Reading blogs #8
Here is what we got since the last digest:
Please share your thoughts about this rubric and whether or not I am missing interesting stuff.
Internet Governance Forum took place in Hydarabad, India, between 3-6 in December. Following are some snippets of information about the event that reached my RSS feeds. If you happen to know about a way to get video recordings of the debates, please (PLEASE!!!) let me know.
- “UN Internet Governance Forum 2008: Friends And Foes, But More Friends” – I think this is a rather good overview of the process, particularly for those who have never discovered interest in this before.
- “The Path Towards Centralization of Internet Governance Under the UN” – Another review and some opinions on the subject with an emphasis on the opinions part.
- “IGF 2008: Content in local languages is as essential as connectivity” – Interesting point and one of the aspects of the “digital divide” that is being discussed in academic literature. I wonder if this will mark a move of this aspect into the mainstream discourse about “digital divide”.
- “Internet Governance must ensure freedom of expression and universal access, UNESCO says” – Another piece in the Internet Governance debate.
- “China threatens to leave IGF” – Milton Mueller’s observations from the meeting.
- “Security at the IGF: Just Give Me the Money” and “DNSSEC, Incentives and the Color of Bicycle Sheds” – Michel van Eeten’s reflections from the meeting. Interestingly, Patrik Fältström, responded to Michel van Eeten’s critique int he first post here – “Just give me the money” – then Milton Mueller summarized their debate in yet another post on IGP – “What is the IGF for?” – which yielded another responce from Patrik Fältström – “Why do we have IGF?“. Finally, Brenden Kuerbis tried to summarize it all and offer a number of additional observations – “IGF 2008: Epilogue“. Interesting exchange, you may want to read it even if you choose to skip all the other IGF related links.
Interesting reports, numbers, and visualizations
“Latin America welcomes 2009 with 388Mn mobile lines” – Some highlights about South American mobile market, such as – “Mobile penetration reaches 68.5% in Mexico“.
“Despite growth, fixed lines subscribers declining in Asia” – Not a surprising argument with some numbers in its own support.
“Global Internet Map” – Another interesting report from TeleGeography. The blog post is of course a promotion, but it gives you an insight about the data they have, which may be super interesting to work with.
“TV Viewing and Internet Use Converge” – Some data from Nielsen showing that those who watch more TV are also heavier internet users.
“Adults and Video Games” – A recent PEW report showing that adults are actually pretty heavy gamers. Interesting. Maybe this (at least partially) explains why in the US – “Broadband Users On Quest For Speed“.
“The Future of the Internet III” – Another PEW report based on a survey of “internet leaders, activists and analysts”; I do not like to post here predictions, but I think this survey pictures more the current climate of opinions about the technology, rather than some sort of futuristic thinking.
“Rise of Online Universities Continues in Recession” – Hitwise Intelligence suggests that the recession is driving people towards online education; even though there are still significant gaps in popularity between traditional institutions and the online ones, the latter are on the rise and interest in them is correlated with low socioeconomic status.
“China tops engineering publications list” – The volume of Chinese engineering papers and the degree to what they are getting cited are on the rise; the only unclear aspect of this news item is whether or not it all happens in Chinese or in English or any other language/s.
“The data behind ICT and climate change” – Marisa Ahmad of Intel summarizes some ICT and climate change reports; it is an interesting issue to pay attention to.
“Survey: Global entrepreneurs haven’t given up yet” – A beam of light in the dark cloud of economic recession.
“IDPM’s Impact Assessment Compendium” (DOC file; via mmd4d) – A group at the University of Manchester published a rather extensive document (about 200 pages) about assessment of ICT4D projects. I have not read it all and not in depth, but it looks promising.
“Why are Child Soldiers & Prostitution in OLPC Videos?!” – As you may know, there is a “Give 1 Get 1″ program going on right now and OLPC has launched a series of advertisements; one of them, mentioned in this post is viewed as controversial as it shows child soldier and child prostitution as social ills the project is trying to address. What do you think about it?
“Web accessibility moves forward as WCAG 2.0 comes into force” – A new version of standards for website accessability has been released.
