My friend Colin Rule’s put up this presentation on the use of Online Dispute Resolution (ODR) using mobiles in Afghanistan around which he and I had several rounds of email discussion. I have championed the use of mobiles in ODR for years, and it’s good to see initiatives such as this use infrastructure already present [...]
Archive | October, 2009
Peace on Facebook
The Persuasive Technology Lab of Stanford University seems to have teamed up with Facebook to create a dedicated page on Facebook celebrating initiatives and conversations using and on Facebook in support of peace. http://peace.facebook.com is in and of itself not a tool for peacebuilding, and does not for example point to the platform’s use in [...]
Brief note on the incorporation of ICT in draft National Policy on Local Government
This brief note I wrote for the Centre for Policy Alternatives responds to the following points enumerated in the National Policy on Local Government as published in the Daily News on 25th September 2009; 4.6.3 Information Communication Technology for Management Efficiency 4.6.3.1 In compliance to the state policy of ‘an efficient and people friendly public [...]
State of the blogosphere in 2009
Technorati’s State of the Blogosphere 2009 report is out, and as in previous years, makes for interesting reading. The findings help dispel somewhat the commonly held perception that those with the most influence online are ‘ordinary citizens’, when in fact many, as in Sri Lanka, come from privileged backgrounds. Importantly, this would not be the [...]
“My 104 characters did just fine.”
The New York Times has a fascinating story on how Twitter was used to circumvent a court imposed gag order on an important story related to shady activities of a multinational corporation. The article ends by noting that, There is a danger in overpraising a tool like Twitter at the expense of the words it [...]
The premier location on the web for progressive content and debates on post-war Sri Lanka
Post-war, Groundviews has fast become the most frequented website in Sri Lanka for progressive, civil debate over content critically analyzing peace, governanc, democracy and other vital issues. There is no comparable website to date in the country, even amongst mainstream media on the web. The staggering volume of sui generis content on Groundviews, since 2006 [...]
How to identify a fake Facebook profile. Not.
Sri Lanka Watch reports that, According to intelligence reports, a massive fake facebook scam is underway by certain individuals to collect personal photos and information of people for commercial and other purposes. This is the latest Internet scam that is common in Colombo and Kandy areas. Sri Lanka Watch, in a remarkable display of sheer [...]
Nepotism and significant corruption in Sri Lanka’s ICT Agency (ICTA)?
Anticorruptsl.com, a website of indeterminable origin, has a damning expose of significant corruption and nepotism in the operations of Sri Lanka’s Information and Communications Technology Agency (ICTA). The article, which is in Sinhala, points to nepotism in the award of key contracts and huge anomalies in pricing and procurement. Four key examples noted in this [...]
