 |
News |
      |
|
Human Rights
|
| 06/01/2007
WACC's New Flyer
| | WACC has produced a new flyer which gives an introduction to WACC, its programme areas and publications. Please download the pdf file below, or contactKristine Greenawayif you need printed versions. Language versions in Spanish, French and German will soon be available. > more |
|
| 02/01/2007
$100 laptop project launches 2007
| | The first batch of computers built for the One Laptop Per Child project could reach users by July this year. The scheme is hoping to put low-cost computers into the hands of people in developing countries. Ultimately the project's backers hope the machines could sell for as little as $100 (£55). The first countries to sign up to buying the machine include Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Nigeria, Libya, Pakistan and Thailand. The so-called XO machine is being pioneered by Nicholas Negroponte, who launched the project at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab in 2004. Test machines are expected to reach children in February as the project builds towards a more formal launch. Wireless networkingMr Negroponte told the Associated Press news agency that three more African countries might sign on in the next two weeks. The laptop is powered by a 366-megahertz processor from Advanced Micro Devices and has built-in wireless networking. It has no hard disk drive and instead uses 512 MB of flash memory, and has two USB ports to which more storage could be attached.
"I have to laugh when people refer to XO as a weak or crippled machine and how kids should get a"real'one"," Mr Negroponte told AP.
"Trust me, I will give up my real one very soon and use only XO. It will be far better, in many new and important ways." The computer runs on a cut-down version of the open source Linux operating system and has been designed to work differently to a Microsoft Windows or Apple machine from a usability perspective. Instead of information being stored along the organising principle of folders and a desktop, users of the XO machine are encouraged to work on an electronic journal, a log of everything the user has done on the laptop. The machine comes with a web browser, word processor and RSS reader, for accessing the web feeds that so many sites now offer. "In fact, one of the saddest but most common conditions in elementary school computer labs (when they exist in the developing world), is the children are being trained to use Word, Excel and PowerPoint," Mr Negroponte said. "I consider that criminal, because children should be making things, communicating, exploring, sharing, not running office automation tools."
The new user interface, known as Sugar, has been praised by some of the observers of the One Laptop Per Child project.
It doesn't feel like Linux. It doesn't feel like Windows. It doesn't feel like Apple," said Wayan Vota, who launched theOLPCNews.com blogand is also director of Geekcorps, an organisation that facilitates technology volunteers in developing countries. "I'm just impressed they built a new (user interface) that is different and hopefully better than anything we have today," he said. But he added:"Granted, I'm not a child. I don't know if it's going to be intuitive to children." Trial versions of the operating system in development can be downloaded to be tested out by technically-minded computer users around the world. Source:BBC > more |
|
| 20/11/2006
Nelson Agyemang visits WACC in Toronto
| | The Rev Nelson Agyemang, National Apostle of the Fountain of Leadership Church and Apostolic Network, from Ghana visited the WACC Secretariat on Friday 17 November during a short stopover in Toronto. During a meeting with programme staff he outlined his work and the activities of his Church and had the opportunity to learn more of WACC's programmes. Before leaving he submitted an application, on behalf of his organisation, for corporate membership in the Association. Rev Agyemang is pictured here with the General Secretary, Randy Naylor. > more |
|
| 19/11/2006
Statement from AMARC 9 conference
| | We, the participants of the Amarc9 conference held in the Jordanian capital Amman on Saturday November 11, 2006, request the following: 1. Lifting all restriction on the work of media institutions, journalist organizations and journalists whether they be in the form of detention or arrest, arbitrary and closing or restricting the work of media organizations. 2. Requesting government to respect international laws and treaties that focus on the issue of the freedom of expression. 3. Governments should separate themselves from the involvement in media. An independent media body can be established that can experience legal immunity. Ministries of Information, where they exist, must be banned. 4. Access to information and citizen's rights in media must be guaranteed through clear constitutional amendments. 5. Legal and administrative structures must be created that guarantees the establishment and development of community media and community radio without administrative or financial restrictions. 6. Developing a package of media lws that guarantee press freedom and the freedom of expression and the exercise of media work without restrictions. 7. Activating citizen's role in the work of media institute by creating a mechanism that allows for the free expression of journalists. 8. Work must commence towards the establishment of a training institute that is professionally equipped. A professional journalistic ethos should be established with the aim of sponsoring the honour and ethics of this profession. 9. New and independent funding sources or public funding must be found in order to empower media organisations with equipment and trained personnel. 10. Effort must be exerted to empower the courts to be independent so that they can be the only party enstrusted to look into media cases and to address them based on principles of democracy and freedom. > more |
|
| 15/11/2006
Communication for Peace
