The Weekly NetPulse
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The Latest Weekly NetPulse
| Story Of The Week |
May 2, 2008 |
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 Twitter
Post
Rescues Jailed
Journalist in Egypt
James Karl
Buck was bailed out of jail by a 'tweet' post on Twitter, a social
networking site. The message "arr
ested" was seen
by Buck's friends and bloggers in Egypt and the
United States via the Internet.
Buck, a journalism graduate student at the University
of California at Berkeley, was in Egypt for a school
research project, ironically focused on bloggers and
journalists who use tools like Twitter to keep in step
with news, when Egyptian authorities arrested him.
The authorities claimed that Buck may have been
inciting a riot; although, Buck was merely
photographing a labor rally near a textile mill in
Mahalla, Egypt.
Buck reached Twitter through his cell phone, allowing
him to make the post without being detected by
authorities. Twitter allows its users to post 140
character or less messages, providing a place on the
Web for people to be constantly updated in brief, to-
the-point blogposts.
Thanks to the 'tweet' relaying his arrest, Buck was
able to reach his friends via the Web, who contacted
the U.S. Embassy and UC Berkeley, eventually
sending a lawyer to bail him out of jail.
Buck says keeping in contact with the rest of the world
via the Web and his Twitter posts kept him sane,
curbed the fear that he would, "fall into a black whole"
and potentially saved his life. Buck said that he "came
to realize how important a tool like Twitter is."
If you couldn't find a place for another social
networking site in your connection overloaded life, this
story is a great example of how Twitter is a valuable
resource. Tweet posts come in pretty handy in
emergency situations, from connecting people online
after minor earthquakes in the California to proving its
worth internationally by rescuing Buck.
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Hot Quote |
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The world wide web is "still in its infancy" says the
Web's
inventor Sir Tim Berners-Lee ...15 years old...."What's
exciting is that people are building new social
systems, new systems of review, new systems of
governance. "My hope is that those will produce... new
ways of
working together effectively and fairly which we can
use globally to manage ourselves as a planet."
Full Story
BBC News talks to some of the leading figures in the
web community about their hopes for the future of the web.
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Stat of the Week |
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There are now 165 million different websites
around the world, according to internet research firm
Netcraft.
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U.S. News |
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Few States Allow Overseas Troops to Vote By E-
mail (AP) U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan
can speak to their families by Web camera and fight
insurgents using sophisticated electronic warfare. Yet
when it comes to voting, most troops are stuck in the
past. Communities in 13 states will send overseas
troops presidential election ballots by e-mail this year,
and districts in at least seven states will also let them
return completed ballots over the Internet, according to
data compiled by The Associated Press and the
Overseas Vote Foundation.
Full
Story
Online Interest Groups Slam McCain (The
Washington Post) Liberal political action group
MoveOn.org began showing a new television ad tying
John McCain to President Bush on Wednesday, the
five-year anniversary of President Bush's "Mission
accomplished" remark about Iraq.
Full
Story
User-Generated Censorship (San
Frankcisco Bay Guardian) There's a new kind of
censorship online, and it's coming from the
grassroots. Thanks to new, collaborative, social
media networks, it's easier than ever for people to get
together and destroy freedom of expression. They're
going DIY from the bottom up - instead of the way old-
school censors used to do it, from the top down. Call it
user-generated censorship.
Full Story
Insiders debate social media's influence on
Election '08
(CNet) How are Twitter and Facebook
changing the game for the 2008 presidential
frontrunners? Online media executives say the
answer will be pivotal to future campaigns, but that it
won't come until November.
Full
Story