“EU adopts new Safer Internet Programme” – I need to read the original article, but this news blurb does not provide much support to the dangers actually existing out there; what it does, it provides data about parents’ concerns.
“Nude pics this year’s must-have Xmas gift for teens” – Blorge summarises a Cosmogirl survey with some worrying data about the ease with which teenagers exchange sex-related content online; it got me thinking again that filtering of online content is not a sustainable solution to “guard” the kids from potential dangers of the internet, it’s much more deeper and complex issue to deal with and it goes back to education.
“Politicians and reporters row over free broadband plans” – A followup of the debates over the FCC’s plans to auction spectrum freed up by the switch to digital broadcasting.
“Growth Slows for Video Game Market” – Even the gaming market is subject to a recession.
“What’s the revenue model for social networking sites?” – I raised this question in the past and reached a similar conclusion – there is none at the moment.
“Long Tails: just how we roll” (via A Blog Around The Clock) – An analysis of connectedness of science blogs – interesting..
“Power Law of Participation” – Another look at the ‘long tail’ idea, but this time from the point of view of content production.
“Networked Student” – Story of an actual educational project using an innovative approach to education. Please take a look at the video below; I would be really interested to hear what you think.
I will probably get back to this later, as recently checking over 150 papers in a row, I had some thoughts that may be related.
“Has Bild stumbled upon a clever business model for news?” – An interesting case on Online Journalism Blog about a German newspaper experimenting with participatory journalism.
“Why Doesn’t Anyone Comment on Your Blog?” (via A Blog Around The Clock) – A rather thoughtful post about comments and blogging. I do many times think why people rarely comment here.
“And the winners were…” (via LIRNEasia) – The economist announces its choice of best technological innovation in 2008.
“Bloggers vs. Journalists morphs into Twitterers vs. Journalistsface” – Recent events in Mumbai highlighted the complex relationships between traditional journalism and the “new” media; this is one take on it.
“Estonia allows cellphone voting” – This is actually quite an interesting idea…
“You’re Leaving a Digital Trail. What About Privacy?” – An interesting article from NY Times, which feeds well into the following report – “Most Mobile Users Carry Phone ‘At All Times’” – thanks to Norman’s FriendFeed.
“The plan for broadband” – Change.gov is following up on the follow ups to Obama’s weekly address in which he talked about the digital divide; I am a little bit worried about the collection of technocratic statements of support to the internet’s ability to fix everything.
“President 2.0” – An interesting analysis of Obama’s use of MICT published by Newsweek.
“Does Obama Need a Department of Innovation?” – Good question!
“The trouble with participatory government is that anyone can participate” – Megan’s first-hand experience on change.gov; not to suggest that it is representative, but it highlights some of the difficulties this approach is facing.
“Health reform that goes from the grassroots up” – Obama transition team keeps on innovating with technology; now they are promoting community discussions of their proposed policies.
Simply Interesting, Fun, and Coll Stuff
“Game industry maverick Bernie Stolar: unplugged and worried about crappy games” – An interesting interview with a man who was “games evangelist at Google”; I wonder how does one become games evangelist or eevn technology evangelist for that matter?
“Library of Alexandria goes online for science education” – It is coming back and it is digital!
“Social status shapes racial identity” – If I understand this correctly, this research shows that race is partially socially constructed, but I am not completely sure I undersatnd how that works – need more details about the actual study.
“Give Real makes it easier to get drunk for the holidays” – Facebook gifts are getting real!
“Animal Superpowers” – A fun video from the “Good” magazine about a couple of guys in UK who build devices that imitate animals’ sences for kids to learn biology in a more fun way. Here it is:
“Lego Mindstorms NXT for the XO Laptop” – Soon, you will be able to combine Lego robots with XO. In itself it looks interesting, but I wonder who the target audience are, because the Lego kit itself costs over $100; is it pushed to encourage people to participate with the G1G1 promotion?
“Book Review: The Manga Guide to Statistics” – Another way to approach education differently.
Viktor was at the Internet Governance Forum and might know how to get the video recordings of the debates. You can email him directly or if you wish I can ask him when he comes back from his holidays. He is now in Austria and will be back around the 9th Jan.
Thanks! I will ask him…