenda, and don't take any information you're getting from Lebanon – from a blog, MSM, a politician, or whoever – at face value until you sort out what the source's agendas and biases are.
Download Cordahi's interview here (14 MB, 29min)
Coming next: Another insightful and fascinating interview with Cordahi's co-blogger, “Lebanon Profile.”  Listen to them both. They have different perspectives and different points to make.
(My Odeo Channel)
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | RSS


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Lebanon Skypecast #2: Blogger “Lebanon.Profile” · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

After hanging up the Skypeout call with Gustave of the Lebanese Political Journal, I called the Beirut cellphone of his co-blogger who goes by the blog-name “Lebanon.Profile.”  LP prefers not to have his name revealed. As he explains in our conversation, if he identifies himself he won't be able to speak as freely without causing problems for his relatives.
We had a great conversation about why and how Lebanese blogs are saying things neither the local media nor the international media are saying.  One of LP's more famous moments was when he accused the Washington Post of inaccurate and biased reporting.   Hear all about it and lots more:
Download LP's interview here.  (16MB, 35mins)
My Odeo Channel
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | RSS


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Tuesday Global Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

Mahmood of Mahmood's Den announces that he's not only going to take Reporters Without Borders’ guidelines for a free internet and translate them into Arabic, he's going to fax them to his members of Parliament. Why not email? Well,  sending email to Bahraini MPs doesn't seem to work so well.
Another Irani Online ponders the Iranian election results and asks, “how well do we really know ourselves anyway?”
Hoder says that “conservative” isn't the right word to use for Iranian presidential candidate Ahmadinejad; he thinks that “fundamentalist” is much more accurate.
Pedram Moallemian, who writes The Eyeranian, explains why he didn't vote in last week's election.
The Iran News Blog wonders if Rafsanjani and Ayatollah Khamenei were colluding to get a ultra-right-wing candidate in the run-off, to assure Rafsanjani's election as president.
Baghdad Burning has a long, detailed post about daily life in Baghdad.
Sabbah Blog has a story about child camel jockeys being returned to their families.
Saudi Jeans has started to take steps to build a Saudi blogging community.
The blog Al-Hiwar, written by an American in the Middle East studying politics in Lebanon and Yemen, studies how different news organizations characterize the recently-assassinated George Hawi.
Has China started blocking Typepad blogs again? Asiapundit has noticed significant disruption in getting to the hosted blog services, though Fons of China Herald notes that not all Typepad sites have been affected.
Is all censorship bad? EastSouthNorthWest says that maybe there should be some limits to freedom of speech.
Photograph by Anthony Hartman
Barrio Flores reminds us that while there may be many reasons to disagree with Evo Morales, his opponents shouldn't stoop to racism.
Central Budapest notes two anniversaries of note: first, the Budapest stock exchange celebrates 15 years of trading after being re-opened in 1990. On a more somber note, a monument to commemorate the 1956 uprising is being planned to open on the 50th anniversary of the event. Fittingly, the monument will be placed where a statute of Stalin once stood.
Loic Le Meur points to a long article about citizen journalism and blogging in the French newspaper Liberation. The paper has a great graphic on its front page; Loic has reproduced it in his post.
Gaurav Sabnis of Vantage Point celebrates the news that some Indian states are starting to move away from a government-backed monopoly system in selling produce.
Photograph by David Sasaki
This is Zimbabwe posts some startling aerial images demonstrating the impact of the so-called “Operation Clean-Up”.
The Zimbabwean Pundit discovers that the government is apparently printing money to combat inflation. Unfortunately, as students of the Weimar Republic and Chinese Civil War can tell you, printing money only leads to hyperinflation.
We'd like to apologize to the author of Black Looks; an editing error in producing yesterday's blog roundup inadvertently changed her gender.  Our apologies for the mistake.
The irrepressible Mr.Brown on the topic of blogger manifestos.
Tomorrow covers the minor disaster that strikes when a newspaper mixes up two different young Singaporean bloggers.


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Wednesday World Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

Central Asia & the Caucuses:
The Farsi blog Shared Pains (winner of the 2005 RSF Freedom Blog award) has a post in English on freedom of expression in Afghanistan (hat-tip to Afghan Lord).
Registan points to an interview with the leader of Uzbekistan's opposition coalition.  On the 40th day of mourning after the Andijan crackdown, Nathan has some harsh words for Russia's blind eye.
Blogrel discusses America's influence on democratization in the Caucasus.
Southeast Asia:
Webbed Feet has a big list of people blogging about Cambodia.
As Vietnam's prime minister tours the U.S., the new Vietnamjournalism blog, run by a Vietnamese journalist, reports that the Vietnamese president wants journalists to help “encourage the nation's citizens to flay enemy fabrication.”
Brandmalaysia's Mack Zulkifli talks about media reaction to the Singaporean blogger who bared most of herself on her blog… and about the larger issue of blogging as a lifestyle.
Economist/columnist Paul Krugman visited Bangkok, and Sarasonteh has the fallout.
East Asia:
In China, Typepad blogs are now confirmed to be blocked. Asiapundit has started a campaign to shame companies whose technology enables the Chinese government to do this.  (There's a big argument going on about this in the comments section of my blog.)
Meanwhile, the Chinese adopt-a-blog project is getting lots of buzz in the English language blogosphere.
Chinadigitaltimes points to an article in Singapore's Straits Times: CHINA: Hackers hit website of firm trying to control Internet use.  I guess we know where at least some of China's hackers stand on the censorship issue…
ESWN describes how information is kept out of newspapers in China.
South Asia:
Reporters Without Borders is hosting a new blog from Nepal, Nepal Info (in Nepalese).
In Bangladesh, Futurebanglanetwork is cynical about the World Bank's motivations when it comes to lobbying against a SIM card tax.
Chiens Sans Frontieres brings us a link to Gujarati rap.
In India, the Mumbai bloggers are planning another blog meetup on Sunday.  If you're in town be sure to join them.
Africa:
Ma-Schamba in Mozambique is looking forward to an upcoming exhibit of Mozambican contemporary art [Portugese]. (Poster for the exhibit at left.)
Sokwanele is concerned that Zimbabwe is turning into a Chinese colony.
Vilho's World has some thoughts about the issue of transparency in Namibia.
Middle East:
At the Lebanese Political Journal, “Cedar-Guardian” has some views on Lebanon's post-election political future, and “Lebanon.Profile” is resigned to political asassinations. (Click on their names to hear podcast interviews with these two bloggers in Beiruit.)
Brooding Persian explains why he chooses not to vote in Iran’ s election run-off on Friday.
Under Underground will vote but is bitter about it.
In Egypt, Manal and Alaa describe how they organized a protest and how blogs played a part.
Spark Armada‘s Nir Ofir wants to start an August 31st World Blog Day tradition. Why that date? Because he thinks the date 3108 kind of looks like the word “blog” if you write it a certain way…  His idea: “in this is day every blogger will post a recommendation of 5 new blogs (in the same time). In this day all Blog web surfers will find themselves leaping and discovering new, unknown blogs.” (He has even created the graphic at right.)
Europe:
Bonjour L'Estonie describes Estonia's native religion.
Finland for Thought has a short quiz about his nation's leader…
Pestiside has some dirt on Hungary's highway wars.
Latin America:
Coming soon. Check this post later for today's Latam links courtesy El Oso.


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Blogosphere Reacts to Zapatista Communique · Global Voices
David Sasaki

The Zapatista Army of National Liberation, otherwise known as the EZLN or more commonly, the Zapatistas have recently released three somewhat enigmatic communiques (1, 2, 3) declaring a “General Red Alert” and heightened militarization of the movement. In addition, as the first communique [english] warns, “national and international civil societies who are working in peace camps and in community projects are being urged to leave rebel territory. Or, if they decide freely of their own volition, they remain on their own and at their own risk …”
Bloggers in Mexico and throughout the world have been quick to offer their analysis. Alejandro Juárez (who is asking for non-English and Spanish speakers to translate his friend Carlos’ post into other languages) points to his friend Carlos’ post which warns that Mexico is in the middle of a crisis and that if Indigenous rights are not recognized shortly, a revolution is on the horizon. His post also summarizes in English the Zapatista movement over the past 11 years and links to many recent articles in Spanish.
Meanwhile, Ivan Eduardo of Tampico, Mexico writes on his blog, Actualidad that the Mexican political group  is currently investigating whether or not the Red Alert and expulsion of civic groups was actually inspired to ease the cultivation of drugs in the rebel held territories in order to gather funds.
Espacio del rudoska relates that the Mexican national army has been put on alert and that Bancomer has frozen the accounts of the organization while investigating into laundered money. The Brazilian blog XOJOBIL – NOTÍCIAS has posted an email from the University of Texas Chiapas 95 mailing list which announced the Center for Human Rights in Chiapas’ intentions to avoid any escalation of violence in the Zapatista stronghold of southern Mexico. Part of the latest bulletin from the respected human rights organization reads:
Llamamos a la sociedad civil a organizar iniciativas que apoyen la distensión e impidan el avance de una escalada de violencia
We call to the civil society to organize initiatives that support the distention and impede the advance of any escalation of violence
As an aside, the blog Europa Focus, written by a Mexican journalist living in Belgium recently clarified that without a passport, Subcommandante Marcos (pictured here), would never be allowed to enter the EU. There had been some talk previously of a friendly soccer match between the ski mask clad Zapatistas and Italian powerhouse Inter Milan.
Up to the minute information on this newest development in the Zapatista movement can be found in both Spanish and English on the Chiapas Independent Media Center website. If you know of any blogs written from Chiapas with first hand accounts, please leave a link in the comments section.

