NHK’s Project Wisdom, ‘Internet Growth Affects The World’

Further info on NHK’s Project Wisdom, ‘Internet Growth Affects The World’ which I participated in earlier this week. Also see

Panel details

Video clip (recorded prior to the programme)

'Project Wisdom'

I contributed to an NHK programme panel for 'Project Wisdom' today, on 'Internet Growth Affects The World' - no broacast date yet. There's a preliminary short clip from a Skype interview I gave last week for their website. Other contributors were Mona Eltahawy, Tarek El Khoury, Shuji Hosaka and Ethan Zuckerman. More details to follow as I receive them.

Facebook privacy issues

Hiroko Tabuchi, NYTimes.com, Facebook Wins Relatively Few Friends in Japan, 9 Jan 2011 "Japanese, until now, have flocked to various well-entrenched social networking sites and game portals — like Mixi, Gree and Mobage-town. Each has more than 20 million users, and each offers its own approach to connecting people online.

"One trait those sites have in common is crucial to Japan’s fiercely private Internet users. The Japanese sites let members mask their identities, in distinct contrast to the real-name, oversharing hypothetical user on which Facebook’s business model is based."

The privacy issues have implications in other contexts, hence the inclusion of this article here.

Tip: John Moe, publicradio.org, Tech Report Blog, Japan hates Facebook, 10 Jan 2011

Kyoto III

I'm currently in Amsterdam airport, hoping to connect to Cardiff *soon* having managed (unexpectedly) to get back earlier than planned from Japan. It was a useful trip to Kyoto: there's a lot of interesting research going on, including in relation to Islam and the net, and I made some good contacts which I hope to build on. I'll be posting some related links in due course. Some of the work I heard going on in Japan would benefit from a wider audience. I'm hoping to prepare a paper for publication in Japan, based on my presentation. We'll see whether a Japanese version of iMuslims comes together as well ...

Kyoto II

Gave my paper today on e-Jihad. It was very introductory in nature, and compressed (30 minutes including a video), so could have done with more time to unpack the detail (I guess that's what the book is for) or could have spoken quicker (not so good). Some useful questions, on defining iMuslims, defining e-jihad (and historical precedents), and on comparative approaches between different forms of activism online. There's plenty of scope in all these issues, but - as many readers of this blog will know - also the need for more researchers. There's some very interesting work going on in Japan in relation to studies of the net - as well as Islamic Studies in general - which I may link into in a future post. The conference itself is very well organised, and has a good range of speakers on its programme.

alyaban.net

As I'm presently in Japan, I've been finding out a little more about resources useful to readers to this blog. One in particular is alyaban.net. This is a project promoting news from a Japanese perspective. It is linked to the Sasakawa Middle East Islam Fund. The news and commentaries are regularly updated, and can be obtained via RSS.

Kyoto

Today's blog comes to you live from Kyoto, where I am participating in a conference.

New Horizons in Islamic Area Studies.

My paper tomorrow is part of the Islamist Discourse in Media: Papers, Computers, and Satellites session. I'm providing a version of my E-jihad: a Brief History presentation. Every time I give this, I end up re-writing it, and this time is no exception. There's no shortage of material. I'm presently wondering how to fit hundreds of screen shots into a short amount of time ...

If any material relating to the central theme of this blog emerges, I'll post it. I'm not sure if others are posting or tweeting from here.