Tuesday, October 5, 2010
The Importance of Google Maps in Darfur
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has teamed up with Google Maps to bring visualization to the Crisis in Darfur. The Museums mapping initiatives are intended to collate and provide evidence through digital media and eyewitness testimony in Google Earth "to help inform citizens, governments, and institutions about current and potential genocides and related crimes against humanity". These types of initiatives are essentialy to the spread and understanding of the nature of genocides. Putting events to maps provides users with relatable information, and provides a context in which citizens are forced to face this travesty face-to-face.
The personal testimonies on the Google Map's layers of attacks in Darfur provide a completely personal experience and connection with the horrible occurrences in Darfur. This personal connection can provide users with powerful incentive to create change, or at least spread the word of what exactly is going on overseas.
Lisa Parks of UC Santa Barbara believes there are issues with the interface, as well as criticizes Google for its "involvement in the Crisis in Darfur project and use of it to market and extend its brand name..." Although the corporation's involvement in such a politically charged subject-matter can only be beneficial when trying to spread the word about the crisis, I do agree that Google's involvement will certainly only help their public image. Parks also argues that there is a disconnect between social and political change and showing images and testimonials online. She believes that just displaying digital documentations of the travesties occuring in Darfur isn't enough to ensue political change.
Google's involvement not only shows their interest in improving the lives and situations of others, but I think the company is using it's power and popularity to spread information about a very important issue. An issue that needs to be addressed and dealt with before our world is affected by any more genocides.
-Kate Aronson
The personal testimonies on the Google Map's layers of attacks in Darfur provide a completely personal experience and connection with the horrible occurrences in Darfur. This personal connection can provide users with powerful incentive to create change, or at least spread the word of what exactly is going on overseas.
Lisa Parks of UC Santa Barbara believes there are issues with the interface, as well as criticizes Google for its "involvement in the Crisis in Darfur project and use of it to market and extend its brand name..." Although the corporation's involvement in such a politically charged subject-matter can only be beneficial when trying to spread the word about the crisis, I do agree that Google's involvement will certainly only help their public image. Parks also argues that there is a disconnect between social and political change and showing images and testimonials online. She believes that just displaying digital documentations of the travesties occuring in Darfur isn't enough to ensue political change.
Google's involvement not only shows their interest in improving the lives and situations of others, but I think the company is using it's power and popularity to spread information about a very important issue. An issue that needs to be addressed and dealt with before our world is affected by any more genocides.
-Kate Aronson
US uses taxpayer dollars to purchase/destroy war memoir
The US Pentagon purchased 9,500 copies of a war memoir written by US Army Lt. Col Anthony Shaffer and subsequently burned them because they were deemed to be “a threat to national security.” The publisher was paid almost $50,000 of taxpayer dollars for printing costs before the book was pulled from the press.
A second, edited version of the book is going to be released; Operation Dark Heart: Spycraft and Special Ops on the Frontlines of Afghanistan, with some portions blocked out.
The New York Times acquired a copy of the book previous to the Pentagon pulling it from the publishers. The Times described the book as “a breezily written, first-person account of Colonel Shaffer’s five months in Afghanistan in 2003.” Wikileaks is said to release a copy soon.
These actions should be met with scrutiny by journalists and American citizens. Is the government trying to cover up unlawful actions taken during war? It definitely wouldn’t be the first time.
-Kate Aronson
A second, edited version of the book is going to be released; Operation Dark Heart: Spycraft and Special Ops on the Frontlines of Afghanistan, with some portions blocked out.
The New York Times acquired a copy of the book previous to the Pentagon pulling it from the publishers. The Times described the book as “a breezily written, first-person account of Colonel Shaffer’s five months in Afghanistan in 2003.” Wikileaks is said to release a copy soon.
These actions should be met with scrutiny by journalists and American citizens. Is the government trying to cover up unlawful actions taken during war? It definitely wouldn’t be the first time.
-Kate Aronson
Will Free Speech in China Ever Truly Exist?
Rebecca MacKinnon argues that the internet is a tool for political change in China. "Given the right circumstances, online citizens’ media such as blogs may indeed facilitate, amplify, and accelerate these causes. But blogs will not be the cause." She is under the assumption that people acting in large numbers under confident, persuasive leaders will be the cause of political change in China.
Blogging and freedom of speech are important to ensuing political and social change; however, with China owning "the most extensive, technologi-cally sophisticated, and broad-reaching system of Internet filtering in the world" (OpenNet Initiative 2005), the Chinese government has a lot of control over what type of information it's citizens can see.
Take the example of the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989. This event began with some intellectuals and students protesting the Chinese political system. The group of protestors eventually grew to be well over what the Chinese government believed was reasonable, and subsequently planned an attack on the protestors. Chinese military began approaching the square from all corners of the city. Protestors ran into the streets to block military tanks and vehicles, but were met with open fire.
The Chinese government reported 241 dead and 7,000 wounded; however, a document in Soviet archives suggested the actual death toll was around 3,000 protestors. The worst part is the the Chinese government tried to erase this massacre from its history.
The country has blocked all access to information about the massacre inside country lines. The government even blocked pages of the Economist which featured an article about the 10-year anniversary of the incident.
Can blogs create social change? Not when the government's technological sophistication mixed with its relentless communism block the majority from conspiring to have a voice. In order for this to change, the political structure of the government has to drastically change. However, communism has been running deep in China's blood fro quite sometime now; I don't see it erupting into anarchy anytime soon.
-Kate
Blogging and freedom of speech are important to ensuing political and social change; however, with China owning "the most extensive, technologi-cally sophisticated, and broad-reaching system of Internet filtering in the world" (OpenNet Initiative 2005), the Chinese government has a lot of control over what type of information it's citizens can see.
Take the example of the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989. This event began with some intellectuals and students protesting the Chinese political system. The group of protestors eventually grew to be well over what the Chinese government believed was reasonable, and subsequently planned an attack on the protestors. Chinese military began approaching the square from all corners of the city. Protestors ran into the streets to block military tanks and vehicles, but were met with open fire.
The Chinese government reported 241 dead and 7,000 wounded; however, a document in Soviet archives suggested the actual death toll was around 3,000 protestors. The worst part is the the Chinese government tried to erase this massacre from its history.
The country has blocked all access to information about the massacre inside country lines. The government even blocked pages of the Economist which featured an article about the 10-year anniversary of the incident.
Can blogs create social change? Not when the government's technological sophistication mixed with its relentless communism block the majority from conspiring to have a voice. In order for this to change, the political structure of the government has to drastically change. However, communism has been running deep in China's blood fro quite sometime now; I don't see it erupting into anarchy anytime soon.
-Kate
The truth about Wikileaks, according to GAP
In this video: Jesselyn Radack breaks down the truth about Wikileaks and its importance to free speech and the empowerment of American citizens. Radack is Human Rights Director for the Government Accountability Project. The GAP is a leading advocacy organization for whistleblowers. Be sure to check out her column in The Daily Kos too, where this story was originally posted.
-Kate
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