KONY2012: Can Social Media Capture a War Criminal?

I blogged before about Kony, the infamous leader of the Lord's Resistance Army. For decennia, he has been terrorizing, first Uganda, and now, larger areas of the surrounding countries.

According to the guys from KONY2012, one of the reasons why Kony has not been captured, is lack of a lack of means and efforts. Those in turn, can only be possible if the public opinion pushes policy makers to allocate enough resources in order to smoke out an indicted mass murderer.

Thus, was the approach from KONY2012: "Make Kony Famous". And so came this video about. It has many stories, within the story. The story of the love of a father for his son, the impression an ex-child soldier and abducted Ugandan child, had on a film maker. How a mass movement can start with a single idea, loads of creativity. How one person can make a difference. And about the awesome power of social media.

This movie is the current Internet hit with over 52 million views, and counting.

Watch the movie, and sign the petition.

Read the full post...

Calling on the good and willing

After 17 years in the field, working in front line humanitarian emergency response, of which 15 years in food aid relief, I took a sabbatical break. Taking a distance allowed me to discover an other side of the humanitarian work, something more longer term, but with no less impact: agricultural development.

Over the past sabbatical year, I had the opportunity to work with a team at CGIAR, mostly on social media related projects. That work brought me to the field, talking to farmers about ways they adapt (or don’t) to the economic and climatic changes, their needs, their wishes,… I wrote about it, made videos, published pictures.. I realized the impact even small things can have, on their daily lives. I talked to researchers, to extension agents, to suppliers… In short, I got hooked.

At this moment, I have the opportunity to work with CGIAR on an event taking place in Nairobi on Sept 1^st, highlighting the importance of longer term agricultural research to augment the resilience of farmers confronted with a rapidly changing world, specifically related to the current drought (again) in the Horn of Africa.

The work of the CGIAR is not well known to the outside world. Having worked in food aid for the better part of my professional life, the CGIAR was certainly an unknown to me. It is part of my job is to make it known. And this is where you all can help, even though the effort is still at its early beginning (isn’t it great to be part of something from the start?).

We have set up a repository (in the form of a blog), in which I post simple examples of agricultural research the CGIAR is doing, particularly in the Horn, leading up to the Sept 1 event.

At the same time, we are “populating” a brand Twitter account @cgiarconsortium , using the hashtag #Ag4HoA (Agriculture for the Horn of Africa) for all tweets related to agricultural development. We started publishing development projects related to the Horn, but after Sept 1, we will broaden to other projects the CGIAR does, as time goes by.

On Sept 1^st (followed by another event on Sept 2^nd and 3^rd), I will be live blogging/tweeting from the event, using the same Twitter account.

Now where can you help?

Just as I called out to the social media community for the Addis Sharefair, I am calling out to you now. I am looking for people active in the social media community to help spreading our worthwhile message. You don't have to be related to development or agricultural research, but any reach you have within your own social community, can help.

I am looking for people who are willing to retweet, reblog, post our articles on Facebook, Google+, in short "make some social media noise". I have assembled a good list of people in an email list already, whom I update daily of the new events and posts we are broadcasting.

Are you willing to help? Leave a comment, or email me via peter (at) theroadtothehorizon (dot) org and I will include you on our mailing list.

I hope with this effort, we can do some good, make a change, and maybe contribute our small bit to make sure droughts and floods no longer turn into famine.

Maybe one day, we won't need to put up pictures of cattle starving due to a drought. Maybe one day, we will be able to publish pictures of thriving crops and well-fed cows, even though the area has been hit by yet another drought, or a flood.

Read the full post...

US military hijacks social media

The United States military is developing software that will let it secretly manipulate social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter by using fake online personas to influence Internet conversations and spread pro-American propaganda.

A Californian corporation has been awarded a contract with US Central Command (CENTCOM), which oversees US armed operations in the Middle East and Central Asia, to develop what is described as an "online persona management service" that will allow one US serviceman or woman to control up to 10 separate identities based all over the world.

The project has been likened by Web experts to China's attempts to control and restrict free speech on the Internet. Critics are likely to complain that it will allow the US military to create a false consensus in online conversations, crowd out unwelcome opinions and smother commentaries or reports that do not correspond with its own objectives. (Source)

Original picture courtesy Evan Vucci/AP

Read the full post...