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Viral Video of the Week |
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As President and Vice President of the College
Democrats of America, Lauren Wolfe and Awais
Khaleel are both superdelegates at the Democratic
Convention in Denver. They are both undecided and
want to know how college students feel they should
vote! Contact them and let them know how you feel.
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International News |
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Brave Cubans Take to the Web
(AP) Only a month has passed since ordinary
Cubans won the right to own computers, and the
government still keeps a rigid grip on Internet
access. But that hasn't stopped thousands from
finding their way into cyberspace. And a daring few
post candid blogs about life in the communist-run
country that have garnered international
audiences.
Full
Story Computers Sold to
Cuban Public for First Time
Saudi Activist Blogger Freed
After 4 Months in Jail Without Charge
(The Washington Post) Saudi Arabia's most
popular blogger was released Saturday after serving
four months in prison without charge. Fouad al-
Farhan, 33, was detained Dec. 10 after authorities
warned him about his online support of an activist
group. At the time of his arrest, the Interior Ministry
said only that his violations were not related to state
security.
Full Story
Egypt: Facebooking
the Struggle
(GlobalVoices) After little less than a month following
the April 6 strike in support of the textile workers in
Mahalla City, during which a number of prominent
Egyptian bloggers and internet activists were arrested,
preparations for the next round of a planned general
strike to mark the 80th birthday of President Hosni
Mubarak, on May 4, 2008, are currently spreading all
over the blogosphere and the Internet.
Full Story
A Free Press Gets Mixed Reviews
(Reuters)
People in Argentina, Mexico, Egypt and China are
more likely than those in the United States to say it is
very important for the news media to be free from
government control, a survey published Thursday
found. The survey of 20 countries by World Public
Opinion.org, a project at the University of Maryland,
found strong support worldwide for a free press and
opposition to government restrictions on access to the
Internet.
Full Story
Mayoral candidates talk IT ahead of polls
(Computing.co.uk)
As Londoners go to the polls today, Computing has
examined the technology policies of the three mayoral
candidates. Ken Livingstone, Boris Johnson and
Brian Paddick all have different views on how
technology can be used.
Full
Story
Luminaries
Look to the Future Web (BBC)
Exactly 15 years ago the directors at the lab where the
web was first developed signed a document which
said the technology could be used by anyone free of
charge. That decision was instrumental in making the
web truly world wide. BBC News talks to some of the
leading figures in the web community about their
hopes for the future of the web.
Full Story

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Event Calendar |
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Location: Central London
Date: May 14, 2008
Event
Details: The European Union's INSPIRE
Directive, which paves the way for all geospatial data
to be shared by public bodies across the EU, is set to
come into full force in the UK in May 2009, but the
countdown begins now. The directive is the focus for
Headstar's fourth annual conference and exhibition on
Geographical Information Systems (GIS) in the Public
Sector, supported by the Association for Geographical
Information (AGI), on 14 May 2008 in central London.
Plenary speakers will include representatives from the
Local Government Association; the Improvement and
Development Agency (IDeA); and the Department for
the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra). Our
event promises to be essential day for anyone
involved in the collection, management or use of
geospatial data, from policymakers looking at
statistics across a region to those charged with
putting user-friendly map content onto a website.
Places cost 295 Pounds plus VAT for public sector
and 395 plus VAT for private sector. Register today!
Location: Georgia Tech Hotel and Conference
Center Date: Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Event
Details: The AAPC will be hosting a training event
for political consultants, public affairs pros, issue
advocates, lobbyists, and youth activists. The nation's
leading strategists will reveal the secrets of online
advertising, micro-targeting, mobile marketing, and
other emerging technologies. Got a question? Here's
your chance to ask the experts. Please visit www.aapc.org for program
details and sponsorship opportunities.

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Political Banter |
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The focus of the
Weekly Netpulse is to report on how
technology is affecting politics, but since one of our
local boys, Chris Lamb in Charleston SC, came out
with his
new
book, I'll be Sober in the Morning, filled with
political
putdowns, comebacks and ripostes, we haven't been
able to put it down.
Someone asked Senator Margaret Chase Smith
of
Maine, "What would you do if you woke up and found
yourself in the White House?" "I would go to the
President's wife," Mrs. Smith said, "apologize and then
leave at once."
Buy it on
Amazon.com for 15
bucks.
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