| | Peace is the greatest challenge facing the world, the way to survival or extinction, according to the General Secretary of the International Peace Research Association. Speaking at the organization's biennial conference in Calgary, Canada, Luc Reychler stressed the importance of peace research which he says “implies leadership by people young and old who respond with intellectual and moral energy to crises or challenges in meaningful ways.” The conference, held 29 June to 3 July under the theme Patterns of conflict, paths to peace, attracted 400 researchers, teachers and activists. Majid Tehranian, director of the Tokyo-based Toda Institute for Global Peace and Policy Research, told conference participants that the opposite of peace journalism is not, paradoxically, war journalism. The opposite, is what he calls “muddled journalism” where information is presented with so little context it is practically useless. Tehranian decried the notion of objectivity saying, “We are all biased and some of us are prejudiced as well.” Johan Galtung, whose theories of direct violence and structural violence, and of negative and positive peace, are the foundation of peace studies today, presented real-life examples of peace mediation undertaken during the past year. Galtung dismissed moralizing as a dead end. What you need, he said, is a proposal, a good idea. In order to have a chance of success, a mediator needs empathy for all sides and an ability to respond instantly and creatively to sudden developments. A First Nations (aboriginal Canadian) woman recalled the story of her grandmother telling her to throw a rock into a river. As Doreen Spence watched the ripples it created move downstream with the flow of the water, her grandmother pointed to the ripples and asked, “What imprint will you leave on the planet for seven generations to come?” Her question hung on the minds of many at the conclusion of the conference. (The full version of this article appears in the current issue of Media Development 4/2006.) > more |
|
| 13/11/2006
Democratising the media
| | George Clooney, the famous son of journalist Nick Clooney, featured a video on MySpace,"Footage From Sudan and Chad," providing images and substance for what many believe to be a story marginalized by major media. Adding George Clooney's celebrity attraction to a captive audience on MySpace ensured that the message, the reality of suffering and death in Darfur, reached many, many people. Conversely, had even the story been carried on the evening news more regularly, I believe there are people who watch television news and there are those who do not. MySpace was a mechanism to reach those who may not watch otherwise. National Public Radio's Morning Edition carried a story about Darfur on November third. Citing part of the frustration by the United States and the United Nations as the refusal of the Sudanese government to cooperate and allow diplomatic intervention, the use of a blog and a podcast figured prominantly in international discourse. Read morehere > more |
|
| 12/11/2006
Disney's PR Strategy Unhealthy for'Little Consumers'
| | Disney says it's concerned about kids'eating habits. But the company can't turn down the huge profits associated with helping junk-food companies market to children. The announcement this week by Disney that the company is placing nutrition guidelines on licensed food products aimed at children (along with kid-friendly meals at theme parks) is just the latest effort by Corporate America to save its tarnished image. Read morehere > more |
|
| 12/11/2006
North Korea, Turkmenistan, Eritrea the worst violators of press freedom
| | New countries have moved ahead of some Western democracies in the fifth annual Reporters Without Borders Worldwide Press Freedom Index, issued today, while the most repressive countries are still the same ones. “Unfortunately nothing has changed in the countries that are the worst predators of press freedom,” the organisation said, “and journalists in North Korea, Eritrea, Turkmenistan, Cuba, Burma and China are still risking their life or imprisonment for trying to keep us informed. These situations are extremely serious and it is urgent that leaders of these countries accept criticism and stop routinely cracking down on the media so harshly. Read morehere > more |
|
| 06/11/2006
Daniel Davies on the Lancet study, Peggy Charren on the FCC and indecency
| | When a study in the British Medical journal the Lancet found that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died as a consequence of the war, the Lancet was dismissed by George W. Bush, who called its methodology flawed. American media outlets also cast doubt, calling the peer-reviewed findings"disputed" and pointing to lower, less scientific numbers as more reliable. Daniel Davies, a writer for the Comment is Free blog on the website of London's Guardian, will join us to explain why the critics are wrong. Read morehere > more |
|
| 28/10/2006
Marines Without a Beach and Soldiers as Citizen Journalists
| | You cannot see much out of an armored Humvee, and even if you could, you have no chance to identify the enemy until first you come under attack. You’ve got all these weapons, and you’ve been told that you’re a mighty warrior, a Spartan, but what are you going to shoot—the dogs? You’re a Marine without a beach…Reduced to giving candy to children, and cut off by language and ignorance from the culture around them, they work in such isolation that the potentially positive effects of their presence usually amount to nil…Many had joined the Corps in response to the September 11 attacks, now four years past, but the emotions that once had motivated them had been reduced by their participation in an enormously bureaucratic enterprise, and by the tedium of war. Fine—they were probably better soldiers for it. These were not the taut warriors portrayed in action movies. As they shed their helmets and body armor, they emerged as ordinary five-foot-nine-inch, 150-pound middle-class Americans, sometimes pimple-faced, and often sort of scrawny. Some of them were mentally agile, and some quite obviously were not. Read morehere > more |
|
| 28/10/2006
Human Rights Video Blog