Announcing my low traffic Twitter Feeds: The Two's

For almost a year, I have run a dozen Twitter accounts which are automatically fed with the latest posts from several of my blogs. Most of these Twitter accounts broadcast a dozen updates per hour.

Some people like the abundant stream of information, but others wanted less frequent tweets.

As an experiment, I have now released "The Two's": a series of Twitter accounts broadcasting the same information as the "main accounts", but at a far lower pace: 2 Tweets per Hour (or 2 tph ;-) ).

Each has the name of the "main account", with a "2" added to it. To show the link to the "main accounts", the Twitter icon features a large "2" too (toodeloo).
These accounts will not be monitored for direct messages or replies, for which you will have to go to its related main Twitter account.
Each tweet of the "Two's" will refer to its main account with a "via @mainaccount" in the suffix.

As a reference, here is a full overview of the Twitter accounts I manage, with the blog they refer to, and -if applicable- its low traffic account:

• AidNews tweets via @AidNews and low traffic via @AidNews2 (Aid related news tweets)
• AidResources tweets via @AidResources and low traffic via @AidResources2 (Resource material for those interested in aid and development)
• Humanitarian News tweets via @HumanityNews and low traffic via @HumanityNews2 (for any updates published on Humanitarian News
• You and Us and Me tweets via @NewsOnGreen and low traffic via @NewsOnGreen2 (Tweets about the environment, green living and other eco-related stuff)
• The NonProfit Blogs tweets via @NonProfitBlogs and low traffic via @NonProfitBlogs2 (all updates from an extensive list of over 700 nonprofit blogs)

For the following Twitter accounts, there are no changes:

• The Road to the Horizon tweets via @TheRoadTo (the main Twitter account I work with)
• AidBlogs tweets via @AidBlogs (Tweets the latest posts from aidworker blogs)
• BlogTips tweets via @BloggerTip (everything related to blogging)
• Blogging Today tweets via @BloggingToday (tweets updates related to blogging and social media)
• The Weird Bit tweets via @TheWeirdBit (one of my "fun" accounts: it tweets the 'funny' and 'weird' news)

Do know if you subscribe to one of the "Two" Twitter accounts, you will miss updates as I can never get as far as I need to keep up with the frequency of the posts at 2 "tph"...

Read the full post...

Honourable mentions on Twitter

Yeepee, I got four mentions at the list of "100 terrific twitter feeds for humanitarians" on AlertNet and OnlineDegreePrograms for:

• @TheRoadto, my personal Twitter feed; 
• @AidBlogs, the Twitter feed collecting the latest blogs from aidworkers; 
• @AidNews, the aggregator for aid related news. 
• @HumanityNews, the feed for my mega-collector of hard articles in the soft sector.

With thanks to the authors for the honours!

If you still doubt what social media can do for your blog, for your non-profit organisation, for your advocacy causes, have a look at BlogTips, where I publish my findings on social media for non-profits. It also features a tutorial on Twitter.

Read the full post...

The Facebook age: Your Life Is Empty

No words to add...

Discovered via Mashable

Read the full post...

#CNNfail: CNN versus Twitter on the Iran protests

Since the onset of the post-election violence in Teheran on Saturday, Iranian Twitter-ers have been using two main tags to identify their updates: #iranelection and #CNNfail.

The latter was to protest the lack of coverage of the protests by the mainstream traditional media, of which CNN took the brunt. The #CNNfail tag became so popular that US broadcaster found it necessary to take a defensive stand (or was it a justification?) on the air:



Did he just say 'we should be transparent'? He actually said this on CNN? Wooohahahaha. The words "transparent" and "CNN" should never be used within the same sentence.

I find it hilarious CNN is pushed into a corner and actually finds it useful to prove "we have covered this as of F-R-I-D-A-Y. And here is the video clip to prove it!"

By the way, Twitter scheduled a 90 minutes maintenance on Monday, which upset all the Twitter-ers in the Iran protests and beyond, making #nomaintenance the 3rd most used tag for a while...
Update: It worked! Twitter has rescheduled its planned downtime for tonight.