author: David Sasaki


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Thursday World Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

Africa:
As Zimbabwe's government crackdown called “Operation Restore Order” evokes an international outcry, Sokwanele describes what it's like to “have stared into the face of evil.”  The Zimbabwean Pundit calls for a boycott of South African goods to protest the fact that South African President Thabo Mbeki could be doing much more to bring Zimbabwe's President Mugabe under control.
Congo Girl describes what its like living and working as the country hunkers down for an impending general strike, plus fears of possible looting and pillaging on June 30th, the 45th anniversary of DR Congo's independence from Belgium.
Middle East:
The Arabist Network has a first hand account of a demonstration in Northern Cairo. (Picture from Arabist Network, with more here.)
From Cairo With Love asks “What's Wrong with Egyptians?”
The Big Pharaoh has some views about the exchange of ambassadors between Egypt and Iraq.
Silly Bahraini Girl has some sarcastic remarks on “Democracy in Wonderland.”
Hossein Derakhsan (Hoder) has returned to London from Iran.
Omid at the Iranian Prospect believes Friday's runoff election will be a battle between Iran's middle class and lower classes.
Babak Seradjeh at Free Thoughts on Iran believes the road to democracy does not lead through this week's elections.
Iran Scan has some new opinion poll numbers predicting a win for Rafsanjani.
Iraq the Model has been mentioned in the AO/Technorati Open Media 100. Congratulations!
Central Asia and Caucasus:
Afghan Warrior reports on the killing of an election worker.
Registan.net points to this interesting post about the tightening of  government control over the .kz domain name in Kazakhstan.
Also at Registan.net, Nathan points to debates around the blogs about the geopolitical struggle over Uzbekistan.
Blogrel continues a lively discussion of democracy in Armenia.
In Azerbaijan, Carpetblogger found something strange in a copper workshop.
The section above was compiled by Rebecca MacKinnon.
Latin America:
Venezuelan blog directory, VeneBlogs points to [es] an article in El Universal [es] which profiles three Venezuelan blogs dedicated to the art of … food. The first is that of gourmet chef Sumito Estevez [es], who just recently opened his own restaurant. Caracas based journalist María Luisa Ríos writes about local restaurants, events, and desserts in her blog Mil Sabores [es] (One Thousand Flavors) and finally blog de Takeshi [es], from the Andean region of Mérida is written in Spanish by a Japanese chef and focuses on gastronomy from the Venezuelan Andes.
Rosario is ecstatic [en] that “Uruguay has now joined the ranks of civilized countries”.. who read Harry Potter…
Eduardo Arcos of Mexico City encourages readers to participate in the First Conference of Weblogs.Communication [es] on July 15 at the Coyoacan Cultural Forum in Mexico City. In addition to registering for the free event, conference administrators are soliciting short presentations and white papers. Here's the conference description [es]. Widely regarded Spanish blogger and professor, Dr. José Luis Orihuela Colliva [es] will be speaking at the conference.
The section above was compiled by David Sasaki (el Oso).
The Lost Nomad alerts us to the fact that PBS has posted on-line (streaming only, unfortunately) a number of Frontline documentaries on North Korea’s nuclear program. Thanks to Asiapundit for the heads-up.
ESWN explains the lengths that officals take to keep information out of the newspapers in China.
The China Digital Times points to an OJR roundtable about the hurdles that Chinese bloggers face.
Japanpundit points to a matched set of point-counterpoint Op-Eds in the pages of the Japan Times arguing the merits of whaling; this is an interesting dicussion in light of the IWC’s recent decision to defeat Japan’s proposal to resume commercial whaling.
Photograph by RM Tunick
The Brussels Convention outlines transnational civil jurisdiction issues in the European Union; this makes doing business in the EU a much more predictable affair. The Aseanist argues that for ASEAN to really fulfill its potential, it needs its own version of the Brussels Convention.
The Insane Ox Relaoded, an anonymous academic blog in Malaysia, wonders what it will take to wake up his collegues.
Jeff Ooi has a question about a disgruntled reader and what he should do.
Clair from Blah! on the task of changing the image of the Filipina online. This is a movement that exists partly due to the unfortunate fact that the majority of first-page Google results for ‘filipina’ are mail-order bride sites.
Mr.Brown on whether or not nerds make better lovers.
Noodlepie is attempting to review all the softdrinks on sale in Saigon. Hopefully his teeth won’t all fall out before he finishes…
Vichaar.org points us to an anonymous blog written by a US diplomat in India.
United We Blog wonders, tongue only slightly in cheek, about whatever happened to the Nepalese Royal Commission for Corruption Control?


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Friday Global Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

United We Blog! puts out the call for more Nepalase bloggers. In furtherance of this goal, Uzz of UWB has translated WordPress into Nepali, and that tool will be availble to the public within two months…
Sakdipat, at Thai-Blogs, blogs about her first day of school… as a teacher. One of her projects is teaching her students—who are currently learning in an all-Thai environment—to blog in English.
Mr.Brown critiques Singapore’s appearance in an American comic book. At least they got the Singlish right, no?
Photograph by Hartanto
Hoder explains the very practical impact of what’s at stake in the Iranian election. In addition, the Los Angeles Times has an interesting feature story about Hoder and his return to Iran in Thursday’s edition.
A Free Writer details the latest tactic that terrorists are using to raise money in Iraq.
Having traded Tehran for the countryside, Mr.Behi looks at the difference between Iran’s two presidential candidates.
Another Irani Online has voted and now he’s watching TV, waiting for the results.
Brooding Persian further explains his decision to not vote in the election.
Yishay Mor recently observed that Secure Computing’s filtering software is used by Tunisia to control their internet. David Burt, Secure Computing’s PR manager, posted a comment on his blog stating that Secure Computing does not license their software to Iran. Yishay wrote back, pointing out the discrepancy; Mr. Burt’s response is, to say the least, eyebrow-raising.
Ammar Abdulhamid, who writes Amarji – A Heretic’s Blog, is very skeptical of the Syrian Government’s attempts to reform itself.
Isam Bayazidi on the culture of software piracy in Jordan.
The pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat has been running a series of articles on Arab blogs; The Big Pharaoh points to two in the series that mention him.
A detailed cultural critique comes from From Cairo, With Love, as he tries to figure out why Egypt seems to be perpetually stuck in neutral.
Bankelele points out that Harvard Business School is holding an open house in Nairobi next month.
Amnesty International launched an appeal for action in Zimbabwe yesterday, reports This is Zimbabwe. The blog also condemns the African Union’s refusal to act, stating that the AU’s “comment[s] denies the truth that, even by Zimbabwe’s own legal system, the actions have been illegal.”
Japanpundit looks back on the remarkably successful administration of Prime Minister Koizumi, and starts to explain how and why the Japanese political system is not what it seems to be to western observers.
Following up on the recent report of a black watermelon, Tokyo Times reports that square watermelons have started to go on sale in Japan.
SimonWorld notes that whaleburgers are now on sale in Japan. No first-hand reports on how they taste yet.
Pesticide notes that the world’s largest mass kiss-in will be attempted on Saturday night on the Elizabeth Bridge in downtown Budapest. I’m sure that if anyone wants to join in, they’d be more than welcome.
Heiko Hebig points to an interesting-looking German-language article about blogs and bloggers.
Is the French newspaper doomed? Loic Le Meur points to the report of a government think-tank that seems to think that it is…
Budget airlines are sprouting in Europe like mushrooms after a rain; A Fistful of Euros has the latest on their expansion into Eastern Europe.
When the cop’s in the bathroom, the crook will play? The Daily Czech reports an embarrassing incident when a billionaire fraud suspect managed to escape police custody when the police officer guarding him went to use the loo.
Pretend You’re Dread, a new blog about Kyrgyzstan, on differing cultural norms: “It seems that the guest of honour is very much optional when it comes to parties in this neck of the woods.”
Oneworld reports that Georgia is putting together a proposal to host 2014 Winter Olympics.
With elections in Kyrgyzstan only a month away, election-related ‘incidents’ are on the rise, reports Alan Cordova.
There’s a really interesting guest post at The Road to Surfdom about Chinese defector Chen Yonglin. The anonymous author is apparently a former employee of the Chinese Foreign Ministry.
The Committee to Protect Bloggers [en] and Ecuablogs [es] both cover the cease and desist letter [es] which Ecuadorian blogger Eduardo Ochoa (AKA “blue”) recently recieved [es] from the telecom company Movistar. While Ochoa has so far complied with the demand, Mexican blogger Eduardo Arcos opines [es] that what Ochoa did was legal under article 83 of Ecuador's Intellectual Property Law [es]. Ochoa now satirically proposes [es] doing away with the letter “M”, which seems to be the intellectual property of a single company.
The Chilean blog, El mundo sigue ahí gleefully announces [es] that pro-business Chilean presidential candidate Sebastián Piñera has opened up commenting on his blog [es]. According to Angus Reid consultants, Piñera is the conservative favorite and currently is running second place after Socialist Party candidate Mora from Babalu [en] points us to Venezuelan blogger, Tomas Sancio [en] who in turn links to an audio file [es] of a Cuban-American man asking the Cuban Phone Company for a cell phone (which can only be obtained in Cuba with a government permit.
The Latin America roundup above was compiled by David Sasaki (el Oso).


