Friday, September 28, 2007
'Citizen Journalists' Evade Blackout On Myanmar News - WSJ.com
photo by Soneseayar
Can a repressive government still censor the news? Can the military junta in Myanmar keep the world from finding out about the brutal repression of the uprising led by Buddhist monks? The government is shutting down the Internet cafes to try to prevent the uploading of images of violence and bloodshed. Protesters are posting video on YouTube (Riot at Shwe Dagon Pagoda East gate in Burma ) and bloggers are covering the unrest. Can that be stopped as easily as the regime has silenced the Burmese press? The mainstream media are using the images provided by Burmese citizens to tell the story of the government crackdown:
"At 1:30 yesterday afternoon, a cellphone buzzed with news for Soe Myint, the editor in chief of Mizzima News, a publication about Myanmar run by exiles in New Delhi.While the junta maybe able to shut down the internet cafes it will be more difficult to halt the use of cell phones to send information. This incident clearly shows the power of individuals armed with mobile phones and internet connections to capture the story and share it with the world even in the face of violent repression. Here's what the Wall Street Journal article concludes, quoting the managing editor of CNN Asia Pacific:
The message: "There is a tourist shot down" in Yangon, the center of recent protests by Buddhist monks and others against the military junta in Myanmar, formerly Burma. Troops there were clearing the streets, telling protesters they had just minutes to go home -- or be shot.
The text message wasn't from one of Soe Myint's reporters. In fact, he doesn't know who sent the message. He believes it came from one of the more than 100 students, activists and ordinary citizens who have been feeding him reports, images and video of the violent events unfolding in recent days.
In the age of YouTube, cellphone cameras and text messaging, technology is playing a critical role in helping news organizations and international groups follow Myanmar's biggest protests in nearly two decades. Citizen witnesses are using cellphones and the Internet to beam out images of bloodied monks and street fires, subverting the Myanmar government's effort to control media coverage and present a sanitized version of the uprising. The Associated Press reported yesterday that soldiers in Yangon fired automatic weapons into a crowd of demonstrators as tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters converged in the capital. Wire services have reported the number of dead at nine, citing the state media.
The BBC, which has a Burmese language Web site and radio service, is encouraging its audience to send in photos, like the ones it received of a monk's monastery that had been ransacked by authorities. A shaky video, now on YouTube, shows a sea of chanting and clapping monks draped in red robes marching down a street, past Buddhist monuments. One blog features a photo showing two abandoned, bloodstained sandals.
Another blog was updated at 3 p.m. Myanmar time yesterday with a few English lines: "Right now they're using fire engines and hitting people and dragging them onto E2000 trucks and most of them are girls and people are shouting." Below the post is a blurry photo of trucks with the caption, "This is how they come out and try to kill people."
Who produced these reports -- or how the information got out of Myanmar -- hasn't been established. But that's the point in a country where people caught protesting or writing against the government risk years in prison."
"When traditional methods and professional journalists can't provide footage, and personal safety allows, citizens rise to the challenge time and again, often with remarkable material," said Ellana Lee, the managing editor of CNN Asia Pacific in an email. "Even in countries like Myanmar, the spread of the Internet and mobile phones has meant that footage will always continue to get through and the story will be told, one way or another."
Below is a list of links published by the WSJ to the Burma blogs used by the mainstream media to get the story:
"MONITORING MYANMAR Here are some blogs and media outlets with video and pictures of the protests in Yangon. (Some are in Burmese.)
1• Mizzima News
2• The Irawaddy
3• Democratic Voice of Burma
4• Justice & Injustice
5• http://soneseayar.blogspot.com/
6• http://mmedwatch.blogspot.com/
7• http://ko-htike.blogspot.com/
8• http://mogokmedia.blogspot.com/
9• Today Burma
VIDEO
10• Jim Carrey's Youtube call to action
11• Anti-march warning broadcast from Burmese state broadcaster MRTV, via BBC"
Would you rather watch a clip?
The Wall Street Journal reports that CBS is betting that you would rather watch a short clip from a TV show than the whole episode. Reporter Rebecca Dana writes that CBS has decided
It sounds like TV is being Youtubed. CBS has seen the popularity of the clips on YouTube and decided to compete. Here's the question: Are these clips promotional or are clips the new content for a generation with a short attention span? Why bother with a lame 30 minute sitcom when you can see the best three minutes and skip the rest?"To cater to what it believes is the short attention span of online audiences, the network today is launching CBS EyeLab, a digital-production studio that will create and distribute short clips cut together from the network's most popular shows."
