Month: November 2004

Wikinews

After revolutionizing the way encyclopedias are built and maintained, the team behind Wikipedia is attempting to apply its collaborative information-gathering model to journalism.

Through a new effort, Wikinews, members of the open-source community who write and edit Wikipedia’s encyclopedia entries are encouraged to test their skills as journalists and report the news on a wide variety of current events.

The news site follows a similar set of rules as the encyclopedia, which allows anyone to edit and post corrections to entries, so long as each change is recorded.

The current rendition of Wikinews is an experimental version that, according to Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales, offers just a taste of what’s to come when the news effort builds momentum.

I think this is great.
I already thought of this idea some time ago and thought of how great it would to be to have a source of news that is compiled by the normal people on the ground and not the media giants who often offer a disconnected view on things and are even biased in some cases.

Bravo to the guys behind Wikipedia and Wikinews for making my idea come true.
You guys rock!

It just pisses me off a bit that another one of my ideas has been implemented by somebody other than me, lol…

[Source: Wired]

Leader Yasser Arafat Street

This morning, on my way to work, I drove through a street I’ve driven through almost everyday of the past 2.5 years, but today I noticed something different in it.

Before, it was called the “Environment Street”, but today I noticed a big sign that says “Boulevard du Leader Yasser Arafat”, or in English “Leader Yasser Arafat Street”.

I heard that a street was named after him here after his death, but I had no idea which one and where.

And true to it’s old name, it’s all green and full of flowers on the sides and in the middle. Pretty worthy of it’s new name.

War Criminal Bush

Vancouver legal experts join movement to rule the U.S. president a violator of Geneva and U.N. conventions.

When George W. Bush visits Canada this week, he’s sure to get an earful from demonstrators who see him more as a “war crimes president” than a “war president.”
Gail Davidson, a Vancouver lawyer, says the prime minister should rescind his invitation to Bush, because the president is a “major war criminal.”

Prominent jurists have echoed Davidson’s claims. Most recently, Louise Arbour, the former war crimes prosecutor and current United Nations’ High Commissioner for Human Rights, has called for an investigation into crimes against the Geneva Conventions during the recent American assault on Fallujah…

[Via: The Tyee, Je Blog]

Medina Mediterranea in Yasmine Hammamet

Medina Mediterranea in Yasmine Hammamet

Yesterday, and at last, we visited the Medina Mediterranea in Yasmine Hammamet and took a full tour inside it.

We actually attended a concert there last year, but most of it was still under construction and not open to the public.

The Medina Mediterranea is a new touristic project that embodies a whole old-style Tunisian city recently built in the touristic station of Yasmine Hammamet to be a living memory of our old Tunisian and mediterranean heritage and life. Some sort of a trip into the past and how cities and life were.

Anyway, I’ve taken a bunch of pics for you guys to see. So check them out here: Medina Mediterranea.

Enjoy, and tell me what you think 🙂

Mosques in Iraq

Before, the US army PR department used to distribute nice pictures showing how culturally sensitive they are. The US administration said, at that time, that they were very careful in dealing with mosques. But now, things are different. The smiley face mask fell off.

New pictures are either showing mosques under attack, or US soldiers using a mosque like a lounge. Entering with their shoes on, and sleeping on the floors, etc… This does outrage Muslims…

[Via: Raed In The Middle, Je Blog, Jalan-Jalan]

NBC to air hidden Princess Diana video

NBC television network will broadcast a never-before-seen video tape of Diana, Princess of Wales, next week in which she says she suspects a member of her staff with whom she fell in love was “bumped off.”

Earlier this year NBC aired audio tapes Diana secretly recorded for a 1992 book that exposed the turmoil of her marriage to Prince Charles, whom she divorced in 1996. The princess was killed in a car crash in Paris in 1997.

The two-hour special is to be broadcast in two parts, on November 29 and December 6.

“This unusual tape, recorded in Diana’s living room, hidden for years after her death, and fought over for months in the British courts, offers a view of the princess quite different from the formal public face she usually put forth,” NBC said.

It seems that even years after her death, the press just isn’t willing to let the poor Princess Di rest in peace.

In her life and after her death, it seems all the press can seem of thinking about is how to make more noise and profit off her back.
It’s about time everyone quit and let her soul enjoy some peace at last.

[Via: CNN]

Nour El Sharif To Portray Yasser Arafat

Prominent Egyptian actor Nour El Sharif has announced that he plans on presenting the life story of the late Palestinian President, whom he was very good friends with, in a new film. Nour revealed that he video taped the funeral ceremony held for the President in Egypt and Ramallah in order to use them in the film, which he will begin work on once the mourning period is over.

Nour stressed that he will seek a good scenarist to write the script of the film once he completes collecting all the needed research on the President

Ketchup ‘hero’ dismissed

An Indian soldier who used tomato ketchup to fake his claim for a bravery medal has been dismissed from service.

Colonel H.S. Kohli, who commanded an artillery regiment in Assam, tried to present photographs of civilians splashed with ketchup as ‘enemy casualties’.

But the fraud came to light while authorities were processing his claims for an award.

The army officer was tried and found guilty in a court martial while a major who connived with him in the fake encounter, faces a five-year suspension.

How pathetic, lol…

[Via: Ananova]

Anger!

“I have a right to my anger, and I don’t want anybody telling me I shouldn’t be, that it’s not nice to be, and that something’s wrong with me because I get angry.”

— Maxine Waters, in Brian Lanker, I Dream a World, 1989