Related posts:
Who is on Twitter from Iran?
Social media buzzing after elections in Iran

Video discovered via The Huffington Post

Read the full post...

Social media buzzing after the Iran elections

Updated June 20 2009



Something is brewing in Iran. And the people are reporting.

Thousands of angry protesters have clashed with police in several cities in Iran after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was declared the winner of Iran's presidential poll. He claims victory over his rival Mir Hossein Mousavi, who called the results a "charade". (Full)

As violence broke out, the mobile phone network was switched off for hours and Internet connectivity was either interrupted or slow at least. Still, in what seems to become a school example of crowdsourced reporting at its best, individuals got their messages out through different social media channels.

Twitter is abuzz with on-the-ground reports directly from Iran by @madyar, @mohamadreza and @IranRiggedElect to name a few. Many of the tweets contain direct updates, local news, eyewitness reports, and pictures directly posted on Twitpic way before the mainstream media picked up. (The up to date list of all Twitterers in Iran, you find in this post)
New "special occasion" Twitter accounts like @Change_for_Iran got 4,000 followers in the first 12 hours.

Even foreign correspondents like @thomas_erdbrink (deleted his account), ABC correspondents Jim Sciutto and @LaraABCNews resort to Twitter when they can not get their official messages out, and to assemble information.



Tweets about the elections are tagged "#iranelection" so they can easily be searched and followed. #iranelection quickly shot to the most popular tag on Twitter.

The blogosphere is on a high run too. Iran News, Teheran bureau and Revolutionary Road are some examples of the bloggers active from different places in Iran, giving "liveblogging" a whole new meaning.

Other Iranian bloggers seem to be as active on the streets as in the Blogosphere. IranElections even features a picture of the imprints of police battons on his back and arms. Tehran Live posts excellent pictures.

Online blog coverage is available via blog giants Huffington Post and The Daily Dish. Global Voices does an excellent job in translating Tweets and blogs covering the post-elections'turmoil from Farsi to English, while expat Iranian bloggers are using their in-country connections to keep up. - check out NiacINsight.

There is a flood of pictures coming in on Flickr (look at Iran Streets After Elections) and plenty of videos taken from mobile phones posted on YouTube.



Facebook has been trying to keep up, even though access to the most popular social media resource was said to be blocked in Iran after the elections. There is the opposition leader Mousavi's Facebook page, with comments mostly in Farsi and page of the student movement. For English exchanges, check Where is my vote?

Meanwhile, social bookmarking sites start what they do best: spreading the links to the actual news resources. This thread on Reddit even contains tips on how to access Facebook from inside Iran, bypassing the government firewall.

As we get into the second day of protests, aggregators like Twazzup present an overview of the incoming flow of crowdsourced information. Check this out: Twazzup's Iran page. (Tnx for the tip, Uli!)

While foreign reporters and camera crews have their equipment confiscated, it looks like the authorities are trying to take a grip on the country again.

I wonder with the proliferation of social media if crowdsourced reporting will be or can be muffled. Short of disconnecting Iran from the international telephone network and pulling the plug on the Internet completely, it seems there is no stopping.

As the Daily Dish puts it in The Revolution will be Twittered:

That a new information technology could be improvised for this purpose so swiftly is a sign of the times. It reveals in Iran what the Obama campaign revealed in the United States. You cannot stop people any longer. You cannot control them any longer. They can bypass your established media; they can broadcast to one another; they can organize as never before.

Picture courtesy Revolutionary Road

Read the full post...

Peter is on Facebook. And does not like it. (understatement)

One needs to have an account on Facebook if you want to look at any postings any user makes. No wonder Facebook has billions and billions and billions of so-called users. (Statistics, ah!). So after I joined two years ago, and kept my foot tracks well covered, I am coming out (so to speak): My Facebook profile is now public.

Well, I already had 4 "friends" before I made my profile public. And I had not even used my real name.

But now you can be-friend me as if there were no tomorrow. Write on my wall like it was yours. Spam me with your applications and videos. Do it! Do it! ;-)))

So, just as I use Twitter, I want to play with what it can do and what it can't, as a social site, creating a community. Even if it was just to experiment.

And I don't like it. The user interface sucks. They made it an art turning something simple into something utterly complex. Is there a science in making software cumbersome for mere mortals? Is this what Computer Science PhDs make these days?