"CBS says the EyeLab-produced clips will both entertain viewers and serve a marketing purpose. "It turns our promotion into content," said George Schweitzer, the president of CBS Marketing. "The clips about 'CSI' or something from how a director shoots a scene in the show 'NUMB3RS,' these are all things that link back to our shows." The network also plans to sell ads that will be embedded in the clips."Online video is fast becoming the new TV and content will have to be reformatted for the constraints of the new medium and the limits of the audience. All that is old will be repackaged as clips for a distracted population.
This approach is something of a return to an older Internet strategy for TV networks. Until 18 months ago, most of the networks only made available short clips from their shows, seeing them as a promotional tool. But the explosion of interest in online video, driven by the popularity of video-sharing sites such as YouTube, helped prompt most of the networks to put full-length episodes of much of their prime-time lineup onto the Web last year."
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Digrevo...your a hit
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Do You MySpace? I'll Bet You Do
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
The Impact of Virtuality
There are however flipsides in being apart of this online community. Yes, it may create a second life for many, but are the experiences real? A prime example is given when Turkle discusses a teenager exploring the adventures of a Colorado river. If this teenager explores a virtual rafting on the river and there are obstacles that needs to be overcome, how is the online adventure going to prepare her for the real world and the obstacles she has to overcome in real life? Turkle emphasizes
Comparatively, virtuality creates a fantasy for many young people. We may look at the virtual game called the SIMS as an example which the player chooses a character and chooses a fantasy lifestyle that he or she would want to live. Virtuality's influence spans from a community that engages in useful conversations to potentially charging one's lifestyle. However, it's flipside provides the insecurities and creates this second life that lures you into fantasy.
Blogging from Cambodia
(AP Photo/Heng Sinith)
The Washington Post reports that blogging has opened up a new political and cultural discussion in Cambodia. The king himself, or at least his staff, is blogging daily. The article goes so far as to call it a "cultural revolution":
"But it is clear that young, tech-savvy Cambodians are joining Sihanouk in embracing blogs. The trend is changing their lives and their communication with people abroad _ even as electricity remains an unreachable dream for most households in this poverty-ridden nation of 14 million.
"This is a kind of cultural revolution now happening here in terms of self-expression," said Norbert Klein, a longtime resident from Germany who is considered the person who introduced e-mail to Cambodia, through a dial-up connection in 1994. "It is completely a new era in Cambodian life."
Cambodians with the skills and the means to blog are discovering a wider world and using the personal online journals to show off their personalities and views about the issues facing their country, from corruption to food safety.
"Blogging transforms the way we communicate and share information," said 25-year-old student blogger Ly Borin."
Blog Comments Fuel Negative Campaigns
A political television advertisement in a race for the state legislature in Virginia cites a comment posted on a blog as a source for an attack on a rival candidate. The ad cites the blog as the source despite the fact that it is citing a reader's comment posted on the blog and not something written by the blogger.
"The ad by Del. Timothy D. Hugo points to a new form of negative campaigning in which information for an attack ad is sourced to comments posted on the Internet instead of more authoritative sources such as news reports or public records.Campaigns are using blogging and material from blogs in creative ways to compete for publicity. Should blogs be treated with the same respect as "official" news sources? What is the value of a blog comment in this case?
Hugo's ad highlights critical comments about his Democratic opponent, Rex Simmons, that someone with the screen name "Pitin" posted on the Democratic blog Raising Kaine.
Ads that quote from blogs, on which it is often difficult to identify the author, represent a benchmark in increasingly negative political campaigns, several political analysts said."
Looking for Sources on Blogging?
Monday, September 24, 2007
Digital Outreach: U.S Blogging in the Middle East
The Times reports that the State Department has a "Digital Outreach Team" posting on Arab blogs and web sites. The goal is to influence public opinion in the Middle East through online public diplomacy. Two Arab-American employees of the State Department are monitoring the Middle Eastern blogosphere and posting when they see an opportunity to present the American perspective on politics and violence in the region:
"The postings, are an effort to take a more casual, varied approach to improving America’s image in the Muslim world.
Brent E. Blaschke, the project director, said the idea was to reach “swing voters,” whom he described as the silent majority of Muslims who might sympathize with Al Qaeda yet be open to information about United States government policy and American values.
Some analysts question whether the blog team will survive beyond the tenure of Karen P. Hughes, the confidante of President Bush who runs public diplomacy. The department expects to add seven more team members within the next month — four more in Arabic, two in Farsi and one in Urdu, the official language of Pakistan.
The team concentrates on about a dozen mainstream Web sites such as chat rooms set up by the BBC and Al Jazeera or charismatic Muslim figures like Amr Khaled, as well as Arab news
sites like Elaph.com. They choose them based on high traffic and a focus on United States policy, and they always identify themselves as being from the State Department."
