The Progressive Blog Alliance HQ

First posted on Two for Tea

Google is setting up a new site - Google.cn - which it will censor itself to satisfy the authorities in Beijing. This has been done in order to gain greater access to China's fast-growing market see here

In a statement the company insists the move is entirely high minded “While removing search results is inconsistent with Google's mission,
providing no information... is more inconsistent with our mission

Google refuses to comment on the claims that Beijing is insisting that it replace it’s present motto of “Do no Evil” with the more appropriate “See no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil”

From the thread "Pat Robertson says something stupid, again"

"a man this vile has a platform in the most powerful state on the planet" ~ Marduk

Don't believe the hype mate. The basis for the claim that the US is the most powerful nation on earth has been fallacious for some time. It is based on the seeming potential power of the american economy, however as recent events have proved, even the dollar's value being artificially propped up by the fact that it is the currency OPEC chose as the standard for the sale of oil (thus like a magic chequebook, in that the redeemable value would never be required to be payed by the Federal Reserve), has not prevented a massive Trade Deficit ($650 billion, i believe).

The domestic economy is in such poor shape that the President was forced to levy a %30 import tax on foreign steel imports not long ago, in an illegal (by the standards of the WTO) effort at protectionism, this despite the sheer hypochrisy of that, whilst at the same time championing 'Free Trade'.

The domestic motor industry is so unable to cope that the big 3: Ford, GM & Chrysler successfully negotiated a freeze on the application of law which would require their vehicles to meet minimum standards for fuel efficiency (so called CAFE law) for at least 3 years running, this despite that the required mpg was something like 27 point something for cars and 20-ish for light vans. Can you imagine European customers, never mind environmental lobbyists, standing for anything so piss poor?

Oh yeah, but it's ok because gasoline is so cheap in the US, right? In 2000, foreign imports of oil topped %50 as the source of domestically produced petroleum products, at a bill of a staggering $110 billion/year, at the time 1/4 of the Trade Deficit, as it was.

If telcos get their way, they'll implement a "pay-for-performance" marketplace that gives preference to content providers willing to improve the bottom line. In other words if you're Google, megabucks in the bank, you'll get to pay to have your packets delivered ahead of everyone else's.

In a nutshell folks, this would be he end of the Internet as we know it, and legislation before the House Energy and Commerce Committee right now may make it so.

Check out what SBC CTO, William Smith and Edward Whitacre of AT&T think about pay-for-performance and how they'll use it to stifle competition, here.

In response to the Daily Mirror revelation about a Memo in which Bush discusses bombing the Al Jazeera HQ in Qatar, some Al Jazeera staffers have set up an unofficial blog titled "Don't Bomb Us" (http://dontbomb.blogspot.com). Here is a post:

These are the men and women who bring you the news at Al Jazeera. We have a diverse staff complement. Our people are made up of dozens of nationalities...Come and have a look at who we are (here is our flickr photoset). We are not afraid of your threats - we are journalists. And there thousands like us around the world. You may be able to kill some of us - but you will never kill us all.

I'm wondering why the US blogsphere is so silent on this Memo? Or am I just not looking in the right places?

Crossposted from The Republic of T.

It's been a while since I posted anything about Zach's story, mainly because since his return home I felt it necessary to back off and give him whatever space he needed to work out what he's experienced. Since then, a discussion about whether Zach was controlling his blog or not broke out on a previous post. Zach's blog is now temporarily disabled. But's that's not what this post is about. It's about the other side of the story, which involves LIA/R being investigated by the Tennessee Department of Health. This evening I got an email from EJ, which linked to his post concerning the outcome of that investigation. The news for LIA/R is not good.

Crossposted from The Republic of T.

I know I should probably get off this topic already, but with the progressive blogging report coming out around the same time as Dave Sifry's "State of the Blogosphere" posts, I feel rather awash in blogging related statistics. Maybe that's because these days I work with blogging stats, and have learned a bit about them. Maybe it's because blogging has changed for me since I began; since I started working in it.  Anyway, Sifry's most recent post, leaves some unanswered questions hanging out there; one in particular has been lurking in the back of my mind this week.

Crossposted from The Republic of T.

Kos is complaining again, and it's almost comical, though that wasn't the intent. "I am not a gatekeeper," he says, bemoaning the reality that political campaigns are seeking his assistance. Oh, but he is. He's one of them anyway. And the irony is that at the end of his rant he cites a recent report that makes a pretty good case for his gatekeeper status. The only question is what or who travels through that gate.

Crossposted from The Republic of T.

