Archive for
June, 2005
Stories
June 30th, 2005
Questions for Chinese bloggers
June 29th, 2005
Syrian online journalist jailed two years in inhuman conditions
Roundup: Africans on Live 8
June 27th, 2005
Global Voices, Global Dinners
June 25th, 2005
Iranian Election Reaction
Links for Roundups
June 30th, 2005
Americas , East Asia , Middle East & North Africa , South Asia , Sub-Saharan Africa , Western Europe
We’re always looking for new ideas and good stories to write about. If you have a story or a blog post that you think would be a good fit for our daily roundups, email us with the link!
Latin America
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).
South Asia
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.
Europe
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]
Africa
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.
The Middle East
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.
East Asia
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
South-East Asia
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.
June 29th, 2005
Americas , East Asia , Eastern & Central Europe , Middle East & North Africa , South Asia , Sub-Saharan Africa , Western Europe
We’re always looking for new ideas and good stories to write about. If you have a story or a blog post that you think would be a good fit for our daily roundups, email us with the link!
Africa
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.
East Asia
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
Latin America
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).
South-East Asia
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.
The Middle East
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.
South Asia
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.
Central Asia
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.
Europe
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.
June 28th, 2005
Americas , East Asia , Eastern & Central Europe , Middle East & North Africa , South Asia , Sub-Saharan Africa , Western Europe
We’re always looking for new ideas and good stories to write about. If you have a story or a blog post that you think would be a good fit for our daily roundups, email us with the link!
South-East Asia
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
The Middle East
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.
Latin America
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).
Africa
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.
East Asia
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.
Europe
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.
South Asia
Niraj engages in a pastime familiar to any international traveler: complaining about a lousy airline.
Central Asia
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.
June 27th, 2005
Americas , East Asia , Eastern & Central Europe , Middle East & North Africa , South Asia , Sub-Saharan Africa , Western Europe
The Middle East
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.
East Asia
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
Europe
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?”
South Asia
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.”
Africa
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.”
South-East Asia
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.
Latin America
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).
June 24th, 2005