The bloggers attempt to create a discussion, an interaction which creates an image of openness for the U.S. government. The goal is not to argue about U.S. foreign policy and the war in Iraq. The interactive nature of blogging is ideally suited for this message of openness:
By participating in an open discussion in an interactive medium like blogging the State Department is seeking to improve the image of the U.S government and portray us as an open society ready for dialogue as well as war."Analysts said they had been surprised by the positive response, with people seemingly eager to engage, although the overall impact was impossible to assess. “They are not carrying the slogans of liberalization or democratization across the region,” said Adel al-Toraifi, a Saudi political analyst. “They are talking about peace and dialogue, and I think that makes it difficult for those debating them to justify criticizing them.”
Mr. Toraifi said the postings had generated some debate in the Arab world and had been the subject of a column in an Algerian newspaper lauding the State Department for discussing policy with ordinary people, something the writer said the Algerian government would never do.
Indeed, several analysts said having State Department employees on the Web helps to counter one source of radicalization — the sense that Washington is too arrogant to listen to the grievances of ordinary Arabs, so violence is the sole means to attract attention."
Is Blogging Worth the Time??
"I won't say that it's been a complete waste of time,but I can confidently say that it has not been a productive use of my time."He felt as though blogging has not helped him gain anymore business than his other websites, therefore it is not productive.
Gay Teenager Stirs A Storm
Down With Blogs
A Declaration of The Independence of Cyberspace
Lonely Girl or lonely viewers?
"Both sites drew contributions from novelists, journalists, academics, day traders, lawyers, bloggers, filmmakers, video game designers, students, housewives, bored youngsters and experts on religion and botany."
I think that it is safe to say that most of those viewers were 30 to 40 year old men who do nothing all day but surf the net for the most obscure viewing material there is. I also think that it would be safe to say that many of these men were doing more than just watching this thought to be young girl in the privacy of thier home. Im sure that many of them were fantasizing about meeting this lonelygirl and making all her loneliness go away. Get a hobby guys, but most of all, get a girlfriend!!
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Myspace...Stay Connected
Another blog about myspace. And after reading another article about myspace what could I do but blog about it? Myspace has become big, and by big I mean 26 million users big, and whale it catches some heat at times because of weirdoes and child molesters it is still a big part of most teens and young adults. It is a big part because it keeps people connected. Now don’t get me wrong, the people I have in my “Top Eight” are my friends and I usually know what’s going on in there lives and what there doing on the weekend, but myspace is key for those people you don’t see a lot or those people who go away to school in the fall. This along with keeping up to date with small local bands or even major label bands is a strong selling point of myspace, even thought myspace doesn’t need to be sold to anyone, and almost everyone is on it.
Although many people over 30 have never heard of MySpace, it has about 27 million members, a nearly 400 percent growth since the start of the year. It passed Google in April in hits, the number of pages viewed monthly, according to comScore MediaMetrix, a company that tracks Web traffic.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
First Essay Assignment
Due: Thursday, October 4th.
Write an essay answering the following question:
Describe your voyage of discovery into the blogosphere. What were your first impressions of blogging? What is blogging? What makes the blog form distinct from other forms of online communication and mass media? How is the relationship between the blogger and his or her audience different than other forms of media? What kinds of blogs exist in the blogosphere? What do you feel are the most important genres of blog? Give examples of your three favorite blogs and explain why you feel that they are significant. What do you feel are the most important roles played by bloggers today in politics, the news, business, the arts, or any other major topic of human affairs? Some bloggers feel that blogging is changing the world. Some critics feel that blogging is a lot of hype. Discuss the arguments for and against blogging as an important part of modern media and communications.
Your essay should be at least 5 typed, double-spaced pages in length. You must clearly and explicitly cite at least six sources of information in your essay. Do not plagiarize, use quotation marks and cite your sources clearly.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Inter-Sane
This article from the New York Times, "Lonely Gay Teen Seeking Same" by Jennifer Egan quotes what a young boy Jeffery thinks about the internet.
"The Internet is the thing that has kept me sane," he told me. "I live constantly in fear. I can't be my true self. My mom complains: 'I can see you becoming more detached from us. You're always spending time on the computer.' But the Internet is my refuge."
Living as a young gay teen he is constantly haunted by his lifestyle and by what society thinks of him. He is scared to come out with his sexual orientation and is hiding behind the internet. He like many other young teens use the internet as a sheild protecting them from the real world. He feels free when he goes online, he feels that he can be himself.
