Twitter Diplomacy via Jackfruity
San Francisco Demonstration in Solidarity with Gaza, from isa eUnless your holiday season involves complete and total hibernation, you've probably heard about this weekend's attacks in Gaza. More than 350 Palestinians and four Israelis have been killed so far, and neither Israel nor Hamas shows any sign of backing down.A few minutes ago I got an e-mail from Jill York announcing that the Israeli Consulate in New York will be holding a press conference this afternoon to field questions about Israel's offensive. Slight twist: they'll be holding it on Twitter, where they set up an account yesterday.Anyone can submit questions to @israelconsulate, and David Saranga, Consul of Media and Public Affairs in New York, will do his best to answer, either via Twitter or by posting a link to the...
Crossposted on The Morningside Post.Image from Desmond BlogBarack Obama has been called, by everyone from Columbia Law School professor Eben Moglen to media expert Jeff Jarvis, "the first candidate elected by the internet." By all accounts, online fundraising was a major factor in propelling Obama to the top, and his new Change.gov site lets Americans share their vision for the next administration.Now, as the Presidential transition is in process, Obama's team is taking Internet awareness one step further. If you're interested in working in a top position in the White House, the New York Times reports that you'd better be willing to divulge your blog, your Facebook profile, and "all aliases or ‘handles’ you have used to communicate on the Internet" in the past decade.I gave it a... 
Via Pernille:White African and Kenyan Pundit are presenting a new tool to chronicle the incidents of violence happening around Kenya. Check it out here: www.ushahidi.com. Ushahidi means witnessing in Kiswahili, and the website itself is quite and interesting way of using the Internet.Report Acts Of Violence In... 
Atis Originally uploaded by Farl. Jonathan Dommer explores The Rules of Beeping in Rwanda and India: Reports from the economic development community suggest that the practice is common across many African nations (Chipchase & Tulusan, 2007; McKemey et al., 2003; Oestmann, 2003; Samuel, Shah, & Hadingham, 2005) and is not limited to teens. Slater and Kwami (2005) describe flashing as both an economic and symbolic practice, noting how "Michael, a man who flashes the same five people every morning, is not merely keeping in touch but also discharging obligations and responsibilities" (p. 10). Sey (2007) describes flashing in Ghana as one of a set of cost-saving strategies developed by users. Others note that beeping conventions in Africa differ between men and women (Alhassan, 2004;...