| | It includes footage of the Zimbabwean police and security intelligence services breaking up a peaceful demonstration by members of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trades Unions (ZCTU) on September 13th.The police repeatedly beat the demonstrators, who are calling for the provision of antiretroviral (ARV) drugs for the treatment of HIV, a minimum wage, and stabilisation in the prices of certain basic commodities. The bulk of the video involves interviews with the ZCTU members describing the events of the day, and the actions of the police. Ethan and Rachel Rawlins have kindly provided a transcript. When news of the beatings originally leaked out, trades unions in other countries strongly condemned Robert MugabeÂ’s hardline approach with legitimate and peaceful demonstrations. Last week a court dismissed the police report on the incident, and postponed the trial of the ZCTU protestors until October 17th, to give the Criminal Investigation Department time to conduct a thorough investigation of the allegations of police torture. When footage of the protests was smuggled out of Zimbabwe on DVD to South Africa this week, it prompted the head of one of South AfricaÂ’s labour unions to say that she would give President Thabo Mbeki a copy of the DVD of the beatings in a meeting with him on Friday. Read morehere > more |
|
| 28/10/2006
World congress on communication for development shopping for an identity
| | After the formal greetings and a string of political and international organisation figures lining up to express their good intentions towards communication for development, the World Congress on the Communication for Development (WCCD) really got started with an introductory plenary session explaining what the goals of the congress were. The WCCD drafting team is composed of the ‘usual suspects’ from the World Bank, the FAO, as well as The Communication Initiative – an organisation based in Canada. It has already released a draft document containing a number of recommendations for rejuvenating and giving the field of ‘communication for development’ some impulse. read morehere > more |
|
| 23/10/2006
Reporters on the Job
| | When the main subject of today's story,"Africa After War: Paths to Forgiveness," introduced herself to staff writer Abraham McLaughlin she said her name was Atto Betty. The order of names she used was typical among folks in this part of Uganda and in other rural parts of Africa - her clan name first, and her individual name second. In the West, of course, we'd know her as Betty Atto. "It's a small thing but also hugely symbolic of what I see as the basic difference between Western and African culture - Western individualism and African communalism," says Abe. "Western culture essentially revolves around individuals - celebrities, biographies, individual and human rights, etc. But in many places in Africa," he says,"it matters much more where you come from and which family or clan or ethnic group you belong to. Group identifiers, in fact, are arguably far more important than each individual's identity." Read morehere > more |
|
| 23/10/2006
Making the Web Accessible For All
| | Despite many efforts to move away from those most traditional interfaces - the ubiquitous computer keyboard and mouse - they remain the bedrock on which nearly all computer interfaces rest. But for those who find it difficult to use a standard computer there is a raft of user-friendly add-ons and upgrades to help things go more smoothly. We live in a world that demands us to communicate in many different ways, usually with the computer at the very heart of it. Read morehere > more |
|
| 13/10/2006
CMD Issues Full Rebuttal of RTNDA Claims
| | The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) released today a full rebuttal of claims made against its April 2006 report,"Fake TV News: Widespread and Undisclosed." The report tracked television stations'use of video news releases (VNRs), narrated pre-packaged segments produced by public relations firms for their clients. The report documented 77 television stations airing VNRs or related materials; not once did stations disclose the client behind the segment. The report led the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to launch an investigation of the 77 stations named, in August 2006. Read more onPRWatch > more |
|
| 11/10/2006
Save the Children ad banned
| | A Save the Children Fund marketing campaign has been banned by the advertising watchdog after complaints that it distressed children by implying that those with brown eyes might die young. The mailshot ad used a leaflet and an envelope that showed a close-up of a child of African origin and text stating:"If you have brown eyes, you're more likely to die young." The reverse of the envelope showed a close-up of the eyes of a child of Asian origin with the same text. Read moreMediaGuardian > more |
|
| 11/10/2006
Lloyd Shot Dead by US Troops.
| | ITN reporter Terry Lloyd was shot in the head by American troops as he was being driven to hospital, the inquest into his death was told today. An account by an Iraqi witness that was read out at the inquest in Oxford claimed Lloyd was still alive after the original attack on his car but was killed by US troops as he was driven from the scene. The unnamed driver's account, which was read out by the deputy assistant coroner for Oxfordshire, Andrew Walker, gave new details of the last moments of Lloyd's life. Read more atMediaGuardian > more |
|
| 10/10/2006
The Web as Political Weapon
| | John Harris of the Washington Post has noticed that the three largest recent political controversies have stemmed from work done by digital inhabitants. In the article, New Media a Weapon in the New World of Politics, he notes the connections between the recent scandals involving Mark Foley, George Allen, and Bill Clinton were representative of the new, web-driven age of American politics." Read more on Slashdot > more |
|
| 09/08/2006
Indonesian Christians to be Executed, Muslims to get Amnesty for Same Crimes?
| | (August 9, 2006) The Washington-DC based human rights group, International Christian Concern (ICC) www.persecution.org has just become informed that the execution date has been set for three Christians involved in the Poso conflict. The men are to be executed on Saturday, August 12, at 12:15am. While these men have admitted their involvement in the conflict, they were the only ones charged in a conflict in which massive numbers of Muslims participated. >> Read more |
|
|
| | | | |
|
| © SPCM International - We are dedicated to serving the physical, emotional and spiritual needs of those suffering... |
|
Welcome - News - Activities - Bible - Forum - Directory - Calendar - Contact us - Links
Legal notice |
|