Apparently they just had a facelift (I never used the old 'Facebook' so can't compare), and no wonder 94% of the Facebook users don't like it.

I get utterly confused as what Facebook aims to be. A Twitter with pictures, and links? With some applications you can link into, as a sort of 'my webpage'. An iGoogle for non-techies? But why then, why do they have to make it so complicated?

I know posts of my blog are automatically imported to my Facebook, but - heaven is my witness - I can't find back where they put it.

I know I can put links in something they very significantly call 'my wall' (like I write on my wall at home, rrright), but why, then, why don't they let me edit the text that comes with the link?

I know Lydia wrote on my wall-to-wall (I got an email saying she did so), but I swear, I can't find it. And what a weird name "wall-to-wall". No wonder I feel claustrophobic each time I go onto Facebook.

I once got on a wall-to-wall with Sophie in China and wrote something on it, but no way to trace it back.

Every time I click on this or that, it asks for authorization to access my profile this and my approval for thing that and disclaimer of the other. Phew. It looks like I am signing my life away each time I click on something.

If people had to pay for Facebook, they would be left with a dozen users, I guess.

It smells like Microsoft a couple of years ago: people used it because it was the least painful of all evils. And just like Microsoft looses market bit by bit (look at the bad press Explorer is getting versus Chrome and Firefox), Facebook has only one way to do: Down baby...

Facebook? Beeeeh.

Read the full post...

Picks of the week: Libraries in Africa, Ning and Plain English

Here are the interesting links I harvested this week:

• Room to Read partners with local communities throughout the developing world to provide quality educational opportunities by establishing libraries, creating local language children's literature, constructing schools, providing education to girls and establishing computer labs. They also feature on my post about meaningful Xmas gifts.
  
  
• You might think Facebook is "it", but I like Ning more as a highly customizable social network platform. It features blogs, forums, video and picture libraries, events scheduling all on an easy to use platform. I subscribed to ChangeBlogger network on Ning.
  
  
• You might have come across some of the Commoncraft ".. in Plain English" video tutorials, but have you checked out their library. All in Plain English, from "Electing a US president" to "Twitter" and "Social Media", all in short videos and in Plain English.
  Some of their productions is also worth a look. (Watch the Google Docs video).
  
  
• You would be surprised of the digital trail you leave on the Internet through your signature (your IP address). There are plenty of public domain tools available allowing anyone to trace back the origin of the visitor through that IP address. So.. should your activity can be monitored? Maybe you are a human rights activist, or you blog about controversial issues. TorProject allows you to 'hide' your entity, and 'go onto the web anonymously'
  
  
• And last but least, Technorati published their 2008 overview of the Blogosphere. Who are the bloggers? What is the impact on the Internet? Even just these figures are impressive: 184 million blogs active worldwide, reaching 346 million readers. 77% of active Internet users read blogs.

More Picks of the Week on The Road.

Read the full post...

Picks of the week: 60 seconds and more

Ironic Sans does nothing else but publish 60 second videos "in the life of". Weird how beautiful "simple" can be.

Women for Women International mobilizes women to change their lives in conflict and post-conflict environments.

Positive Africa lists success stories in a continent riddled with poverty and war. This site is part of African Loft, "Where the People and Friends of Africa Mingle", a discovery by itself.

CauseWired features as headline "Plugging In, Getting Involved, Changing the World - the Rise of Online Social Activism". How the digital social media can help changing the world.

Stood in the Congo is a funny and sweet Tumblr blog. Find the treasures! From the same author: Stood in the Maasai Mara.

Our Wall Bears Witness features pictures from the US Holocaust Museum.

Short-Term Volunteer in Africa is a fresh blog from Jo, working in Nairobi and DRC. It shows Africa in the eyes of someone who just arrived.

Congo Gorillas, the official website of Virunga National Park in DR Congo.

Humanitarian Relief by Michael Bear Kleinman is one of the newest treasured additions to my aidworker blogs. He writes informed posts about aid work and aid issues. Is part of Change!, a new site working on informing the masses of social issues.


More Picks of The Week on The Road.

Picture courtesy Stood in the Maasai Mara, discovered via The Signs Along The Road

Read the full post...