Stories about Technology from February, 2012
Cuba: Worry about Hunger Striker
Uncommon Sense hopes that political prisoner Ernesto Borges’ fate will not go the way of so many other hunger strikers, saying: “He needs you to learn his story and to spread it so that his life can be saved.”
Macedonia: Skopje's Pollution Monitoring Saga Continues
NGO Greenbox is compensating for the lack of web interface for the air pollution measuring system in Skopje by posting photos of the display on their blog. Filip Stojanovski writes about the initiative.
Thailand: Facebook Blamed for Teen Pregnancies
Netizens in Thailand react to the report of the National Economic and Social Development Board that popular social networking site Facebook is partly to blame for the unwanted teen pregnancies in the country. Thailand has one of the highest rates of teen pregnancies in the world.
Cuba, USA: Blogger Perspectives on the Embargo's 50th Anniversary (Part 1)
The United States' economic embargo against Cuba has been in existence for 50 years. To mark the occasion, Global Voices interviews two bloggers about the blockade and what it has (or hasn't) accomplished. This is Part 1, in which Cuban diaspora blogger Alberto de la Cruz shares his views.
India: Cheap Tablet, Unaffordable Mistake
Nitin Pai at The Acorn posts an in-depth analysis on the controversies related to the $35 Aakash tablet PC.
Trinidad & Tobago: Carnival is My Time
“In an attempt to imitate art…culture in T&T seems to have perverted itself and in trying to become something else, may have succeeded all too well; the business model of Tribe and the other new ‘Rio’ styled bands seems to be built on encouraging excess for profit”: Plain Talk suggests...
Jamaica: Inmate Beatings
Following reports that several high-profile inmates are being beaten, Active Voice wants to know “what’s going down at the Horizon Adult Remand Centre”, which seems to be “a virtual Guantanamo Bay.”
Pakistan: Fighting the Great Firewall
The recent blow to the internet freedom in Pakistan has been the announcement of a request for proposal (RFP) for national “URL filtering and blocking system” by the ICT R&D Fund under the Ministry of Information Technology (MoIT). The $10 million system is required to be able to ”handle a block list of up to 50 million URLs".
Uzbekistan: Why Did Uzbekistan Ban Wikipedia?
Sarah Kendzior reports that Uzbekistan’s ban on Wikipedia, enacted late last month, blocks all articles written in Uzbek while leaving articles in other languages accessible.
Cuba: Working for “The Enemy”?
Havana Times reports that “the leading Cuban government website…unleashed a front page attack on blogger Yoani Sanchez…with an article accusing her of working for the enemy (USA) for pay”; Sanchez herself sees a news report “in which the blogger Miriam Celaya and other acquaintances appear, surrounded with epithets such as...
Cuba: More Sunday Detentions
Uncommon Sense blogs about yet another Sunday of repression as members of Las Damas de Blanco were again detained by authorities.
Portugal: Web Users Debate Portuguese Private Copying Bill
Currently being debated in the Portuguese Parliament is a new bill (PL118) which proposes a tax on any equipment or software capable of recording, copying or storing analogue or digital content, in the name of author's rights. The online community has wasted no time in wading in on the debate, with the hashtag #PL118 duly trending on Twitter.
China: Capitalizing Social Network
Jin Ge from China Bubble Watch reports on how star micro-bloggers capitalize their social network by merging their influence with e-commerce.
Indonesia: Should Government Censor ‘Rude’ Tweets?
Reacting to the report that Indonesia's Information Ministry plans to target ‘rude anonymous’ tweets, Unspun reminds authorities to focus on more important things like fixing the digital divide in the country
Pakistan: The Government Tender To Purchase Filtering Tools
Apparently the Pakistani government has invited tender to private and semi-private companies to purchase a tool to block thousands of urls. Awab Alvi and Faisal Kapadia hosts a video podcast at SpeakForChange to discuss why the government is doing this.
China: 1 Billion Mobile Phone Users
C Custer wrote in Asia Tech News for the World on the latest statistic of mobile users in China. The country's mobile phone users will break 1 billion in February 2012 and about 13.7 percent of China’s mobile users are on 3G.
Cuba: Bejerano Against Corruption
“Eliot Ness and his group in Chicago…[have] a female version in Cuba”: Iván's File Cabinet blogs about the country's “Iron Lady”.
Cuba: Prisoners’ Rights
Uncommon Sense republishes a statement by Amnesty International about “former prisoner of conscience Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia [whose] whereabouts are unknown following his alleged arrest in central Havana, Cuba, on 21 February”; Pedazos de la Isla, meanwhile, reports that “the political prisoner on hunger strike, Ernesto Borges, was taken from...
North Korea's Radio Jamming Fails Temporarily
North Korea Tech reports a temporary failure of North Korea’s external radio services and its powerful jamming operation that blocks foreign broadcasts.
Haiti: Students in Sheds
Haiti Grassroots Watch explores the issues surrounding the non-reconstruction of the state university in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake.
Barbados: A Woman's Worth
Free Logic is concerned about the tweets from “little girls and ignorant women extolling their love for Chris Brown, in spite of his ‘misdeeds'”, saying: “It made me feel sick inside. That there are women out there who think so little of themselves. For the record, no man will ever...