Later in the article she quotes
"Online boyfriends and girlfriends were common among the gay teenagers I spoke with. In some cases, the relationships had a sexual component, but what startled me was the level of closeness and intimacy teenagers derived from these cyberrelationships."
Showing how many teenager (especially gay teenagers)because of their insecurities develope online relationships that tend to even become serious. They often even talk about marriage and adopting kids without even meeting face to face. It was the sense of security without judgement from those around them that make them feel comfortable about being free online.
Gay Teen Online
After reading the article entitled “Gay Teenager Stirs a Storm” by Alex Williams I realized how much a person with a blog is exposed to the world, for better or worse. In this case it was both. This kid who goes by the name Zach was writing on his blog and even though he had come out earlier to his friends about being gay, he felt the need to write it on his blog for the world to see. A sure change of the times no doubt about it says the author of this article.
It was the sort of confession that a decade ago might have been scribbled in a teenager's diary, and then quietly tucked away in a drawerand that got me thinking about how online journals or blogs open people up to anyone looking around on the web. I thought journals were supposed to be something you kept private? Regardless, these times have changed and this kid posted his life online and was the focal point of the church as well as a boot camp to kick the gayness out of you that goes by the name of Love In Action Intl. Tons of support would pour in from people around the world as Zach went to this boot camp. People were made aware of it due to his posting on his blog. The amount of interest and political action ranged from comments on his blog page to protests outside the camp, and whale it didn’t stir up a national issue (I follow the news a lot and am just finding out about this now), it did reach a lot of people. All because a few ones and zeros put together formed some text online. Amazing.
Monday, September 17, 2007
All Classes Cancelled: Tuesday 9/18
Classes will also be cancellled throughout the day of September 18, 2007 as a result of this situation.
Please visit the College website (www.oldwestbury.edu) or call 516-876-3030 for updates."
--Michael Kinane, Assistant to the President for Advancement
Online Blogs and There Impact
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Game Playing and Virtual Reality Blog
Come join the Game Playing and Virtual Reality Blog! Discuss what the future holds for this technological advancement, only seen previously as science fiction in the movies. With things like Online Gaming, Second Life, and other ways of bringing people together with game playing; that fiction is becoming reality.
Check it out here
Monday, September 10, 2007
Bits: A New Link to a New York Times Tech Blog
I have added a link to this blog under "useful links" in the sidebar. It is an example of a well-written tech blog for you to use to keep up on the latest news of the digital revolution."news and analysis on the technology industry throughout the day with posts about the inventors and dealmakers trying to master and profit from the digital age. We cover start-ups, giant enterprises, government policies and the way technology is used around the world."
Labels: announcement, links
The Independence of Cyberspace
"Cyberspace does not lie within your borders. Governments derive their just powers from thee consent of the governed. You have neither solicited nor received ours."
"You are terrified of your own children, since they are natives in a world where you will always be immigrants. Because you fear them, you entrust your bureaucracies with the parental responsibilities you are too cowardly to confront yourselves."
Too Many Creeps? Try Private Social Networks
This is an example of a professional social networking site, a "micro community" that will sell access to make money and then try to sell that exclusive clientele to advertisers."There, the thin and beautiful can post pictures, videos and information about themselves, find romantic matches and get deals on everything from cosmetic dentistry to clothes. Unlike other modeling-focused sites, ModelsHotel is for professional models only. No poseurs. No voyeurs. No exceptions.
"Our site is a digital velvet rope," says Mr. Lannung, who has rejected more than half of the more than 2,000 people who have attempted to register so far.
It's this promise of exclusivity that is drawing sponsors to the site.
Among its high-profile marketing partners: eccentric fashion design house Heatherette, Diesel jeans and luxury jeweler Piaget.
Just as models can get into the most exclusive night clubs, now online social networks may increasingly have their own "digital velvet ropes" to limit access to their preferred market.
ModelsHotel was created by a male model named Jesper Lannung. According to the Wall Street Journal, Lannung convinced one model to join "by assuring her that his site is similar to other social networks, 'but without the creepy people.' "
Source: Rachel Dodes, "Can Models Find Bliss Beyond a 'Digital Velvet Rope'?" Wall Street Journal, 09/10/07
Labels: social networks
Sunday, September 09, 2007
Implications of Cyber Communication
"The rules of this new communications medium stress ethics, transparency and honesty...and they have to have real passion/energy. Otherwise nobody listens/buys" (p.3).The fear of scruitiny affects what people have to express or stories that are published are tailored to suit what they think the people from the corporations want to hear . The Implications that arise ultimately affects businesses or consumer confidence.
Saturday, September 08, 2007
Down with blogs? Yes...Wait No!
