It began as a collaboration of journalists during the Kenyan post-election violence in early 2008. Now, Ushahidi is taking collaboration to a whole new level with the Haiti Ushahidi site. Unless you have been living under a rock the past few days, you should know that Haiti requires a massive humanitarian effort in the wake of the 7.0 earthquake on January 12. We cannot all rush to Haiti to clear away rubble to help find survivors. However, you can help through the Ushahidi and Crisis Mapping Network projects. How you – or your friends – can help The Crisis Mapping Network is defined as “Leveraging mobile platforms, computational linguistics, geospatial technologies, and visual analytics to power effective early warning for rapid response to complex humanitarian emergencies.” Ushahidi is the Swahili word for “testimony”. (Re-read the title of my blog post with that in mind.) In other words: rapid-response crisis communication.…
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I saw an amazing movie, but found no reviews that saw it my way… The movie in question is Avatar. If you haven’t seen the movie and want to see it, stop here. Keep your mind open and free of any influence to make your movie experience your own. That’s how I like my movies! After watching the movie, I read the reviews in The New York Times, the Marginal Utility’s blog on PopMatters called “Avatar and Invisible Republic”, and Jan Karlsbjerg’s blog. These reviews surprised me because I had not seen the movie from their point of view. For example, I rarely think about the practical side of science fiction movies anymore. I go in to be entertained, and I park any remnants of logic I may have in my brain outside the door. I was aware of gender issues and stereotypes, but I didn’t think about “white man’s…
3 CommentsIn 2010, I’m going to take a photo a day to learn more about, well, many things. The idea comes from Project 365, which is “How to Take a Photo a Day and See Your Life in a Whole New Way”. What can I do with this? Discipline – it seems easy enough now, but it might be easy to forget to take at least one picture a day at some point. Training the habit consciously at first is my way to tackle that issue. Practice – I need to test my camera a lot more. I have had it for two years now, and I still haven’t understood all its features. Not that it is complex, but I don’t know how to switch between options quickly when the situation calls for it. I am also uncertain about the ideal method for certain situations. I end up with pictures that…
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