· July, 2006

Stories about Media & Journalism from July, 2006

Uzbekistan: Revoked Licenses

The Long and Winding Road has a report on Uzbek pop musicians losing their licenses to perform in public after a journalist accused their lyrics of not being authentic Uzbek poetry and them of being bad musicians.

The unshackling of Bangladesh

  31 July 2006

Tasneem Khalil reports that Bangladesh is the cover theme for August 2006 issue of Himal Southasian, South Asia's first and only regional magazine. The magazine's introspective comment: "Bangladesh is set to become a powerful member of the world community, once it deals with its difficult issues of mal governance and confrontational politics".

Albania: Reactions to the Sunday Times Article

annabengan of annasblog reposts the Sunday Times Magazine's article on Albania, and the “official reply/explanation from the chief editor of Sunday Times.” annabengan's Albanian friends thought the article was “fair” – while her non-Albanian friends considered it “bad journalism.” One reader wrote: “[…] if this were written about a poor...

Hong Kong: Richard Li

  30 July 2006

Martinoe comments that even though Richard Li (Tycoon Lee Kar-shing's son) is able to purchase the liberal intellectual Chinese newspapers, Hong Kong Economic Journal, some young progressive columnists will probably leave and the original readers community won't be the same anymore.

DRC: Carefully Hopeful

  30 July 2006

Echoing the optimism of another US-Based DRC blogger, The Salon writes (Fr): “The elections have finally begun. Though there are justified worries about the election's transparency, this is a a historic experience on this vast land which is as large as Western Europe. As a Congolese, while keeping a sane...

Russia, Ukraine: Stories About Words

Below is the translation of three stories about words: in the first one, they are being banned; in the second, they offend; in the third, there aren't enough of them. LJ user plushev, a Russian radio journalist, writes (RUS) about the government's attack on the name of the controversial National...

DRC: Last Minute Campaigning and Complaining

  28 July 2006

As Sunday's presidential election approaches, and the campaign period closes today, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) bloggers chronicle last minute campaigning and complaining by some of the 30 or so candidates and other actors. Candidates’ Backgrounds Prince du Fleuve du Congo continues a debate with Christian Geraud about Joseph Kabila...

Indonesia: New English Daily

  28 July 2006

Unspun reviews the newest English language daily in Indonesian market. The paper is produced by a business group called Jababeka. “If the Jababeka group wants to run its own newsletter then they should just get a blog, a website or print out a newsletter. To dress it up as a...

China: spoofing culture

  27 July 2006

Lyn Jeffery in Virtual China blogs about spoofing culture in Chinese internet sphere and translates an article from QQ discussing whether spoofing can prevent social tragedies. Spoofing is a popular subculture that deconstructs serious themes to entertain people with comedy effects.

Voices from the Caucasus

Russian tourists rest in the shade in the Novy Afon (New Athos) monastery near the capital of the Georgian breakaway region of Abkhazia – by eurutuf What follows is a roundup of notable blog conversations from the Caucasus that took place over the last week. For a change, how about...

Malaysia: Online Freedom

  27 July 2006

Malaysian opposition politician Lim Kit Siang is asking the Prime Minister to give assurance that online media would not be censored in Malaysia. The call comes after the Prime Minister and other cabinet ministers made negative comments about blogs and online media in general.

China: century China

  27 July 2006

The famous mainland Chinese BBS websites Century China forum and lifeweek BBS were closed down almost at the same time (25 of July 2006). The later is set up by Joint publishing company which focuses on the publication of intellectual thinking. Mongee in Soho Xiaobao feels very pity about the...

Hong Kong: Jimmy Lai

  27 July 2006

ESWN translates Jimmy Lai's recent column in Next magazine discussing the limit of time and space in pan-Asian publications.

South Korea: no-fta

  27 July 2006

Media cultural action (a Seoul based independent media activist group) has put up the “no-fta” demonstration video in July 12, 2006 with english subtitle on their website.

China: blogging

  27 July 2006

wzp in ofblog has an evaluation of the impact of blogging in China and describes 2005 – 2006 summer as the hottest year. He claims that blogging has smashed the monopoly of hegmonic discourse and changed the tragetory of journalism (zh) . However, after the summer, winter follows (zh) ,...

Singapore: Looking for Contributions

  26 July 2006

Singapore's new groupblog is calling for it's readers to contribute articles. “As those among the readers who have been perusing the blog might surmise, Singapore Angle strives to be an online forum for promoting civil and reasoned discussions of Singapore affairs and other related issues of interest. To that end,...

Ukraine: Relying on Contradictory Reports

LEvko of Foreign Notes points out a serious problem one encounters when attempting to follow Ukrainian politics: “Tracking events in Ukrainian politics is often confusing because of conflicting and contradictory reports and comments given by the media, and by leaders and spokesmen from differing political parties.”

Somaliland, Somalia: Journalistic criticism

  26 July 2006

Guest-blogging on the Voice of Somaliland Diaspora, Faysal Diriye launches an attack on journalistic standards among Somali Web sites which he describes as Siadist. “Cheap shot journalism! Too subjective, too emotional, and as boring as hell! They often shed more tears than thunder clouds could spill,” he writes.