Global Voices Online

Omanizer was away from blogging for a few days and she has an excuse. She couldn't put Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol down.

The Initiative for an Open Arab Internet [Ar] reports that a number of online activists have been summoned for questioning by the security and military forces and made to sign declarations that they will refrain from discussing Omani public affairs and the 'symbols of the Sultanate' online.

Harvard University's Berkman Centre for Internet and Society has released a study of the Arabic blogosphere entitled Mapping the Arabic Blogosphere. About 35,000 active blogs were covered. “The goal for the study was to produce a baseline assessment of the networked public sphere in the Arab Middle East, and its relationship to a range of emergent issues, including politics, media, religion, culture, and international affairs,” announced the centre.

In a “little sartorial digression” Lalla Lydia picks on Libyan president Colonel Muammer Al Qaddafi and Oman Sultan Qaboos bin Saeed's fashion.

Omani blogger Muscati muses: I lost my blogging momentum. Is it because I have nothing to write, or is it because I'm more active on Twitter?”

Smile O Smile shares this joke on “how things work” in Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and Oman.

Paradise in Me, from Oman, writes about her first few days in her new job in this post. “A lot of fainting, morning sickness, food, weird craving absent minded pregnant women is what I surround myself with for average 8 hours a day,” she explains.

American Coolred38, who lives in Bahrain, asks: “In your opinion…is it safe to assume…that the millions of prayers sent to God by Muslims asking for Palestinians to be saved and for the genocide to stop once and for all have fallen on deaf ears…but prayers sent out with hopes of scoring a hat trick or at least an overtime winner…were heard and answered” after she heard Omani football prayers attributing their success over Saudi Arabia in a game to God.

Muscati from Oman is enraged at the treatment Omanis receive when they apply for Schengen visas to visit Europe. “The reason I'm writing this post is that I am pissed off that Oman has a visa on arrival policy for countries that don't have quick visa procedures for Omani citizens,” he notes.