Online Dispute Resolution: Theory and Practice | A Treatise on Technology and Dispute Resolution

Till I received a PDF of the chapter I wrote for Online Dispute Resolution: Theory and Practice: A Treatise on Technology and Dispute Resolution as it appears in the tome, I had entirely forgotten about it. Ethan, Daniel and Mohamed are three of the finest minds in ODR today, and writing this chapter for them was […]

ICT4Peace: Beyond Crisis Mapping

At the invitation of Crisis Mappers, I delivered a presentation on ICT4Peace to an audience from around the world at an ungodly hour in Sri Lanka yesterday. Though Jen Ziemke’s notice on the Crisis Mappers website noted that I would be talking about the latest in the field, when in fact I spoke about the […]

Behind the scenes: How to upgrade a citizen journalism website

Updated 22nd December 2010 with list of plugins used on the site. Groundviews launched its new version today. It was a radical departure from the look and feel of the old and first version to the new avatar. Old / original version Current version Counting articles and comments, Groundviews has, at last count, well over […]

Groundviews and ICT4Peace profiled in Fast Company

Fast Company profiles Groundviews and my work on ICT4Peace in an article by Jenara Nerenberg published today on their website. Hattotuwa now serves as Special Adviser to the Geneva-based ICT4Peace Foundation affiliated with the United Nations to leverage his real-world experience in new media and citizen journalism to help with crisis response, early warning and […]

The demise of G.ho.st: Two years too late

TechCrunch reports that G.ho.st will shut down in two weeks. I extensively reviewed G.ho.st in 2008 after fantastic claims made in the media and by its makers that the online OS was somehow so novel as to contribute even to peacebuilding in the Middle East. Two years ago I called G.ho.st a sham, destined for […]

ICT4Peace: Beyond the hype

This is a presentation I gave today to students from the Southern Methodist University (SMU) on the invitation of Dan Rainey, the Director of the Office of Alternative Dispute Resolution Services (ADRS) for the National Mediation Board, and the agency’s Ombudsman. The presentation covers aspects of my work using ICTs for citizen journalism and peacebuilding […]

Information and Technology for socio-political Change

I had an interesting interaction this morning with Christina Goodness and a group of graduate students in New York University on Sri Lanka, touching upon the challenges it faces post-war and the ways in which information and technology can play a role in more systemic peacebuilding and reconciliation. The class wiki (as PDF here), largely […]

Ushahidi’s Goma release incorporates features from ICT4Peace Foundation’s crisis information management prototype

Ushahidi’s launched a major new update to their platform called Goma. I’m looking forward to downloading their new thin client mobile apps. Their J2ME app does not yet support the Blackberry Bold, so I’m going to download the Windows Mobile version of it on a Samsung i780 later today. I was very pleased to see […]

Is the LTTE really finished and the War over? videos watched over 37,000 times

Is the LTTE really finished and the War over? is a series of short videos in English, Sinhala and Tamil featuring promiment politicians, former LTTE members, academics and civil society activists. The 24 videos in this series have been viewed, just a few days after they were uploaded, well over 37,000 times collectively. Some videos […]

ICT: Peace 2.0

The Chairman of the ICT4Peace Foundation has a great interview with the International Relations and Security Network on the use of Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) in peacebuilding. The podcast is available here.