I don’t blog at all, well unless it is required for a class at school, which in this case it is. And to tell you the truth, it isn’t bad at all. It is very interesting to get a feel for other people’s views about things that you may not normally chat about, or to just read a blog about something you are interested in. I read the article entitled Down With Blogs… by Ed Heresniak and it got me thinking about blogs and the point of them. And well, I still don’t know the point of them but there is one out there somewhere. Blogs are the new “letters to the editor” in your local newspaper except with a much larger audience and much greater power to reach random people. Think about it, you can be cursing around online looking at or for something and then you see a link… so you click that link and it takes you to point b and then c and so on and so on and eventually sometimes you end up on a page with some text in somewhat of a paragraph with bad spelling and grammar. Bam! It’s a blog… about something right? Well maybe or maybe not. There are millions of blogs out there from how to care for your pet rock to peoples opinions about the current presidency. And that’s all very nice but people don’t care. They may care for the 10 minutes they read it, but that’s all it is, a time consumer. Most blogs are garbage or peoples opinions about things you may never have heard of. But there is always that great search bar where you can find something \you are interested in and read and read and lose brain cells by the second. The truth is this, you may have read what I just typed and thought deeply about whatever I tried to make sense of a few lines up, but most likely your just about to click to a different page. And that’s fine, that’s what makes blogs so great I guess, is that you can get rid of them if you don’t like the content. I hope it doesn’t sound like I am bashing blogs because I don’t think I am, im just trying to make it clear that a lot of the blogs out there don’t matter, but there are some that do.
Blogs are important in this day and age because with news corporations like Fox News Corp and other big time cable news channels basically running the world, the people need an outlet, and they need more then ten lines in the back of a newspaper or magazine. Blogs can be used to fight back against news that is fed to us, and blogs fight with the truth…well sometimes, and facts…sometimes. In the article, Ed Heresniak said…
“I think the rise of blogs and other forms of Web-based meandering through primary or allegedly primary sources for news and information is directly related to the much-reported collapse of reliable, trusted news sources and their conversion to marketing shills, promoting either themselves or others for a fee.”And I do agree with him. Blogs arose because technology is better then ever and more accessible then ever. You can blog from your cell phone if you want! Blogs don’t replace the news or newspapers but did any educated person really pay attention to Fox News talking about god knows what? Times have changed but news hasn’t, we the people now report the news because we can’t trust the big news corporations, but can you really trust every person to bring you the truth? The answer is no, but with the rise in blogs and links to everything in those blogs it will at least get people thinking. Blogs kick-start the brain.
Labels: Blog, Fox News, Heresniak
Thursday, September 06, 2007
IN Class
In December, officials say, the agencies will introduce A-Space, a top-secret variant of the social networking Web sites MySpace and Facebook. The “A” stands for “analyst,” and where Facebook users swap snapshots, homework tips and gossip, intelligence analysts will be able to compare notes on satellite photos of North Korean nuclear sites, Iraqi insurgents and Chinese missiles.
Labels: class
Myspace is addictive
"According to Alexa Internet, MySpace
is currently the world's sixth most popular English-language website and the
sixth most popular website in any language,[2] and the third most
popular website in the United States, though it
has topped the chart on various weeks[3]. The
service has gradually gained more popularity than similar websites to achieve
nearly 80% of visits to online social networking websites.[3] It has
become an increasingly influential part of contemporary popular culture,
especially in English speaking countries.[citation
needed]"
Sunday, September 02, 2007
The internet…millions of users in 1995? Who knew?
Yes it is true; the internet is not just an overnight sensation. It has been around for over a decade, but more recently has become the new medium for news, work, and entertainment. And as much as people are worried today that the internet dilutes some news and makes books a thing of the past, there were worries of this even in the early days of the net, you know, dial up connections and AOL. Even now with the shift from only millions of users to billions and more, the debate over the internet wages on. Purists believe that things like celebrity gossip web sites and the millions of bloggers worldwide are the lowest form of news, ideas and thought. Yes you and I may have a great idea or point about a subject, but unless we are sitting down in a room typing it up on a typewriter, we may and will be judged. Books were once believed to be the highest form of though and intelligence and many people bought into this and read them. That’s fine because those were the times. Well times have changed…a lot. Some people like Sven Birkerts, who contributed to the document I am referring to believes that the internet is a distraction and that the information taken from it is not as valid as information from a book.
“The preferred medium for me is the word on the page, alone, with an implicit recognition that I'm not going to be there to gloss and elucidate and expand on it. It drives me, as a writer, to find the style that will best express my ideas. I would write very differently if I were typing on a terminal and my readers were out there already asking me questions
