Bad Blogger

I was planning on doing another post this morning before I went off to work, but then I saw this article, and knew I had to say something.

By BRADLEY S. KLAPPER, Associated Press Writer
Tue May 27

GENEVA - The Red Cross warned Tuesday of a possible surge in "food-related violence" because of soaring prices that are increasing hunger around the world.

Most of the debate surrounding the global food crisis has focused on boosting aid to poorer countries, but there is also concern about the potential for violence as people become desperate for food, said Jakob Kellenberger, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Kellenberger, whose agency serves as the guardian of the Geneva Conventions on the rules of war, said fallout from rising prices has already sparked violence, alluding to food riots that erupted in Haiti, Egypt and Somalia.

It's not just a matter of higher prices, he said. "It becomes a question of survival, of just having access to food."

Because this post was of a more serious nature than I usually get into in this blog-- and because of the fact that I usually do considerably more research for my newsblog, Media Vulture, I decided to do my full report there, titled Let them eat sand.

Since I started my new job, which ends up consuming well over the normal 40 hours of work per week, I had to shape this story up in a hurry, so I'll ask you to forgive me if it's not the most well-crafted piece I've ever done there.

and btw... this thing about food riots spreading worldwide really has me quite upset.

(I've completely forgotten what I thought was so important when I left home this morning...)

Evidence from Mountain View: Google is in favor of censorship and against human rights

Slowly even the Google stock holders are beginning to realize that the “cool” company has quite a few things to catch up on regarding data protection and privacy, and that Google has some enormous deficits in its attitude toward censorship and human rights. At the upcoming stockholders meeting on the 8th of May these topics are on the agenda. The “Googlers” will most probably not deal with these questions for a long period of time and will push the topics aside as fast as possible – as the agenda proves. I recommend that those who still think Google is a “good company, which does no evil” should read the “2008 Annual Meeting of Stockholders Notice of the Annual Meeting and Proxy Statement”.

The New Yorker Office of the Comptroller of New York City and the monastery “St. Scholastica” have proposed, that Google should oppose censorship, support the right for freedom of opinion and press, and should no longer store user data.

Here are the claims in detail:
1) Data that can identify individual users should not be hosted in Internet restricting countries, where political speech can be treated as a crime by the legal system.
2) The company will not engage in pro-active censorship.
3) The company will use all legal means to resist demands for censorship. The company will only comply with such demands if required to do so through legally binding procedures.
4) Users will be clearly informed when the company has acceded to legally binding government requests to filter or otherwise censor content that the user is trying to access.
5) Users should be informed about the company’s data retention practices, and the ways in which their data is shared with third parties.
6) The company will document all cases where legally-binding censorship requests have been complied with, and that information will be publicly available.

And here is the answer/recommendation by the Google Directors:
Recommendation: Our board of directors recommends a vote AGAINST the stockholder proposal.


and from WebGuild.org:

Google Assists Indian Police Arrest Student

Google provided Indian police with information that led to the arrest of 22 year IT professional, Rahul Vaid, on Friday (May 16, 2008).

Vaid posted derogatory content about Congress chief Sonia Gandhi on a orkut community named — “I hate Sonia Gandhi”. The messages were circulated through an email address – Rahulvaidindia@gmail.com, which is operated by Google's Gmail.

The investigation began in December 2007 when the cyber crime cell of Pune police communicated with the Google seeking details about the identity of the person who formed the forum and circulated the obscene content.

On Friday evening a team of Indian police arrived at the home of Rakul Vaid in Gurgaon city, Haryana. He was arrested and flown to Pune where he was arrigned on Saturday. Vaid was charged under section 292 of Indian Penal Code and section 67 of the Information Technology Act because he created a profile and then posted content in vulgar language about Sonia Gandhi in the community. If proved guilty, Vaid could be imprisoned for up to five years and may have to pay a fine up to Rs. 100,000.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, Returning to My Roots, I've decided to return to my journalism roots, and resume posting to a blog focussing on News and Media Criticism called Media Vulture.

From the New York Times article:

In a move that legal experts said could present a major test of First Amendment rights in the Internet era, a federal judge in San Francisco on Friday ordered the disabling of a Web site devoted to disclosing confidential information.

The site, Wikileaks.org, invites people to post leaked materials with the goal of discouraging “unethical behavior” by corporations and governments. It has posted documents concerning the rules of engagement for American troops in Iraq, a military manual concerning the operation of prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and other evidence of what it has called corporate waste and wrongdoing.

(read my post on Wordpress for more details)

Oddly, this ruling gave more publicity to the Wikilinks website than they could possibly have gained for themselves, and the plaintiff, Julius Baer Bank and Trust, inadvertantly brought a ton of attention and scrutiny to their shady dealings-- just as they were planning to take the company public on the NYSE.

In researching this story, I found myself "going down the rabbit hole" into a motherlode of Alternative News, and I really haven't had time to sift through all of it-- especially if you include the many crazed conspiracy theorists. (actually, the reality is weird enough. check out the text of HR 1955, passed by Congress, which you can view on the US Government website at http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=110_cong_bills&docid=f:h1955eh.txt.pdf. I especially like lines 18 - 22, which specifically prohibits "thought-crime")

(2) VIOLENT RADICALIZATION.—The term ‘violent radicalization’ means the process of adopting
or promoting an extremist belief system for the purpose of facilitating ideologically based violence to advance political, religious, or social change.