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What’s going on in the Kenyan Blogosphere · Global Voices
Ory Okolloh

Image via Haidhuru
- The Kenyan budget was recently announced  and the Kenyan blogosphere was on hand to provide commentary.     Ms. K  notes that though she's no budget expert, since “there was a whole House-full of Jack/Jill Arses who sat through the whole thing. I figure that by any estimation, I'm as qualified to ramble on about the budget as any of them!”   Ah…the beauty of blogs…giving people the ability to provide the (much-needed) alternative perspective.       Bankelele highlights the major changes.
- The Kenyan government says that it plans ban smoking in all public places including, according to one report, “bars, churches, and sport stadia.”     Church?   “Who smokes in church?”  wonders Mama Junkyard.
- Bankelele points us to Kenya's first electoral constituency website.
- Thinker deconstructs the soap opera.
-  Nicholas Gichu lets us know what he's been up to.       The entry starts off with a day that was “nipple freezing freaking cold-goodbye peripheral sensation hello numbness-despite dressing like some russian during winter bila (without) the vodosky!”
- Karoki says it is time for a new broom in Kenya.   Ng'ethu Star concurs.  Echoing the sense of frustration with the state of affairs in Kenya, Udi,  pens his version of Tupac's Letter to the President (explicit language).
- Wassapangaz offers up confessions of a blogger.    Ditto Lidia.
- Martin Kimani on Putin and “African cannibalism”.
- Haidhuru on mother tongue interference.    P.S. check out the rest of the blog for some wonderful pictures of daily life in Kenya.

author: Ory Okolloh


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Iranian Election Reaction · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

Here's a quick roundup of Iranian blog reaction to the fundamentalist victory in Friday's Iranian Presidential election:
Hoder notes that Rafsanjani “was beaten by the outcome of his policies.” In the same post, he outlines some strategies that the reformist movement would do well to adopt if they want to spread their message.
Mr.Behi has his take on what the election means: “See who is coming, a hard line conservative, who makes it humiliating to be Iranian. … Ahmadi Nejad is surfing on the sear of poverty and in absence of many of reform supporters.”
Under Underground takes a fatalistic view of the election results, saying that for better or worse, Ahmadinejad is now the President of Iran; he just hopes that the new president doesn’t screw it up…
Iranian Diaries explains how the mullahs played the election game like a fiddle: “Now I am almost sure that all the presidential election game in Iran was really a game to show it to the world.”
Thanks for the boycott: Another Irani Online thanks those in the overseas Iranian community for not voting and wonders when next they’ll be back home to reap the result of their efforts…
The Brooding Persian notes that “Our Iranian Blogistan is utterly depressed/depressing. Most posts oscillate between angry insults hurled at those of us who boycotted or the 17 some odd millions who’ve voted for the new President and/or feeling sorry for having voted for that murderer-millionaire Rafsanjani.” He also points out that “one of our more prominent writers characterizes this seminal event so memorably as the victory of ignorance over injustice!”
And finally, Iranian Truth finds the lighter side: “I guarantee Bush will never mention Ahmadinejad by his name simply because he won’t be able to.”
There'll be more coverage of further reaction in Monday's Global Blog Roundup.


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Global Voices, Global Dinners · Global Voices
Ethan Zuckerman

While it's been great fun to virtually meet people around the world through their blogs, it's always more fun to meet people in person.
Especially when food is involved.
So we're starting a series of “Global Voices Blogger Dinners”, to be held whenever those of us working on Global Voices are lucky enough to travelling around the world.
Our selfish goal with the dinners is to learn a little bit more about the local blogging scene, associate faces with blogs, make some friends and, possibly, do some interviews and podcasts. What's in it for you? Well, we buy dinner…
I'll be hosting the first three dinners in Johannesburg, Cape Town and Amman in late July. The Jo'burg dinner is tentatively July 20th; the Cape Town dinner is tentatively July 21st – in both those cases, I could really use help picking a venue and identifying great bridgebloggers to invite.
The Amman dinner is on July 28th at 7:30pm at Wild Jordan in Jabal Amman – my friend Isam Bayazidi (the man behind Jordan Planet) is helping me organize the gathering, and we'll be enjoying great food and quite possibly the best view in the Middle East.
In all three cases, if you're interested in attending or helping me organize, please drop me a line at ethan AT ethanzuckerman DOT com. Keep your eyes open for pictures, stories and interviews from the dinners in the next few weeks.

author: Ethan Zuckerman


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Monday Global Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

