Stories from 20 December 2013
Don't Just Retweet Blood Donation Requests. Donate!
Dr. Roshan Radhakrishnan at Godyears asserts the importance of donating blood and wonders about the fate of all the blood request retweets in his Twitter timeline: Does anyone ever come to the aid of those tweets? Do you honestly know anyone who has seen a retweet and taken a break...
Votes Cast in the Madagascar Presidential Elections Runoff
Hoping for a new start after a prolonged political crisis, Malagasy citizens went to the polls to select a new president on December 20.
Egypt: 27 Photographs from Hala'ib
Egyptian blogger Zeinobia shares this slideshow of photographs from Hala'ib, a Red Sea port and town, located in the Hala'ib Triangle, close to the Sudanese border: View “undefined” on Storify
Bahrain Preacher: “Celebrating National Day is a Sin”
Bahraini blogger Manaf Al Muhandis tweets from a sermon before Friday prayers in Bahrain, in which the preacher declares that celebrating National Day is a sin.
South Korean Education Ministry Discourages Students’ Poster Movement
As South Korean university students’ ‘We Are Not Fine!’ poster movement spreads like wildfire across the country, even up to the point of motivating high, junior high and elementary students [ko] to write their own, the Ministry of Education has given notice to schools to control students’ poster-making in order...
The Postcolonialist Calls for Submissions on ‘Sites of Home’
A recently launched online magazine and journal, The Postcolonialist, is calling for submissions for the upcoming edition of its academic journal. The Postcolonialist is an inter-disciplinary, multi-lingual publication featuring research, commentary, and creative production from and about postcolonial regions and perspectives. The About page of the website adds: We are an alternative and interactive avenue by which scholars, journalists, writers...
How do police lineups in Lebanon work?
Lebanese blogger Karl Sharro tells us how the newly introduced police lineups work in Lebanon here.
Jihadists Online: The Dark Side of the Internet
Islamist Jihadists are online. Lebanese blogger – and occasional satirist – Karl Sharro tweets: I honestly sometimes can't tell anymore if I'm watching news from Syria or a period drama from early Islamic history. — Karl Sharro (@KarlreMarks) December 16, 2013 Syrian Noor Al Ali replies: @KarlreMarks Have you come...
Video Appeal: What You Don't Know About The Places We're From
For our 2013 end-of-year campaign we asked members of the Global Voices family to fill you in on what their countries are really about.
Unconditional Basic Income for All Europeans
In this episode of GV Face we speak to activists gathering signatures and raising awareness about the need for "basic income" - no work required - in Europe.
Syria: The Free Women of Darayya
Darayya's Free Women have engaged in numerous protests and initiatives since the beginning of the Syrian uprising, in the spring of 2011. Today, they work from exile - and prison.
Without Regulation, India's Domestic Workers Face Low Pay and Other Abuses
The dramatic arrest of India's deputy consul in New York Devyani Khobragade on charges of visa fraud for overstating the wages of her housekeeper has renewed concern for domestic workers.
Coup Attempt? Ethnic Conflict? Figuring Out the Crisis in South Sudan
Political strife and 500 civilians already reported dead: what, exactly, is behind the current crisis in the world's newest nation?
Top 10 YouTube Videos of 2013 in Japan
RocketNews24 has compiled a list of the top 10 YouTube videos in Japan for the year 2013. The list includes a video uploaded by a popular Japanese idol girl group AKB48, a video of two cute kids showing off their new toys, and a video of a shocking moment of...
Indie Voices: Connecting Investors With Journalism Entrepreneurs in Developing Countries
In the Knight Center's Journalism in the Americas Blog, Alejandro Martinez writes about a new crowdfunding platform for independent journalism projects called Indie Voices: Indie Voices seeks to become a meeting ground between entrepreneuring journalists and investors, where the former can find different sources of funding and put together their...
Photos of Mass Candlelight Rallies in South Korea
By holding candlelight rallies across the country, frustrated South Koreans have voiced flooding concerns over current political developments and series of scandals, including the snowballing election manipulation allegations. @Emfla505 tweeted [ko] this stunning photo of protest in Seoul (below) and WikiTree.com site gathered more photos of rallies on December 19. 오늘 서울시청 광장입니다! 민노총의 깃발이 빠져 나가고...
7 Amazing Vintage Photos of 19th-Century Japan
Take a look at what life was like in Japan some 150 years ago, thanks to a series of photos that recently entered the public domain.
Japan's Open Data Catalog Launches Beta Version
Data.go.jp, a website that aggregates publicly available data by Ministries and Agencies of the Japanese government, launched its Beta version on December 20, 2013. Datasets by 21 governmental organizations and 567 groups are available under Creative Commons License Attribution 2.1 Japan detailed in the Terms of Use. This comes as a...
Chinese Film Director Feng Xiaogang on Censorship
When asked about his dream during an interview at China's top Tsinghua University, Chinese film director Feng Xiaogang said[zh] to the students: I have realized all my dreams, if there is any, that is one day, I wish there's no film censorship in China. His words inspired thunderous applause. He...
Protesters March Against Nuclear Plant's Re-Start on Japan's Kyushu Island
About 1,800 people marched on December 15, 2013 in protest of the re-start of the Sendai Nuclear Power Station [ja], according to the protest organizer. After two years of the plant's operations being suspended, Kyushu Electric Power Company applied for a review in July from the Nuclear Regulation Authority with the intention...
