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Facebook and Identification: Caught in a Lie?

In the Wall Street Journal, Geoffrey Fowler has a piece on Facebook asking for real-life identification. Due to a recent bout of spamming, Facebook asked a number of users to verify their identity by submitting–on the site–a copy of their real-life identification. I’ve been aware of this for some time, but here’s what I found [...]

19.11.2010

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Facebook and Saudi Arabia

I went offline for this weekend (complete radio silence) for the first time in years.  Of course, during that time, Saudi Arabia had to go and block Facebook the media went crazy reporting that Saudi Arabia blocked Facebook, but Saudi netizens are saying there was no actual block.  And then unblock Facebook.  It’s almost as [...]

14.11.2010

4 Comments

It Gets Better

I’ve been following the It Gets Better project and wishing I had something new to say about it; I don’t, but that’s okay–the hundreds of gay, lesbian, straight, bi, trans, and questioning folks who have recorded videos for the project have said so much already, and I’d rather share their words anyhow (I also donated, [...]

12.11.2010

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Israel as “Safe Haven” for Arabs

An interesting bit in today’s Jerusalem Post; Egyptian journalist Nabil Sharaf Eldin argues, in a rather poorly written piece, that as a journalist, he is safer in Israel than in much of the region.  His ultimate point?  That as a journalist who refuses to mince words in respect to Arab regimes, he is unsafe in [...]

11.11.2010

21 Comments

What do we lose and what do we gain, by the online constant?

I had the great pleasure yesterday of giving a talk to the (high school) students of Beaver Country Day School; the general theme (and the impetus for my invitation) was this piece I wrote a couple of weeks ago for Al Jazeera, in which I argued: It is imperative that we teach young people not [...]

09.11.2010

2 Comments

“The Internet? Bah!”

Check out these gems from Newsweek, 1995: Visionaries see a future of telecommuting workers, interactive libraries and multimedia classrooms. They speak of electronic town meetings and virtual communities. Commerce and business will shift from offices and malls to networks and modems. And the freedom of digital networks will make government more democratic.Baloney. Do our computer [...]

08.11.2010

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No Justice for Oscar Grant

In the early morning hours of New Year’s Day 2009, responding to reports of fighting on the BART in Oakland, officers arrived on the scene and detained a group of young men.  One of the officers, Johannes Mehserle, pinned a young man to the ground, face-down.  The young man, Oscar Grant III, may or may [...]

05.11.2010

2 Comments

Restoring Sanity: More Media Than Politics

This past weekend, as many of you already know, I traveled to Washington, D.C. for Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert’s Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear.  I had purchased plane tickets barely twenty minutes after the event was announced, honestly, along with a few friends and colleagues.  I couldn’t resist – after wasting a Saturday [...]

02.11.2010

4 Comments