Tag Archives: Politics

Satellites to the Rescue

Here’s a piece I wrote for the Bulletin of the World Health Organisation on how satellites and space technology are helping, and might help, in the case of big medical emergencies, from earthquakes to Ebola. It’s a slightly different tack for me and perhaps not the usual fare for loose wire blog, but I thought… Read More »

The Real, Sad Lesson of Burma 2007

Reuters I fear another myth is in the offing: that Burma’s brief uprising last month was a tipping point in citizen journalism. Take this from Seth Mydans’ (an excellent journalist, by the way; I’m just choosing his piece because it’s in front of me) article in today’s IHT: “For those of us who study the… Read More »

Poisoning the Digital Well

I’m following events in Burma as closely as most, partly because I covered the last uprising 19 years ago. Back then plain clothes officers would spread rumors about poisoned water pots placed around the city for demonstrators to drink from. Now they’re apparently trying to poison the well of pooled information, if this excellent BBC… Read More »

“Tiny, Feisty Women”, Internet Costs (And a Survey)

 I love an AP story in a recent IHT about Le Hien Duc, a gray-haired 75-year-old grandmother who has become the scourge of corrupt officials in Vietnam. But it was one sentence towards the end of the piece that caught my eye: Duc runs her crusade from her narrow, three-story home in Hanoi, where her… Read More »

Cyberwar, Or Just a Taste?

Some interesting detail on the Estonian Cyberwar. This ain’t just any old attack. According to Jose Nazario, who works at ARBOR SERT, the attacks peaked a week ago, but aren’t over: As for how long the attacks have lasted, quite a number of them last under an hour. However, when you think about how many… Read More »