IMHO

Archive for February, 2011

Democracy is alive

As I sit here in my living room, drinking coffee and preparing to go to my yearly Town Meeting people all over the world are facing death so they can do the same. The Women of Darnah: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=406_15Iygk4[/youtube] Alive in Egypt Alive in Bahrain Alive in Iraq Alive in Libya

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Town Meeting

Town Meeting is Saturday and I’m totally unprepared. I’ve recently moved and my town report is late. We have Town Meeting once a year in Thetford, to discuss and vote on the town budget and vote on any articles before the town. Vermont and New Hampshire both hold Town Meetings, I don’t know of any […]

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Cat People

Reading about disasters, wars, suffering of every kind through the screen of written news or television.. the information has always been there but the information has never been so immediate, so graphic and so personal. Because Twitter does feel personal, it is personal conversations, personal connections as well as news a full day ahead of […]

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Bahrain

Subtitle: Why I need to take a break from Twitter I had been wondering how one could use Twitter in classes, it seemed to me that this was an incredibly rich way for students to learn. I am not a teacher but on Friday night I wrote to a history teacher who has always been […]

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Krystal Smith

On another sort of topic entirely I’d like to take a moment to recognize Krystal Smith, from Burlington, Vermont who has been crowned the nation’s top grocery bagger. Bagging groceries is an art and I recognize an artist when I see them work, which I do not much these days unfortunately.  When I do run […]

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Salute! 17th of February

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmrEOANwqUk[/youtube]

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Something is happening, Mr. Jones

It is not that I think I will see world peace in my lifetime because of Twitter. I may be an idealist (semi-closeted) but I am not a complete idiot.  I do think something very interesting is happening though. A man named Kovas Boguta has devised a really wonderful graphic showing the influences English speaking […]

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Further notes on online communication during revolutions

There’s an excellent overview of how online communication tools were used during the Egyptian Revolution as well as a timeline of communication shutdowns here: Egypt Revolution 2011 and Communications. It’s by Ramy Raoof whose photos I followed via Twitter links during the demonstrations.

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The proof’s in the pudding

Another thing the revolution in Egypt has done for me personally is to restore my faith in the power of people, together, to effect great change for good. I am an idealist (surprise!) and today I am not embarrassed to say so, although my idealism had about shriveled after 56 years of life. I graduated […]

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The Sandmonkey effect

Hearing that Sandmonkey had been arrested made my heart clutch up. My cousin (whose knowledge of the Middle East is better than mine) had told me I should follow a “witty Egyptian blogger” Sandmonkey, if I was interested in what was happening. I found his blog and read this post: Egypt, right now!. He said […]

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