A Free Iraqi does an interesting Q&A with his readers.
Crossroads Arabia points to a news story that says that 2,500 scholarships are available for Saudis who want to study at American universities. While 2,500 students is a fairly large number, the American university system is so large that those students could easily get lost in the system: for example, Arizona State University has more than 8,000 students in its freshman class alone.
Sara Jabbari Farouji, an Iranian student studying in Europe, guest posts at Free Thoughts Iran on the election results and makes some interesting semiotic suggestions about how the opposition can reposition itself for future elections.
The author of Iran Hopes 2005 bitterly condemns the election as a fraud and states that “Ahmadinejad may carry the title of the ‘president’, but he is the most powerless man in Iran.”
IranScan points out the parallels between a famous speech that Ayatollah Khomeini gave shortly after the Shah had fled Iran in 1977 and the promises of new president Mahmood Ahmadinejad. It has a brief roundup (unfortunately, linkless) of Iranian blogosphere reaction to the election.
The Syrian News Wire has an excellent summary of the recently-completed Lebanese elections. About Lebanon speculates about how the election results will play out in the Parliament. One possibility is that pro-Syrian politician Nabih Berri will be re-elected Speaker of Parliament, a option that has drawn heated opposition from across the Lebanese blogosphere.
Sabbah’s Blog has a long post about the Hijab, the Muslim headscarf.
Both Mouse Hunter and Subzero Blue have write-ups of the Third Tunisian Blogger Meetup. Sounds like a good time was had by all…
Despite protests from Israeli settlers who attempted to prevent the demolition, the Israeli Army started to tear down a number of abandoned beachfront houses in the Gaza Strip over the weekend. Rafah Pundits Radio notes a striking parallel to IDF demolition of Palestinian houses in the same area a few years ago.
Where are you really from? AquaCool expresses her bitter disappointment when she meets a Jordanian who disavows his origins after having acquired a different passport.
Celebrity gossip meets international blogging: it turns out that the fortune that Paris Hilton’s fiance, Paris Latsis, is heir to, may be tainted. Israellycool points to a magazine report that claims that the Latsis fortune was not amassed in shipping, but rather by running oil and guns.
Japanpundit continues his profile of Japanese prime minister Junichiro Koizumi. Must reading if you’re at all interested in how Japan works.
Bingfeng Teahouse is slightly amused by news that a new poll indicates that China has a better image than the US.
ESWN has a guide to the three stages of breaking disaster news in China. Unsurprisingly, step three is “ban further coverage.”
The website of a police-run security company in Beijing has been defaced by hackers, reports Chinese Internet.
New Mongols finds a story that suggests that women are starting to dominate higher education in Mongolia.
Shanghaiist has full coverage of “One World, One Dream”, the inspiring new slogan for the Beijing 2008 Olympics.
Photograph by Paul Frankenstein
Central Budapest reports that the latest statistics indicate that the Hungarian population is slowly shrinking. However, the Hungarian press is, “in a spirit of exceptional cheerfulness”, reporting this as good news.
A national ID card bill will be set for a second reading in the House of Commons, reports Lots of Big Ideas; they’re less worried about the ID card itself than the idea of a database nation.
The Barcepundit on the Spanish Government’s proposal to remove the word “war” from the Spanish constitution.
Beauty Pageant Vote-Fixing Scandal! Blog de Connard breaks the news that the Miss Russian Army 2005 pageant (won by a Navy Liutenant, reports Siberian Light) may have been fixed, with the judges fixing the outcome before the contest proper. MPC sadly wonders, “can we not even keep the Miss Russian Army contest free from graf?”
Six months ago, the Boxing Day Tsunami devastated the Indian Ocean rim. Macam-Macam has a comprehensive recap and update on the situation. In addition, WorldChanging has its own update.
United We Blog: can protesting journalists alone make a difference in Nepal?
India Uncut has a brief report on Sunday’s Mumbai Blogger Meetup.
Kiruba Shankar points us to an Financial Express article about blogging in India.
Pakistani blogger KO posts a letter to the Indian people: “In Pakistan, we have a slightly different democratic system from India, where you have the worlds biggest elections. … We have greatly streamlined the process. You see, Musharraf tells us he embodies the people’s desires, and so when he votes its the same as the whole country voting, so our process is much faster and terribly efficient.”
This is Zimbabwe relays the news that private citizens are now being ordered to dress ‘appropriately’ by government forces.
Having turned on their erstwhile allies the war veterans, Zimbabwe’s ruling regime now has to find a way to placate them, says Zimpundit.
Inside Somaliland looks inside “the best camel meat restaurant in the country.”
In the Philippines, President Gloria Arroyo has come out and admitted that it’s her voice on the controversial ‘election-rigging’ tapes. Crainal Cavity is less than impressed by her statement, predicting that Arroyo won’t last out the year; Nina at Metroblogging Manila doesn’t even give the President that long. However, The Sassy Lawyer thinks that an immediate change of office is unlikely, at least from a legal standpoint.
Sarasonteh wonders why the English-language press in Bangkok has such tremendous difficulty identifying a “former” casino-owner turned Senator in stories about illegal casinos getting shut down.
Singabloodypore notes the irony in having a Malaysian film festival show a film that’s been banned in Singapore.
Thai-Blogs has an immensely practical post about the different kinds of taxis available in Bangkok. It does not, however, cover tuk-tuks.
ThaRum’s Web complains that copying foreign pop songs is destroying the Cambodian music industry.
Jeff Ooi has a post that excerpts from a a lengthy interview given by Tengku Mahaleel, the beleagued head of Proton, Malaysia’s national car company.
The Committee to Protect Bloggers announces the formation of a Singapore-specific branch of the Committee.
Jeff Barry, an American expat now living in Buenos Aires announces that Google Maps has found it's way to Buenos Aires [en]. He also notes that Buenos Aires is becoming a destination of outsourced call centers [en] from the US.
Gastonl [en], an Argentinian living in Toronto has written a controversial post [es] trying to peg Argentine idendity on the group blog Argenautas, written by “Argentinians spread around the world.” In response, Jorge Gobbi questions [es] if Argentinians living abroad have even the right to characterize Argentine identity.
Marcela Olivera guest blogs on Blog from Bolivia [en] to bring us up to date on the political conflict as well as beautifully describe the importance of the summer solstice to indigenous Bolivians. Major state and federal elections seem to be around the corner.
MABB translates [en] a political cartoon  [es] which seems to effectively sum up the current political situation in Bolivia.
Roberto Arancibia of El Mundo Sigue Ahí [es] has notified me with Chilean presidential candidate Sebastian Piñera’s official blog URL [es]. Piñera, in his latest post, clarifies the difference between this official blog and the one I linked to in yesterday's roundup [en]:
El talentoso escritor Sergio Paz ha expresado sus dudas acerca de si este blog lo escribe realmente Sebastián Piñera, es decir, yo … puedo asegurarte … que estas palabras son mías. Hay otro “blog de Sebastián Piñera” dando vueltas por ahí, pero más bien es una bitácora de campaña que crearon amigos en Antofagasta y por eso está escrito en tercera persona. Este es mi blog y acá pretendo expresar lo que muchas veces no se puede decir en medio de la actividad tan intensa como candidato.
The talented writer Sergio Paz has expressed his doubts [es] in regard to whether this blog is really written by Sebastián Piñera, which is to say, me. I can assure you that these words are mine. There is another “blog [es] de Sebastián Piñera” making its rounds out there, but it is more a campaign weblog created by some friends in Antofagasta which is why it is written in the third person. This is my blog and here I will express what I often can't say in middle of such intense activity that surrounds me as a candidate.
The candidate's blog is open to comments.
As usual, our Latin America roundup was compiled by David Sasaki (el Oso).


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Tuesday Global Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

Tales from Disiniland suggests that embattled Philippines President Gloria Arroyo should take a page out of Bill Clinton’s political playbook.
Singabloodypore notes that would-be Olympic vote protesters could be arrested should they try to organize in Singapore.
Brand New Malaysian alerts us to the plight of a Malaysian blogger who is on the business end of a cease-and-desist letter from a giant US corporation regarding his domain name.
Photograph by Yoshiki Okamoto
Who is Lebanese? The Lebanese Blogger Forum posts an email that laments the habit of overseas Lebanese to downplay their Lebanese heritage.
The Lebanese Political Journal on the phenomenom of the “Waraqa Bayda”, or “white paper”.
What happens when a society that only recognizes religious law has to deal with the reality of a world more complex than religious law was designed to handle? Crossroads Arabia points to an article that suggests that law schools may soon open in Saudi Arabia.
The question of whether or not Saudi Arabia should let women drive raises its head again, reports Saudi Jeans.
The Silly Bahraini Girl, having recovered from a nasty enounter with the flu, posts images of protesters who were beaten by Bahraini police.
More Iranian election fallout: The Eyeranian suggests that Ahmadinejad’s election is not entirely the disaster that it’s been made out to be.
Isam Bayazidi greets the news that Jordan’s King Abdullah will create an anti-corruption committee with a certain degree of skepticism.
Iraq the Model has a list of recent successes against the terrorists in Iraq.
Free Iraqi reports that Saddam’s palaces will be turned into cultural centers.
Farangopolis puts out a bulletin on a missing Iranian filmmaker. Farshid Faraji was arrested by American military forces in Iraq on May 19 after entering the country to film historic sites and has not been heard from since his arrest.
Babalú, celebrates it second anniversary [en] of blogging about Cuba and summarizes, “Not much has changed in Cuba these past two years, but we still have one thing: [hope]” They also suggest a letter writing campaign to Richard Branson of Virgin Atlantic [en] to protest new, direct flights from Britain to the communist island.
MABB emphasizes the importance of the Bolivian congress [en] right now and spells out six important decisions to be made in the upcoming months.
Eduardo Ochoa, using Google Maps new coverage of South America, points out the new location [es] of last Saturdays, “First Blogs and Beer Meetup” in Manta, Manabí, Ecuador. Photos and details are promised soon.
Julio Alonso [es] and Isopixel both contemplate the recent announcement that Engadget will begin posting in Spanish and what it means for the popular Spanish tech blog xataca [es].
As usual, our Latin America roundup was compiled by David Sasaki (el Oso).
Koranteng Ofosu-Amaah, an overseas Ghanian blogger, gives some practical advice to another African blogger who is considering blog-retirement.
Both This is Zimbabwe and The Zimbabwean Pundit cover the release of opposition MP Roy Bennett from prison. It should be noted that Bennett lost nearly 60 pounds (27 kg) in his eight months in prison.
Ethiopundit has a very long post that analyzes the Orwellian propaganda machine of the Ethiopean government.
Issac Mao alerts us to the plight of Chinese blogger Wang Jun, who’s suffering from a blood disease.
Yellow Peril, the blog of an Auckland-based overseas Chinese writer, has a profanity-filled rant about Chinese internet censorship that tackles everything from the Public Security Bureau to Microsoft.
China Digital Times reports that more than 2,000 Chinese journalists have signed a letter protesting the detention of two colleagues.
So this guy goes to an expensive restaurant and gets lousy service. An all too common occurrence, right? Well, as Finland for Thought reports, that’s not the end of the story. The disaffected diner posted his tale of woe to his blog, and it eventually rose to the #2 ranking on Google for the restaurant’s name. Legal action ensues… but the restaurant didn’t realize that the angry diner is one of Finland’s top intellectual property lawyers.
Niraj engages in a pastime familiar to any international traveler: complaining about a lousy airline.
Blogrel is reporting that several Armenian cities have been wired for city-wide WiFi coverage. This is, however, pay-as-you-go access, not free wireless…
Blogrel also brings us the happy news that the Armenian government, responding to public pressure, has backed away from a plan to drop a highway through the middle of a nature preserve.


