Stories about Weblog from January, 2007
Ghana: It's Harmattan again, Re-denomination of Ghanian Currency Looms Large, Why the Ghanian Worker Wants to Leave, and 82 Steps to Renew a Visa
Ghana is currently experiencing a harmattan, and this state of play evidently does not escape the comment of Leanne, of An American in Africa, who explains how the harmattan, which she defines as: a dry dusty wind that blows along the northwest coast of Africa. Its time-frame, she describes as...
Chilean Senator Explores World of Warcraft: Scholastic Team Building or Time Wasting?
Online, multi-player games like Second Life and World of Warcraft have attracted some authentic popularity in the form of subscription-paying registered users and a disproportionate amount of hype from techno-utopian bloggers, the-next-big-thing media futurists, and sociology professors turned computer geeks. So much hype as a matter of fact that New...
Arabisc: Hijab-clad Doll Under Fire in Tunisia
This is Fulla, the Hijab-clad Arab Muslim adaptation of the decadent West's Barbie doll. Our Barbie wears the Hijab (head scarf) and Islamic attire – a long dress with long sleeves. While she is a blessing to many parents in the Muslim world who are happy to see their children...
The Iranian Nuclear Crisis
The United Nations Security Council unanimously voted to impose sanctions against Iran over its failure to halt its uranium enrichment programme on December 23, 2006. Despite the gravity of the situation, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad described the UN’s decision as unimportant and vowed to continue uranium enrichment. As a result,...
Elections in Serbia
The first preliminary results of the Serbian parliamentary poll arrived less than an hour after the ballots closed at 20:00 on January 21. Some started celebration while members of the parties that got less than the required 5 percent of the votes burst into despair. The Democratic Party (whose slogan...
Ukraine: Two Years of Yushchenko's Presidency
Two years ago, Dan and Lesya McMinn of Orange Ukraine were among hundreds of thousands of people who came to Kyiv's Independence Square (Maidan Nezalezhnosti) on Jan. 23 to listen to Victor Yushchenko's inaugural speech. As many others, they had to overcome quite a few obstacles to catch a glimpse...
South Asia: Human rights, blogosphere, traditions, democracy, discrimination, travel and festivals
Picks from different blogs from the following South Asian Countries: Bangladesh: After 5 years detention in Guantanamo, one Bangladeshi (Mobarak) was recently released by the US authorities. However he was arrested again by Bangladesh Airport police for interrogation as soon as he arrived in Dhaka. Naeem of Drishtipat blog is...
Chile: First Bloggers Association
A group of Bloggers have decided to make the Chilean Association of Bloggers [ES]. The idea was born from the concern of not having a organized manner of communication. As they explain: Somos una agrupación de voluntarios con objetivos comunes, que mediante los blogs, buscamos desarrollar iniciativas comunitarias de diversa...
Kurdistance: The End of Saddam
Since the hanging of Saddam Hussein at the beginning of this year, Global Voices has covered what the world has had to say about it, the only group left now is the Kurds. Kurdish reaction was fairly slow to develop. I believe this was because of shock. But don't take...
Lebanon: General Strike
A general strike that was called for by the opposition brought Lebanon to a standstill today. Bloggers posted photos, video clips, analysis and updates on the strike and the activities that ensued. MFL updates and writes about how the strike effected various places and aspects of Lebanese society. The Opposition...
Philippines: Election season begins
It’s already election season! Campaigning for midterm elections will begin next month. On May 14, Filipinos will vote for members of Senate, Lower House and local government units. The Administration hopes to keep its majority lead in the Lower House to block a possible impeachment case this year. The Opposition...
Malawi: Malawian Blogger Passes Away
January 18th, 2007 the Malawi blogosphere was robbed of one of its prominent bloggers, Mangaliso Jere (27), whose blog, Mangaliso’s World, covered different topics of interest including information technology in Malawi. The news was broken by a Malawian blogger Austin Madinga on his blog Austin Madinga’s Big Mouth, where he...
Hong Kong: Impartial rule or discrimination?
難道同性戀的傾向是高度傳染的病菌？就連看一看也會受感染？ Is homosexuality a kind of contagious virus? And that by watching it on T.V and one would be infected? — Jovisky One Jan 20, the Broadcasting Authority (BA) issued a strong advice concerning RTHK’s television programme “Hong Kong Connection”(鏗鏘集). There were very strong reactions from the local blogsphere against...
What Salvadoran bloggers are saying — on the 15th anniversary of peace accords
January 16 marked the 15th anniversary of the signing of the Chapultepec Peace Accords which ended El Salvador's twelve year civil war. The event was marked by official celebrations, conferences, rallies and protests. The bloggers of El Salvador had much to say about the events and the country's progress. The...
Malawi/Zambia: Remembering John Chilembwe, Debate Over Using Yahoo Messenger At Work and ICTs and Gender Based Violence
Malawian blogger Soyapi Mumba is excited about the introduction of Internet and Pay-Per-View TV services by Malawi Telecom (MTL): Malawi's Internet infrastructure, especially to people's homes, is very poor and for MTL to provide these service, it means they will either drastically improve the current infrastructure, or introduce new alternatives...
The Global Voices Show #4
Finally — the fourth episode of The Global Voices Show has landed! In this edition we feature excerpts from the following podcasts: - The IndiCast (India) – also see Global Voices article “The Blogospheres on Big Brother, Shilpa Shetty, Bullying and Racism“ – Pambazuka News (Zimbabwe) – Palabras Libres (Bolivia)...
Bolivia: A Conflict Online
Video taken by Estotaweno of the “Youth for Democracy” crowd that broke through the police line towards an eventual confrontation with coca farmers in Cochabamba. January 11, 2007 is already being called “Black January” for the civil conflict that left 2 dead and hundreds injured in the city of Cochabamba....
Uganda: Bloggers Gathering, Best of Blogs, Ugandan Mercenaries in Iraq And Recolonization of Africa
As manic as a beat poetry gathering in New York or a circumcision ceremony in eastern Uganda, last Thursday's Ugandan Blogger Happy Hour was a mirthful gathering of creativity and wit. Poetry was recited, radical political doctrines defended, and blogging obsessions confessed. The first gathering of its kind in Uganda,...
Terrorism in Assam and Illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, a take in Hindi!
These last two weeks have seen fairly good amount of activity in the Hindi Blogosphere. With the political & other elections season coming up, its hard to ignore it & the resulting activity. So while Rachna composed a poem on elections describing how the environment would be in a village...
Martinique: Homophobia and Segolene Royal's Socialist Party
The French Socialist Party's presidential candidate Segolene Royal. Photo by Manuel MC. Le Blog de [Moi], the blog of an out Martiniquan lesbian, tackled a budding controversy in local Martiniquan politics last week. Martinique, though in the Americas, is a French Overseas Department (what the French call a D.O.M.) and...
China: Independent directors funded
With the news of Chinese broadcasting regulation body SARFT‘s decision to heavily invest in future films from sixteen of China's hottest young independent directors, one might jump to the conclusion that official regulators are just as tired of the same few big-name directors as many Chinese netizens are. LiLiang, for...
