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The Risk of Facebook Activism in the New Arab Public Sphere

Over at The Arabist, Issandr El Amrani ruminates on Facebook’s role in Middle Eastern politics, a subject I’ve had my eye on for quite some time.  Drawing on the recent example of Egyptian reformer El Baradei and his enormous Facebook following, El Amrani marvels at the level of Facebook use for activism in the region. […]

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On Frontiers

A million years ago, in a life I no longer recognize as mine, I knew a boy who was obsessed with frontiers. We would talk, sprawled out on the floor, about dreams and futures. Like me, he was terrified of commitment and we clung to a shared ideal of smashing walls and chasing the sunset. […]

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Filtering Sex in the Arab World

From the OpenNet Initiative blog (which I edit and curate): Google’s recent decision to stop filtering keywords on its Chinese platform, Google.cn, sparked discussion in the media about the role of corporations in controlling access to online material in repressive nations. Microsoft recently added a new layer of complexity to the ongoing debate regarding the […]