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Roundup: Africans on Live 8 · Global Voices
Ethan Zuckerman

Our friends at Technorati are working with the organizers of the Live 8 concerts to call attention to bloggers writing about the concerts and fundraising efforts. The tagline on their special site for the event reads, “We don't want your money, we want your voice!” Technorati is urging bloggers to write about Live 8 and  tag their posts so Technorati can track the conversation.
We thought we'd oblige by rounding up some of the African and Afrophile voices discussing Live 8… critical and skeptical voices as well as supportive and optimistic ones. We'll be continuing this roundup for the next few days – if we missed you, please let us know in the comments on this post so we can include you in the next edition.
We'd also like to urge our readers – and especially our African readers – to let us know what you think about Live 8, whether you think it's a noble effort or misguided and patronizing. As you'll see below, bloggers in Africa haven't been shy about sharing their opinions.
The Kenyan blogger behind Thinker's Room isn't just skeptical about Live 8 – he's skeptical about Bob Geldolf, wondering if anyone could pick him out of a city crowd or name his latest CD. In his post “Live Aid? Please!”, Thinker raises two major concerns about the concert: Will it have any impact? and Where are the Africans?
If a concert in Africa would have me sceptical, words cannot describe just how I fail to see how the remotest benefit a 1 million strong concert in Edinburgh will be derived by a poor fisherman in Lamu. I don't see how one million partygoers will contribute to the filling of stomachs in Darfur, or a reduction of the gunfire. This concert, oddly enough, does not seem to have any African musicians performing aside from the good old token Yossou N'dour, something that will no doubt soon be hastily corrected and laughed off as a “technical oversight”.
Sokari Ekine of Black Looks weighs in with a roundup of Live 8 skepticism in a post titled “Live 8419″. The title is a shout out to Chukwu-Emeka Chikezie of AFFORD, writing in Pambazuka, who proposes a festival to celebrate the aid Africa gives the North: natural resources at fire-sale prices, skilled health professionals who leave Africa to work abroad, and a market for subsidized agricultural goods:
With leading African artists relegated to performing in village somewhere in Cornwall on 2 July we thought it important – some 11 years after apartheid was finally defeated – for African performers to have a presence in London on that day. The excitement will not stop there as African performers at Live8419 will for the first time ever perform the hit song, “Do they know it’s summertime?” written by AFFORD to raise more African aid for Britain. This world exclusive will undoubtedly set the media world alight.
(For those who missed the reference, “Live8419″ adds “Live 8″ to “419”, the section of the Nigerian penal code that concerns mail and wire fraud. In other words, if someone asks you for your bank account information so they can send you a ticket to Live8419, just say no. :-)
Gerald Caplan, also writing in Pambazuka, worries that events like Live 8 paint a picture of Africa as helpless, wracked by natural disaster and in desparate need of northern aid. These views, he argues, distract us from the role the North has had in creating Africa's problems:
These views reflect a common theme: they leave the rich world blameless for Africa's multitude of problems. I greatly fear that Live 8 is inadvertently strengthening the notion that we in the rich world must be missionaries to save Africans from themselves. The truth is already being lost– the deep, comprehensive responsibility of western nations and western financial institutions for so much of Africa's continuing underdevelopment and poverty.
Ethiopundit wishes Live 8 focused more on legitimate governments and fair elections as it did on aid:
“Frankly, what is really needed is the encouragement of the development of the INSTITUTIONS of democracy and the free market in Africa. A concert message to respect the results of the recent election in Ethiopia would have far more meaning and relevance to the world.”
But s/he's at least as concerned about Sir Bob's decision to leave the Spice Girls off the program in favor of more “serious” artists like Destiny's Child, Duran Duran and A-ha, titling his post “Geldolf vs. Girl Power”.
Linking to the BBC article “Do Ghanaians Care about Live 8?”, Aderemi wonders whether the concert fills a need:
I continue to be an optimist about the economic prospects of Africa over the next 10years because I feel a real sense of Africans trying to move things forward. However, I find it hard to understand why African artists are not featured on Live 8, the apparent suggestion that Live 8 organisers want “to keep the millions of eyes around the world glued to the television and [he] felt if it was some remote part of China or Latin America if it was an unknown artist … people might switch off”. Do we really need a concert to tell the world that Africa is poor? I doubt it.
While many African bloggers are skeptical about Live 8's goals, execution or both, a few are optimists. Tunisian blogger Subzero Blue and Afrophile blogger Black River Eagle both point to the Technorati tagging effort. Blogging from Germany, Black River Eagle has some insights on the aparent apathy surrounding the Berlin Live 8 concert:
There may not even be a Berlin Live8 Concert if this June 24th article from Reuters news service is correct ” Lack of German Live8 sponsors a disgrace”. Even Deutsche Welle is pissed off about the German business community and the German government's lack of support for the concert in their article titled “Live8 Organizers Lash Out at Berlin Apathy”. I don't understand why anyone is surprised. After all, the German government's Finance Minister Hans Eichel heldout until the last minute on the recent African Debt Relief negotiations and then the politically embattled German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder made a TV appearance claiming he was for the African Debt Relief deal all along.
Kenyan blogger Gitush is cautiously hopeful that the concerts can bring international attention to issues effecting the continent:
If these concerts attract as much attention as the organizers hope (something like 2 million attending and 2 billion watching) it could serve to bring attention to very important issues affecting the world and Africa in particular, with speacial attention to the debt crisis. However, my greatest concern is that folks will simply ignore the calls for action, suffering from what some call: “Donor fatigue”. But I wish them all the best, it is a worthy cause.


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Skypecast: Freedom Blog winner Markus Beckedahl of Netzpolitik  · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

Today's Global Voices Skypecast is with German blogger and activist Markus Beckedahl, author of Netzpolitik: a German-language blog about open source technologies, Internet-users’ rights and free expression in cyberspace. He is one of seven winners of this year's Freedom Blog Award, sponsored by Reporters Without Borders.
Markus is chairman and co-founder of the digital rights NGO Netzwerk Neue Medien (Network New Media), an organization which is a member of the European Digital Rights Initiative. His company is Newthinking Communications .
Markus started his blog to call greater attention to issues of human rights and freedom of speech in cyberspace, issues which he feels are not adequately covered by the mainstream media. He says he may start an English blog soon, and encourages bloggers around the world to take up the cause.
Listen to the interview here (27 min, 13MB).
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | RSS


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Syrian online journalist jailed two years in inhuman conditions · Global Voices
Ahmed Al-Omran

During the second year of his journalism studies, Massud Hamed, a 29-year-old Syrian student, had posted photos of a peaceful Kurdish demonstration in front of the UNICEF headquarters in Damascus in a Kurdish website. On 24 July 2003, during an exam at Damascus University, the local police arrested him, and on 10 October 2004, he was sentenced to three years in prison after he was found guilty of “membership of a secret organization” and having “attempted to annexe part of Syrian territory to another country”.
According to RSF, Hamed “was repeatedly tortured in the months following his arrest, chiefly by being beaten on the soles of his feet with a studded whip, which has left him with his feet completely paralyzed. He also suffers from vertigo and headaches and his eyesight is failing because he has not been allowed to wear his glasses.”
RSF has appealed to the Secretary General of the Arab League, Amre Moussa, to intervene on his behalf with the Syrian authorities. However, Mohammed thinks that Moussa will do nothing about this. (Thanks to Mohammed for pointing to this)

author: Ahmed Al-Omran


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Wednesday Global Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

