Stories about Eastern & Central Europe from March, 2011
Russia: Tribute to SOVA's Galina Kozhevnikova
At OpenDemocracy.net, Andreas Umland pays tribute to Galina Kozhevnikova, the deputy director of the “SOVA” NGO and a prominent researcher of Russia's extreme right-wing movements, who died earlier this month:...
Hungary: Childhood Memories of the Holocaust in Pécs
Eva S. Balogh of Hungarian Spectrum shares her memories of the summer of 1944 in Pécs, when the city's Jewish population – and most of her neighbors and kindergarten classmates...
Russia: BBC Russian Service's Last Broadcast
Christya Riedel writes on Foreign Policy Association's Russia blog that on March 26, “the BBC Russian Service ceased its radio broadcasts after 65 years on the air because of drastic...
Macedonia: Critique of Video for Eurosong 2011 Entry
Karro compares [MKD] the video (but not the song) of the Macedonian entry for this year's Eurovision festival, “The Russian Girl” by Vlatko Ilievski, to the video of “The Only...
Ukraine: Reasons for Targeting Ex-President Kuchma
LEvko of Foreign Notes explains possible reasons – here and here – for targeting Ukraine's ex-president Leonid Kuchma, against whom a criminal investigation has recently been opened on suspicion of...
Russia: Heroin Epidemic; Attitude to Sex
Posts about heroin epidemic and attitudes to sex in Russia – at OpenDemocracy.net.
Russia: Voina Art Collective
At OpenDemocracy.net, writes about the Voina art collective (RUS: @free_voina; ENG: @free_voina_en) and “explains how their controversial methods have made it difficult to mobilise support.” Kevin Rothrock (@agoodtreaty) re-posts a...
Ukraine: Lukyanivka Pre-Trial Detention Facility
Journalist Kristina Berdinskikh writes (RUS) at her Korrespondent.net blog about Kyiv's pre-trial detention facility SIZO #13/Lukyanivka: the conditions (general capacity is 2,800 detainees, the actual number is around 4,000; cells...
Russia: Life With Autism
At OpenDemocracy.net, Dmitry Golubovsky and Svetlana Reiter write about the lives of autistic people in Russia.
Russia: Unexpected Results of Radiation Mapping
The crowdsourcing project of mapping radiation levels in Russia measured by private dosimeters not only became an interesting case of digital activism, but also showed some effects its creators didn’t even think of.
Ukraine: Myroslava Gongadze on Media Freedom
Viktor Kovalenko writes about the views of Myroslava Gongadze – who is the widow of the slain Ukrainian journalist Georgiy Gongadze – on the freedom of the press and other...
Russia: Life of Migrant Workers in Pictures
Photoblogger zyalt publsed a selection of pictures on the life of migrant workers in Russia. The pictures with English captions are re-posted by English Rusia here.
Macedonia: QR Campaign to Aid Japan
It.com.mk noted [MKD] that Kalina Zografska, Kristijan Ivanovski and Iva Dujak started an independent campaign using QR codes containing Japanese proverbs, quotes and links, to promote the humanitarian concert “Heart...
Russia: Friendship Relations Between LiveJournal Blogs Analyzed
Habrahabr-user RomanL published [ru] a detailed analysis of Russian LiveJournal blogs. According to the analysis, Russian-speaking LiveJournal blogosphere (active audience of around 170,000 users) can be divided into 4 distinctive...
Macedonia, Japan: Anime vs. Reality
poljaff, a contributor to Japan@MK blog, compared [MKD] the experiences of learning about Japanese culture and disaster response by watching the award-winning anime Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 a year ago, and...
Macedonia: Meme of the Day – on Envy
Jasna Soptrajanova Vrteva posted this message on her Facebook profile [MKD]: “When tempted to envy someone – they've a charmed life, they have it so easy … and they're always...
Serbia: Returning Gratitude for the Japanese Donations
Sasa Milosevic reports on Serbian initiatives to help Japanese victims of the recent earthquake and tsunami disaster, in a grateful return of the aid donated by Japan to Serbia.
Russia: Bots To Look For Extremism Online
Lenta.ru reported that Roskomnadzor, Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Communication, intends to use a special software designed to spot extremist content online. The software will...
Macedonia: A Requiem for Democracy
Filip Stojanovski translates Macedonian bloggers' comments on how the public democratic dialog within state institutions has been replaced with private meetings between leaders of the biggest political parties.
Russia: Human Bots Fight Opposition
As Internet control becomes more and more sophisticated, new techniques join the arsenal of online deception and discreditation. Vadim Isakov analyzed the phenomena of 'human bots,' paid commenters willing to turn any constructive conversation into the mess.
Russia: First Candidates for the ‘Net Parliament’
Novaya Gazeta website publishes [ru] the first results of the nominations for the ‘Net Parliament,’ the virtual project described by its creators as an ‘organ of the representative power of...
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