To say that blogging involves an inordinate amount of navel gazing would be something of an understatement. However, such contemplation does occasionally yield useful information. Case in point, the new report on the emergence of the progressive blogosphere, put together by Chris Bowers of MyDD and Matt Stoller of BOPNews. The first "self-referential" study of the progressive blogosphere, it holds some encouraging statistics, some discouraging ones, and some recommendations for encouraging growth and stronger networking between progressive blogs.

 Crossposted from The Republic of T.

Eleanor Clift reviews the Ohio 02 race and says bloggers done good. She also profiles Markos and his appearance with Joe Trippi at a "Reflections of a Blogger" forum here in D.C. (No, I did not attend. Got an invite, but didn't go.) To his credit, Kos disavowed any leadership role, but this assessment from him -- out of Clift's profile -- about what Dems need to do just doesn't go down to well with me.

Crossposted from The Republic of T.

What’s wrong with TV news? Heh. Where do I begin? I’ve mentioned before, I stopped watching television news somewhere between 9/11 and the build-up to the war in Iraq. First it was because I didn’t want to see any more gratuitous footage of the WTC attacks/collapse. Then it morphed into being sickened by utterly unquestioning, uncritical coverage of the build-up to and rationales for Iraq. Well, there’s something out there that might change my viewing habits in the future.

Now for full disclosure. Independent World Television (IWT) is one of our clients at work, but not one that I’ve done a lot of work with. They were the subject of two diaries on Kos this weekend, and I’ve been meaning to post about them myself. Here’s a bit about what they want to do.

Following is an interview from DemocracyNOW with Robert O'Harrow, Jr. who is author of the frightening new book about the security/industrial complex No Place to Hide. Once again, a must see interview from Amy Goodman. Enjoy!

Robert
O'Harrow, Jr. , reporter for The Washington Post and is an associate of
the Center for Investigative Reporting. He was a Pulitzer Prize
finalist for articles on privacy and technology and a recipient of the
2003 Carnegie Mellon Cyber Security Reporting Award. NoPlaceToHide.net

I can't believe I've missed this book for this long. Its edited by Mitch Ratcliffe and Jon Lebkowsky

EXTREME DEMOCRACY

• What is Extreme Democracy?
• Preface
• Foreword
• 1. Emergent Democracy
• 2. The Second Superpower
• 3. Power Laws, Weblogs, and Inequality
• 4. Deep Confidence in the People
• 5.Building on Experience
• 6. Two ways to emerge, and how to tell the difference between them.
• 7. From the Screen to the Streets
• 8. The dead hand of modern democracy: Lessons for emergent post-modern democrats
• Chapter 9. It's the Conversations, stupid! The Link between Social Interaction and Political Choice
• Chapter 10. Social Network Dynamics and Participatory Politics
• Chapter 11. eVoting
• Chapter 12. Democracy for the rest of us: The minimal compact and open-source government
• Chapter 13. Making Room for the Third World in the Second Superpower
• Chapter 14. Campaign Tools
• Chapter 15. Exiting Deanspace
• Chapter 16. 6.4 Billion Points of Light

From Associated Press:

A federal judge has awarded an Internet service provider more than $1 billion in what is believed to be the largest judgment ever against spammers. ...AMP Dollar Savings Inc. of Mesa, Arizona, was ordered to pay $720 million and Cash Link Systems Inc. of Miami, Florida, was ordered to pay $360 million. The third company, Florida-based TEI Marketing Group, was ordered to pay $140,000. (read the full story)

(Tip of the Hat to Jon Lebkowsky)

Emergence is what happens when the whole is smarter than the sum of its parts...And yet somehow out of all this interaction some higher-level structure or intelligence appears, usually without any master planner calling the shots. These kinds of systems tend to evolve from the ground up.

- From Emergence, by Stephen Johnson

All 12 chapters of Dan Gillmor's latest book, We, the Media, are now available for download.

Update for those of you with sex lives: Dan Gillmor left his job at the SJ Mercury this week to work on an emerging citizen-journalism project. The details of his project are few. Gillmor explains:

I'm not ready to discuss the specifics yet, mainly because I have many more ideas than I could possibly try to put into practice at this point -- and we're early in the process of working out the venture's actual form.

Keep in mind that this project is now in what's known as the seed stage. It's not an operating entity yet, though I expect it will be. But we're some time away from that, with many issues to resolve in the meantime.

This Thursday through Sunday I will be in Cambridge attending the Berkman Center conference, Votes, Bits and Bytes, which sets out to critically and skeptically examine the impact which the internet and blogosphere has on poltics. There is an impressive list of speakers and discussion topics and I plan on blogging live throughout the conference. Please leave comments if you have questions you would like me to ask any of the speakers.

On another note, does anyone know of any empty couch in Boston for Thursday night through Saturday night in exchange for some mean Chicken Masala?