The Kenya Democracy Project applauds the growing independence of the Kenyan judiciary.
Thinker’s Room wonders just how exactly will Live 8 help actual Africans?
Hacktivate has a brief rundown on why politics in Malawai are weird.
We’ve been alerted that Blogsome, a free WordPress-based blogging service, has apparently been blocked in China (Chinese language link).
Lalaoshi, a western journalist living and working in China, blogs about his encounter with the Foreign Affairs police in the northern Chinese city of Qinhuangdao.
How well does Henry Kissinger know his Chinese history? The blog Mutant Frog Travelogue thinks the answer is “not well at all”, as does Bingfeng Teahouse.
SimonWorld puts on its thinking cap and wonders what shape government might be in a post-communist China.
New Mongols points us to a useful resource for the Temujin enthusiast: Tim Spalding’s Genghis Khan On The Web. On a more contemporary note, the comments on one of their posts started a discussion of modern Sino-Mongolian relations, a conversation continued in this post.
Japanpundit on the possible return of women’s sumo. One wonders if it could take off the way that women’s boxing has in the United States.
Danwei looks that the furor kicked up by China’s latest blogstar; this leads him to look at the 10 most popular personality searches on Baidu, China’s most popular search engine. Interestingly enough, the top five are all female bloggers. Mao Zedong, somewhat embarrassingly, comes in 8th.
Chatter Garden says that Hong Kong Chief Executive-to-be Donald Tsang will, in a symbolic move, order the gates at the main Government offices in Central to be taken down. However, as the blog notes, this will have little effect on Tsang himself, since his offices are up the hill at the Governor’s Mansion.
ESWN reposts and translates a photo essay about a Shanghai drug bust. However, what’s really disturbing is what happens after the dealer is arrested and then released on bail. Here’s the Chinese original. Some of these images are very graphic and disturbing.
Photograph by Janne Moren
Fernando Flores, co-author of Disclosing New Worlds: Entrepreneurship, Democratic Action and the Cultivation of Solidarity, writes that tomorrow in the Salón de Honor de la Universidad Católica in Santiago, Chile, Law Professor Lawrence Lessig, Chilean Education Minister, Sergio Bitar, and WIPO representative, Richard Owens will be speaking on copyright law and Creative Commons licensing.
Havana Journal has uploaded a satellite image of Havana [en] using Google's new software, Google Earth. They also anticipate a House vote on ending the travel ban to Cuba in the upcoming week [en] and encourage civic participation.
Chica Regia describes her very traditional and very “Northern” quincenera [es], a female coming of age celebration here in Mexico. Complete with photos.
Juanson contemplates on yesterday's decision by Mexican legislators to allow Mexicans living abroad to vote in the upcoming 2006 election [en].
Gemma [es] and Antonio [es] have released the results of their Second Survey of Webloggers and Weblog Readers. The data is available in both text and xml formats and is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.1 license.
Tonight, beginning at 7 p.m., is the first Ecuablogs Convention “About and For Weblogs.” It will take place at the Auditorio de Expoplaza in Quito and the cost is three dollars.
Venezuela News and Views covers Fidel Castro's visit to Venezuela [en] and what it means for Chavez's foreign relations.
The  Latin America roundup was compiled by David Sasaki (el Oso).
Philippine President Gloria Arroyo, in an attempt to deflect some of the pressure arising from the “Tapegate” scandal, announced today that she’s exiling her own husband from the country. Cranial Cavity suggests that customs officials give “Mike” Arroyo a thourogh search before he leaves the country; Inside PCIJ compares the President’s speech with one of her political rival’s and finds Arroyo’s talk to be wanting.
Jeff Ooi is reporting that Maybank, Malaysia’s largest bank, had a severe network crash today. Unfortunately, today also happens to be payday for most Malaysians.
Graham Holliday, the writer behind the Vietnamese food blog Noodlepie, has posted an updated list of Vietnamese blogs. The list is growing by leaps and bounds. He also points us to a Vietnam slogan competition being run by the Ministry of Tourism; taken the time to highlight some of the more unique entries in the contest.
Beth Kantor, blogging at Cambodia4Kids, passes along the news that former King Norodom Sihanouk has promised to stop blogging about politics.
ThaRum’s Web recalls the impact that having an overseas sponsor had when he was in elementary school.
In Egypt, opposition leaders are calling for the state press to cover anti-regime rallies, reports the Arabist Network.
The Beirut Spring is underwhelmed with the opposition’s apparent plan to oust Lebanese President Lahhoud.
Saudi Jeans points at the Saudi Arabia page on the brand-new 43 Places site.
Chapati Mystery points to a CNN.com article that says that internet service for most of Pakistan was out Monday and Tuesday due to a fault in a cable. It seems, though, that not everyone buys this explanation. This may explain reduced posting from Pakistan bloggers recently, though we have seen posts from some Pakistani-based bloggers during the affected time frame.
Prague Watchdog is a Czech-based online service that keeps a very close eye on on-going conflict in Chechnya. Hat tip to David McDuff of A Step At A Time.
A Fistful of Euros looks forward to elections in Albania, a country that unfortunately gets often ignored in discussions of Europe.
Back Seat Drivers posts a reminder that the next Irish blogger meetup is this Saturday in Dublin.


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Clark Boyd interviews Sokari Ekine · Global Voices
Ethan Zuckerman

Our friend Clark Boyd – podcaster and reporter for BBC/WGBH's The World – has a great audio profile of our friend Sokari Ekine, creator of the excellent Black Looks blog. Travelling in rural Spain, Clark gets to visit Sokari at home at her farm in Velez-Blanco and chat with her about blogging, rural life and cherry farming. Sokari talks about the controversy her posts on gay and lesbian issues, Nigerian and US politics sometimes cause and the challenges of balancing other aspects of life to make time for blogging. It's an excellent, brief audio piece (5 minutes, 4.2MB, mp3) about one of Africa's most interesting bloggers. Thanks to The World for letting us offer you the mp3 version of the interview as a podcast.
Earlier on Global Voices: Sokari Ekine blogger profile, podcast interview with Sokari Ekine.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | RSS


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Questions for Chinese bloggers · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

I have some questions for Chinese and China-based bloggers out there. (Please forgive my rusty Chinese… I'm much better at reading than writing, I'm afraid.)
The extent of China's web filtering is often dismissed in the West as not such a big deal because people can use proxies to get around the blockages. People seem to have different opinions about how widespread the knowledge of proxies actually is in China.  If you're in China right now or have been spending a lot of time there recently I'd like to know what you think about the following questions:
在国外经常有人说，因为有代理，中国有很多网站上不了没有太大关：真想看这些网站的人总有办法。不同的人对这个问题有不同的看法, 所以我想问中国的 blogger 几个问题:
It would be great to know your views. If you want to answer this on your own blog, please post the link in the comments section here if the trackback doesn't show up automatically. I would especially love to know what the Chinese bloggers think about this question. 麻烦blogger们在自己的 blog 上,或者在下面的“comments” 里面发表自己的意见!


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Thursday Global Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

Venezuelan News and Views speculates on why neither Trinidad and Tobago nor Barbados signed Hugo Chavez's oil venture, Petrocaribe [es].
The Devil's Excrement questions the significance of Venezuelan Information and Communication Minister, Andrés Izarra's statement that he was not expecting Fidel Castro's visit yesterday.
Tim's El Salvador Blog reports that the White House has agreed to throw in $40 million of aid to Central America as a way to sell CAFTA to democrats.
Fernando Flores summarizes the current political crisis in Brazil [es] and points to Libardo Buitrago who summarizes why Lulu is not able to form an alliance [es].
Elecciones Presidenciales 2005 [es] writes that Chilean presidential candidates Joaquín Lavìn and Sebastián Piñera have agreed to an upcoming televised debate. The office of Socialist front-runner, Michelle Bachelet said she will not be taking part. Meanwhile, Piñera himself writes [es] that he is “astonished by the immediate and gigantic response this [blog] has generated.”
Babalú asks why the mainstream media has forgotten about Elian Gonzalez who was returned to Cuba five years ago.
Juanson World suggests the Mexican government needs a lesson in political correctness as they release a series of Memín Pingüin commemorative stamps just weeks after President Vincente Fox complained that in the US, Mexicans do work that not even Blacks would do. Isopixel, on the other hand, says his northern neighbors need to calm down and take a refresher course in history (referring to US slavery). His readers seems to agree.
The  Latin America roundup was compiled by David Sasaki (el Oso).
Pakistan’s main internet connection has been down for several days,  but many ISPs have switched—or are switching—to backup connections, so connectivity in the country is slowly coming back up.Umar at Metroblogging Karachi reports that his ISP is back up, but the connection is painfully slow. (via Sean Bonner) Misha, another blogger forced off-line by the outage writes about being forced to go cold turkey off the internet.
The Nepalese opposition blog United We Blog reports that they’ve been profiled by the Overseas Press Club of America.
Loic Le Meur and Udo Schroeter discuess why blogging uptake in Germany has been relatively slow.
A Fist Full of Euros on Spain’s move to legalize gay marriage.
Julio Alonso of Merodeando notes that, in Spain alone, the blog service MSN Spaces has already registered more than a million users [es]
Black Looks reports that communities in the Niger Delta have sued the Nigerian government and a number of oil companies because of the open burn-off of natural gas. The flares contribute significantly to air pollution in the area.
Meskel Square picked up a copy of the paper the other day to find a copy of one of his blog posts on the front page. Apparently newspapers in Ethiopia take a somewhat relaxed view of copyright…
This is Zimbabwe asks where does the Church stand in relation to Mugabe?
Kenyan Pundit points to a great story that outlines some of the built-in inefficiencies at Telkom Kenya.
Saudi Jeans points to a newspaper article that says that a two week course at Imam Mohammed Bin Saud Islamic University for any Saudi student who wishes to study in the United States is a “waste of money and time.”
Omar at Iraq the Model has  an update on the progress of the Iraqi Constitution.
Iran Scan has an article about Iran’s longest-imprisoned journalist, Akbar Ganji.
Israellycool takes on the the Condoleezza Rice ex-boyfriend theory.
Is Korean pop culture taking over the world? The Marmot’s Hole a story in the New York Times that profiles the export of South Korean pop culture overseas.
The Korean blogosphere has been agog over the case of a young woman who refused to clean up the mess her dog made in the subway, reports Japanpundit. Some other bloggers, though, feel that the girl’s privacy has been violated.
The Hong Kong Journalists Association has created a Chinese-language blog to protest the arrest and continued detention of Singaporean journalist Ching Cheong on the mainland.
Photograph by Chris Drumgoole
Thai-Blogs.com sends a fish tale our way: fishermen in northern Thailand have landed a 646-pound catfish; it’s believed to be the largest freshwater fish ever caught. There’s also a pretty amazing picture to go along with the text…
Given the news that oil has passed the $60/barrel mark, Mack Zulkifi of Brand New Malaysian thought it might be prudent to stop by the gas station on the way home to fill up. Apparently, most of Kuala Lumpur thought that it was a good idea as well…
Malaysian blogger Jeff Ooi was interviewed on NPR about blogging and cyber-dissents today. Also participating in the talk show were Iranian blogger Hoder and GV’s own Rebecca MacKinnon.
Mr.Brown continues his coverage of l’affair SPG by noting that Sarong Party Girl’s blog is being filtered by government agencies. He wonders if they’re afraid that hardworking Singaporean civil servants will be corrupted by her site.
Saigon-based food blog Noodlepie brings us the story of a restaurant that was forced to shut down because they were lacing the food with gold. The restaurant owners claimed that ingesting gold had health benefits; however, the Health Ministry disagreed.
Rajan Rishyakaran has a very short comment about the Organization of the Islamic Conference’s call for a permanent Muslim seat on the UN’s Security Council.


