“Habitat JAM,” The Canadian-sponsored online forum on urban sustainability starts today and runs through Saturday, December 3. I’m signed up to help with some of the facilitating / moderating duties. I hear that 28,000 folks have signed up for the three-day virtual conference. Habitat JAM is a preparatory event to the third session of the…
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly at the Tunis WSIS
In December 2003, Ralf Bendrath and I put together a listing of the high and low points from the Geneva World Summit on the Information Society, which we called "How Was the Summit?" In that same spirit, we submit to you our very personal take on the best and worst of the Tunis WSIS. The…
Mousers – Cat versus Tech
So living in New York, you have the typical rude inhabitants — the guy who take up three seats on the subway, bike messengers zooming down sideways, the surly waitroid at the corner diner. And that’s just the humans. Everyone living in the city, whether on Central Park West or Avenue D, has to deal…
This is what a government-filtered internet looks like
It apparently looks like a 404 “Site Not Found” Error. The Register IT news site did a story yesterday on how the Tunisian authorities are surreptitiously blocking access to content on the internet deemed offensive to the regime by throwing up fake 404 “site not found” errors. They do this by reportedly using web filtering…
How will you celebrate World Information Society Day?
How are you going to celebrate Information Society Day? Send an e-greeting card to Tim Werners-Lee Get all online gamers to respect virtual “cease-fire” on Quake and Halo Email 12 of your friends and family a message that Mr. Yoshio Utsumi, head of the ITU, will give each of them $50 if they forward this…
A note of thanks to WSIS civil society
Well, its all over. Too much to sum up right now. But I just sent this message to the WSIS civil society listserv. Yesterday afternoon, the smiling, broad face of President Ben Ali appearing simultaneously on every flat screen display in the entire Kram convention center signalled the final end of the World Summit on…
e-Democracy, ICT4Peace and Alternative Media
Today is the first day that I have been able to attend some parallel events at the WSIS, with my major responsibilities completed. Lots of interesting things going on around the Kram Centre. I spent the morning at a panel organized by UBUNTU and the CRIS campaign with the unwieldy title of “Which Reforms of…
Shirin Ebadi addresses Tunis
Yesterday, Iranian human rights activist Ms. Shirin Ebadi addressed the opening ceremony of the WSIS on behalf of civil society. It was a moving moment for many of us. The text of Shirin Ebadi’s speech in French can be found on the WSIS website. Among the main points of her speech: She drew attention to…
Tunis calls for Information Society Commission and IG Forum
The final Tunis documents were released this morning to be adopted by governments at the World Summit on the Information Society. The official Tunis texts can be downloaded from the WSIS website. I have put up not-so-beautiful html versions of the “Tunis Agenda” (action document) and the “Tunis Commitments” (political chapeau) documents. Among the main…
Tunisian authorities harass human rights activists
We’re receiving alarming reports that human rights activists are being harassed, prevented from meeting, and even brutalized by Tunisian police during the last couple of days. Worldsummit2005.org, run by the Boell Foundation, and the Association for Progressive Communications are reporting that the site of a preparatory meeting for a “Citizen’s Summit” was blocked by Tunisian…