politics
Ameritocracy: Collaborative Fact-Checking
If there’s one thing the internet is pretty good at, then it must be crunching lots of info by having a lot of folks look at said info. Call it crowdsourcing or collaboration, if you need a great many eyes to look at stuff, and a lot of opinions, the web is the place to […]
Obama’s Election Campaign: It’s The Social Media, Stupid!
The U.S. elections have been an interesting spiel of old vs new, of traditional vs social media. While Republican Senator McCain and Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton have put their money on traditional media (think Clinton’s “phone in the middle of the night” TV spot and its, shall we say: mixed success), Obama’s campaign strategists have […]
Did Deutsche Telekom Track Journalists’ Movements?
Over the last couple of weeks, a major privacy scandal has been unfolding in Germany: Deutsche Telekom - the company that also monopolized use of the a certain shade of magenta - spied on their management. Not only their on their management, though, Telekom also spied on journalists.
(Please note: Quite a few of the […]
Little Brother: Protect Your Privacy To Protect Your Freedom
Privacy isn’t usually the most sexy topic. At least it isn’t usually treated that way, which is a shame. All the better: Cory Doctorow’s latest novel Little Brother (download for free, buy on Amazon) more than makes up: Little Brother is a passionate & compelling rant against government surveillance, and a rally cry to protect […]
Chinese Anti-CNN Campaign
Note: I won’t touch the politics behind this campaign in this post. If you were looking for any political opinion on this subject, feel free to skip this post.
Over the last couple of days, I’ve been getting increasing amounts of propaganda material spam (pardon: information) related to China’s campaign against the CNN.
(When I say […]
Re:publica 08 #2
Today is day 3 of re:publica 08, the last day of this year’s installment of this conference. Re:publica is the biggest and most important blogger & social media conference in Germany, organized largely by the Newthinking Team (i.e. the net activists whose most prominent member is probably Markus Beckedahl, author of Netzpolitik.org. Thanks Markus, and […]
My Masters Thesis On Weblogs And Political Journalists: Now Available On Amazon
Exciting news (well, for me): My masters thesis on the Relevance of Weblogs for the Work of Political Journalists just went into print. (It’s German only, sorry, but you’ll find the abstract at the end of this post.)
The thesis is now available through amazon.de:
Author: Peter Bihr
Publisher: Vdm Verlag Dr. Müller (March 2008)
ISBN-10: 3836464292
ISBN-13: […]
Thesis Key Findings: Political Bloggers Hardly Relevant in Germany
For my M.A. in Communications and Media Studies (Freie Universität Berlin) I did research on how political journalists in Germany use weblogs. The thesis is available in (German) full text here: “The Relevance Of Weblogs For The Work Of Political Journalists” (PDF, 1MB). (More info about the thesis here.)
As the masters thesis is available in […]
Ze Frank on Privacy
The godfather of podcasting Ze Frank is back, this time on blip.tv. Here’s his take on privacy:
Well put. Talking of which, the German Bundestag has passed legislation for massive data retention. Why not join the class-action lawsuit against the data retention law?
Good to have you back, Ze!
Beijing Wide Open: Bloggers detained in Beijing for live blogging for a free Tibet
Tibetan-Canadian Free Tibet activist and director of Students For A Free Tibet Lhadon Tethong has been liveblogging from Beijing. The activists have gathered in Beijing exactly one year before the Olympic Games are about to start - tonight, there will be the official countdown ceremony.
Their live blog Beijing Wide Open has declared their goal to […]