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Friday Global Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Paul Frankenstein

ESWN has a nice photo essay covering Hong Kong’s annual June 1 march. The turnout for the march was substantially lower than it has been in years past; the fact that Hong Kong’s much-reviled former Chief Executive, Tung Chee-Wah had stepped down from his post and had been recently replaced by the relatively popular Donald Tsang probably had something to do with the lower turnout.
The Angry Chinese Blogger takes the government to task for seizing school textbooks that didn’t conform to the official government line. Given that these books were destined for a Japanese International School, one might think the offending portions might have to do with the occupation of China by the Japanese in the 1930s; however, what really set of the censorship machine was the fact that a map inside the book showed China and Taiwan in different colors.
Chinese blogger Wang Jianshuo has started the process of registering his blog; having submitted the required information, he's waiting for the Chinese bureaucracy to get back to him.
Photograph by ESWN
Saudi Jeans points us to an Arabic wiki about arabic bloggers.
Abu Aardvark devotes a long post to, among other things, the image of Saudi women abroad, the development of Saudi pop stars, and the tensions inherent in a religious society where 9 out of 10 households have satellite dishes. In a separate post, though, he sadly notes that “it seems like every month or so I need to update the same basic post with new names:  more Arab journalists killed, arrested, or otherwise harmed.”
Baghdad Burning critiques President Bush’s recent speech: “‘He’s describing a different country…’ I commented to E. and the cousin.”
Iran Hopes addresses the was-Ahmadinejad-a-hostage-taker-or-not controversy by noting that not only is the new Iranian President somewhat shorter than the man in the photographs, but the hostage-takers are well-known in Iran, and many of them have risen to positions of power. Hoder agrees, saying that while they look similar, the eyes and eyebrows are too different for them to be the same man.
The Orthodox Anarchist explains why he marched in Jerusalem’s controversial Gay Pride Parade.
African Bullets & Honey calls Live 8 “an exercise in white, Western megalomania;” and that “Geldof and company will lay claim to the very last thing so many Africans own: our problems.”
This is Zimbabwe reports that the Mugabe regime, dissatisfied with terrorizing city-dwellers, has started to target pet dogs.
Chien(ne)s Sans Frontieres looks at the political gamble that Sri Lanka’s JVP party has taken (they’re threatening to leave the government over sharing tsunami relief with the rebel Tamil Tigers) and points out that two Sri Lankan TV networks have turned it into a kind of real gambling, with real money.
According to United We Blog!, the Nepalese government has blocked access to two websites that report on political affairs in Nepal. The government's rationale for the banning is that the two sites “encourage Maoist activity”.
The internet in Pakistan continues to creak, as ISPs rely on their backup links while waiting for the main cable to the internet to be restored. However, accessing more of the internet seems possible, reports Habitual Procrastination.
Both Brand New Malaysian and Jeff Ooi’s Screenshots take issue with the Malaysian state of Selangor declaring itself to be a ‘developed state’. In the introduction to his lengthy post analyzing the situation, Mack Zulkifli says that “it reeks of a kind of elitism that borders on a form of treason that is separatist in characteristics, and it can be very dangerous. Extremely dangerous.” Jeff Ooi clearly finds the whole affair distasteful, and suggests that those behind the effort are ethically challenged.
Photograph by Bentley Smith
Following up on yesterday’s note about the slow uptake of blogging in Germany, Loic Le Meur reports that the German food company Frosta has started its own blog. In addition, Loic points to a case study by Shel Isreal of a cosmetics company that at first failed in the blogspace but rebounded strongly.
The blog The UK Today wonders why the British government is wasting its time on things like making sure the sides in the recreation of the Battle of Trafalgar are labeled ‘Red’ and ‘Blue’ instead of, say, ‘England’ and ‘France’ when there are so many other things it should be working on—like a UK connection to the Uzbekistan massacre.
Red Star News, a Berlin-based blog that mainly focuses on China, turns its gaze closer to home to report that it saw a report on television that Austria now requires all bloggers who “can influence public opinion” to blog under their real name. We haven't been able to verify this story yet–has anyone else heard about this?
Altered Argentina writes about his latest trip to Brazil [en], comparing Argentinian Spanish with Brazilian Portuguese as well as Argentina versus Brazil on the soccer field. Christian Gomez of Juanson World [en] asks, what about Argentine versus Brazilian women?
Barrio Flores [en] and MABB [en] both discuss the latest political poll to appear in La Razon [es] for the upcoming special election. Both agree that “the biggest surprise is that the pollsters asked if ex-President Carlos Mesa was allowed to participate, how many would vote for him. His returns were at 25%, considerably lower than this favorable ratings of the mid 40s, when he left office, but still shows that many think that he will return to the race someday.”
Fernando Flores reflectspositively on Lawrence Lessig's recent visit to Santiago, Chile [es].
While attention on Live8 [en] seems to so far be focused mostly on Africa, the Chilean blog Libardo Buitrago reminds us that 96 million people living in Latin America still do so on less than a dollar a day [en].
Babalu points to En La Yuma – another Cuban-American weblog focusing on Cuba.
Christian Gomez of Juanson World shares his thoughts on yesterday's Senate vote on CAFTA [en]. Though the agreement did pass, Gomez says it can hardly be called “free trade.”
The  Latin America roundup was compiled by David Sasaki (el Oso).


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More Africans – and Afrophiles – on Live8 · Global Voices
Ethan Zuckerman

Imnakoya, a Nigerian living in Minnesota and blogging at Grandiose Parlor wishes fellow African bloggers would seize the opporunities presented by Live8:
“…many Africans are not in unison on this matter either- critisicm abound over the Blogoshere among African bloggers, and this is fine. However, Live8 will generate a more positive impact if we, Africans, focus on the positive energy generated by the concert. It is really easy to be arm-chair critics…”
In a comment, Owukori (Sokari Ekine of Black Looks) objects to being termed an arm-chair critic.
Imnakoya is not naïve in his optimism, noting in an earlier blog post titled “Live8: Where are my African Bretheren?“:
By nature I’m an overly optimistic being, and I’m most appreciative of the good intents of Bono, Geldof and other kindred spirits that have been clamoring for debt cancellation for Africa. However, I have some difficulty psyching myself up to believe that this festival of music in far away lands and cultures will have any meaningful impact on the lives of my fellow African brethrens. No offence please.
Brian, a former Peace Corps Volunteer in Guinea Conakry and confirmed Afrophile, has an excellent responseon his Black Star Journal to a post I wrote on my personal blog about Live8. Sharing some of my concerns, Brian thinks I miss the value of celebrity participation in bringing critical issues to the attention of the general public:
I remember back when Princess Diana got involved in the landmine question. I wondered how those ordinary activists felt. They worked on the issue for years to little effect but then this fancy royal flies in and suddenly it's the cause célèbre du jour.
But on the other hand, at the end of the day, the Ottawa treaty banning landmines was signed. Most countries (not including the US) do not use landmines anymore. Is it really important who gets credit? As an activist, is it about you or the cause? Do you think any anti-landmine activist would say, “I think we should revoke the Ottawa treaty because it wouldn't have passed without star power”? I hope not. If so, they are not real activists.
If you're an African or Afrophile  blogging about Live8, please let us know so we can continue rounding up these posts.


