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We Have Joined Facebook

BY Nancy Scola | Monday, November 8 2010

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A Spot of Tech with the PM's Toast

BY Nancy Scola | Thursday, October 14 2010

From the UK Conservatives' Flickr feed: "The Prime Minister David Cameron has a piece of toast and checks the web on an iPad." Read More

Listen: National Archives' Digital Services Director on the UK's New Leg Site

BY Nancy Scola | Thursday, August 19 2010

Here's a bit more on the UK's new legislative website I noted yesterday: O'Reilly Radar's Alex Howard has a 19-minute audio interview with John Sheridan, the National Archives' (UK) head of e-services in which Sheridan ... Read More

The UK Gets Its Law Dot Gov

BY Nancy Scola | Wednesday, August 18 2010

The United Kingdom's National Archives has launched Legislation.gov.uk, an online home for legislation from 1267 to the present day. That's not a typo. That's just an old, old country. Read More

Thank You for Not Emailing

BY Nancy Scola | Tuesday, August 10 2010

British MP Dominic Raab; photo by Miki Yamanouchi Read More

Britain's Cameron and Facebook's Zuckerberg Talk Deficit Reduction

BY Nancy Scola | Friday, July 9 2010

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Apps for the (American, Not British) People

BY Nancy Scola | Thursday, July 8 2010

Sunlight Foundation designer Ali Felski grades the revamped USA.gov, your portal unto the United States government, in light of the suggestions her org had previously made for the site. She raises a point that I'm ... Read More

Quote of the Day: Twitter as Joy Reactor

BY Nancy Scola | Monday, May 24 2010

Add one quantum to the sum of human happiness. Read More

Britain's First Social Media Election, or Not

BY Nancy Scola | Monday, May 3 2010

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Quote of the Day: Dean's Props to Lib Dems

BY Nancy Scola | Friday, April 23 2010

There are people in the Liberal Democratic Party who really understand the internet... It's very subtle -- there's a community out there -- they are one of the only parties in Europe who really understand how to use it. ... Read More

News Briefs

RSS Feed thursday >

Mastercard Funding New Mobile-Based Financial Services in Kenya (Updated)

MasterCard is funding a Grameen Foundation initiative to bring financial services to the poor and the unbanked in Kenya.

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Transparency and Public Shaming: Pakistan Tackles Tax Evasion

In Pakistan, where only one in 200 citizens files their income tax return, authorities published a directory of taxpayers' details for the first time. Officials explained the decision as an attempt to shame defaulters into paying up.

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wednesday >

Facebook Seeks Approval as Financial Service in Ireland. Is the Developing World Next?

On April 13 the Financial Times reported that Facebook is only weeks away from being approved as a financial service in Ireland. Is this foray into e-money motivated by Facebook's desire to conquer the developing world before other corporate Internet giants do? Maybe.

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The Rise and Fall of Iran's “Blogestan”

The robust community of Iranian bloggers—sometimes nicknamed “Blogestan”—has shrunk since its heyday between 2002 – 2010. “Whither Blogestan,” a recent report from the University of Pennsylvania's Iran Media Program sought to find out how and why. The researchers performed a web crawling analysis of Blogestan, survey 165 Persian blog users, and conducted 20 interviews with influential bloggers in the Persian community. They found multiple causes of the decline in blogging, including increased social media use and interference from authorities.

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tuesday >

Weekly Readings: What the Govt Wants to Know

A roundup of interesting reads and stories from around the web. GO

Russia to Treat Bloggers Like Mass Media Because "the F*cking Journalists Won't Stop Writing"

The worldwide debate over who is and who isn't a journalist has raged since digital media made it much easier for citizen journalists and other “amateurs” to compete with the big guys. In the United States, journalists are entitled to certain protections under the law, such as the right to confidential sources. As such, many argue that blogging should qualify as journalism because independent writers deserve the same legal protections as corporate employees. In Russia, however, earning a place equal to mass media means additional regulations and obligations, which some say will lead to the repression of free speech.

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Politics for People: Demanding Transparent and Ethical Lobbying in the EU

Today the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency and Ethics Regulation (ALTER-EU) launched a campaign called Politics for People that asks candidates for the European Parliament to pledge to stand up to secretive industry lobbyists and to advocate for transparency. The Politics for People website connects voters with information about their MEP candidates and encourages them to reach out on Facebook, Twitter or by email to ask them to sign the pledge.

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monday >

Security Agencies Given Full Access to Telecom Data Even Though "All Lebanese Can Not Be Suspects"

In late March, Lebanese government ministers granted security agencies unrestricted access to telecommunications data in spite of some ministers objections that it violates privacy rights. Global Voices reports that the policy violates Lebanon's existing surveillance and privacy law, Law 140, but has gotten little coverage from the country's mainstream media.

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