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Chinese bloggers react to registration deadline · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

Laohumiao (老虎庙) at 24HoursOnline describes his frustrating efforts to figure out whether and how he should register, given that his blog is hosted on Blogbus, which is registered as his blog's host domain. (Laohumiao's blog is thus a subdomain, at http://24hour.blogbus.com.) According to our recent interview with Isaac Mao, who is an investor in Blogbus, Laohumiao doesn't need to register because the blog hosting service is registered and is also required to comply with government filtering and censorship requirements anyway. (So in other words, if the government asks Blogbus to take down Laohumiao's blog, Blobus must comply.)
But Laohumiao says that when he made inquiries with the relevant departments in the Shanghai city government and the Ministry of Information Industry, which issued the registration requirements and is administering the applications, he got a range of contradictory answers. At the end he was told by one young woman he reached on the phone at the MII in Beijing that blog hosting services as well as all their sub-blogs must ALL register. Then he called the person who runs the Shanghai office in charge of registering Shanghai-based sites. The person said: “信产部热线是怎么搞的？为什么这样解释呢？我要去电话，子域名登什么记呀！” (Loose translation since the colloquialisms don't translate: “What's the deal with the MII? Why are they giving that explanation? I'm going to call them. Sub-domains don't have to register!”)
Gotta love Chinese bureaucratic disconnects. I've heard from some Chinese bloggers who hope to slip through the cracks of bureaucratic confusion.
As we pointed out in Friday's roundup, Wang Jianshuo has applied for a registration number for his blog, but is still awaiting a response from the authorities.
For what it's worth, when surfing Chinese blogs over the past week, I've been running across a lot of blogs with registration numbers on them.
Blogging in China is certainly not dead. In fact, according to this report, the blog hosting company BlogChina plans to list on the Nasdaq.
In response to my questions to Chinese bloggers about how internet filtering affects them and other Chinese internet users, I got a variety of answers.
People guess that somewhere between 1-5% of Chinese internet users know how to use proxies. Some think that those who know how to use them are likely to do so, while others think that even those who know how to use proxies don't bother very much because it's such a nuisance and time-consuming.
At CNblog, calon points out that the real problem has less to do with people's ability to access information, but their ability to pass it on to other people.
MadeinJune points us to a  PDF paper written in Chinese on “China's superficial online democracy“. I haven't read the whole thing yet but it sounds like a great translation project for somebody to take on.
There is a good comment on the importance of bulletin boards and how censorship impacts them.
Williamlong, who has run websites himself, says that when a site's IP address is blocked in China it loses 99% of its traffic and when its domain name is filtered it loses 100% of its traffic.
Ken says that when a site gets blocked that can often create buzz and interest about the site, causing people to learn how to use proxies. But he also thinks that government filtering policies do result in an information imbalance.
Blogger ZhiZhaiTianKong (止斋天空) (blog legally registered in Jiangsu) says my questions are well meaning but show lack of understanding of the Chinese people. He recommends I should have more contact with people who live in China. He says “we can't and don't need to access all information” and he doesn't feel that he is prevented from saying what he wants.


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African Blog Roundup · Global Voices
Ethan Zuckerman

Debates over the relevance of  Live 8 have kept the African blogosphere jumping this weekend. Andrew Heavens of Meskel Square is amazed that “you can't open a British newspaper (or in my case website) at the moment without reading someone's views on Africa”. Onyango Oloo of Kenya Democracy Project has a long riff on watching TV this weekend, experiencing mixed feelings about the event and wondering what it means that far left critics of the event are finding themselves sympathetic to views on the far right.
Awkete McAlister was at the Philadelphia concert and found herself hoping “that at least half of the million people in the audience would be concerned with what is occurring for many countries on the continent of Africa.”
Watching the London gigs on television, Mambo wonders “Imagine if Femi Kuti had been there. Performing a track like Sorry Sorry. That track alone would have been the most apt song of the whole concert, and Femi is such a performer, everyone would have loved it. Instead we got Mariah Carey. WTF??? If it was in my hands, I would have kicked Mariah up the ass and booted her straight into Kibera.”
Kenyan blogger MMK of Bullets and Honey has perhaps the fiercest response to the events, “Live 8 and Those Who Would Steal African Humanity”. Statements like, “Geldof and company will lay claim to the very last thing so many Africans own: our problems. And it will be terrible and evil beyond imagining for owning your problem is at the heart of what it is to be human,” have been widely quoted and debated, leading MMK to write an additional post on the “combative comments” the post generated.
Sokwanele has an inescapable thought while looking at the pictures of the Live 8 crowds in London – more people than attended the concert have been driven out of Zimbabwean cities by Mugabe's “Operation: Drive Out Trash” and made homeless.
Sokari has another excellent Naija Blog Roundup at Black Looks. She's happy to see Chippla online and blogging again, talking about upcoming elections and the influence of Islamic schools on northern Nigerian youth.
Kenyan Pundit Ory points to an excellent article on the Wabenzi, the social class of African “big men” known for driving Mercedes.
Brian at Black Star Journal is worried that Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni is positioning himself to become Africa's next “President for Life”.
The death of two uncles is an occasion for Tsegasaurus of Satisfy My Soul to reflect on the strength of Ethiopian culture, and the meaning of this year's elections.
Koranteng revels in The Joy of Small Things – evidently, there's joy to be found in Jollof rice, Ikea, bus rides and family, if you know where to look. He's got a soundtrack to go with the trip as well.
Emeka Okafor of Timbuktu Chronicles has the scoop on the Kumasi Institute of Science and Technology's entry in the Mini Baja competition organized by the Society of Automotive Engineers. Ghana's evidently got quite a DIY car tradition, as documented in this article from ClubGh.com.


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Americas Roundup · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Tomas Sancio of Venezuelan Politics explains why Venezuelans trade Bolívares for US dollars in the black market.
Jorge Arena of Arena Space writes on The Devil's Excrement about the recent murder of three engineering students by the Venezuelan police and what must be done to bring forth justice.
Morena discusses the recent explosion of blogging in Peru and links to several valuable Peruvian blog resources [es].
There seems to be some controversy on ALT1040 over whether when one types the letter “M” in the latest Spanish version of MSN messenger, it is the Movistar logo which appears rather than the traditional letter.
Fernando Flores continues his reflections on Lawrence Lessig's recent presentation in Chile [es].
If you'd like to brush up on your history, Uruguay escribe has listed every single Uruguayan President from 1830 to the present.
Babalu Blog asks, “Was Sgt Carlos Lazo offered visas for his sons and family to travel to the US and did Sgt Carlos Lazo refuse said offer?”>was Sgt Carlos Lazo offered visas for his sons and family to travel to the US and did Sgt Carlos Lazo refuse said offer?“
Daniel Duquenal of Vcrisis gives an excellent summary of the latest news items in Venezuela.


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Middle East & North Africa Roundup · Global Voices
Rebecca MacKinnon

The prolific Bahraini blogger Mahmood of Mahmood's Den has done an Arabic translation of Reporters Without Borders’ 6 Recommendations for freedom of expression on the Internet.  (PDF version is here.) He encourages people in the Arab world to: “link to it, replicate it on your site or use it to print and send to your lawmaker.”
Silly Bahraini Girl responds to a commenter who asks her why she stays in a country she complains about so much…
Chan'ad Bahraini has a long post on the local Shia backlash against a cartoon depicting Iran's supreme leader and wishes people would learn to tolerate satire.
From Egypt, Manal and Alaa have a long account (with many pictures) of last week's Zeitun Church protest.  Alaa claims that contrary to press reports, the pro-democracy organization, Kefaia, did not organize the protest.  (Global Voices recently interviewed Alaa here.)
The Big Pharaoh has views on the kidnapping of Egypt's ambassador to Iraq.
The Free Ganji weblog and Zaneraini have both translated a letter by imprisoned journalist Akbar Ganji, who is on hunger strike. (via Iran Scan)
Mr. Behi is worried about the next round of clashes between Iran and the West.
Iran Hopes thinks Americans “need some anger management” in dealing with Iran's new president.
Hossein Derakhshan (Hoder) is annoyed that Apple's new iTunes doesn't support Persian podcasts – which are an important new vehicle for independent, non-regime voices from Iran. He hopes iTunes users will lobby Apple.
Hammorabi writes on Syrian support for terrorism in Iraq.
At Baghdad Burning, Riverbend reacts to Bush's speech last week (in some browsers you may need to scroll down a screen to read the post).
…and on the light side, Desert Kuwaiti Girl describes frustrations of dating familiar to women around the world… how online webchat is the new place for Kuwaitis to meet…and according to some of the comments, at least some marriages have resulted.