24 February 2010

Stories from 24 February 2010

Russia: Government Supports Blogger School

RuNet Echo  24 February 2010

Gov-gov.ru blogs [RUS] about a new online initiative: government-sponsored blogger schools that emerge in Tomsk (Siberia) [RUS] and Dagestan [RUS]. The Dagestan region has one of the lowest Internet penetration rates in the country. The schools involve the most popular Kremlin-affiliated bloggers.

India: Sachin Tendulkar Trended On Twitter

  24 February 2010

Santosh at Über Desi informs that Indian cricketing legend “Sachin Tendulkar became the first batsman to score 200 in a one day international match against South Africa earning him 3 different spots on Twitter trends.”

India: Surviving A Fire

  24 February 2010

Kiran Jonnalagadda posts his accounts of surviving a fire in his Carlton tower office in Bangalore. Nine people have died and 70 people have been injured.

Bermuda: Budget Day

  24 February 2010

“With a very important budget looming I've been thinking about what the individual parties can get out of it”: Politics.bm considers the upcoming Budget Day in Bermuda.

Haiti: On Beauty

  24 February 2010

“The problem is not lack of food. It's lack of money. Put people to work. Pay them enough to support the local economy. Pay them enough to eat good local food”: Chronicles of an Unplanned Return writes an uplifting post about “beauty, lightness, and good things” in Haiti.

365: A video a day from Cartagena, Colombia

  24 February 2010

Today from Cartagena in Colombia: UNESCO World Heritage Site and a top travel destination we bring you a selection of videos from the 365 video project participants, who are uploading one video a day during 2010.

Russia: Provider Sued For Not Blocking Web Sites

RuNet Echo  24 February 2010

The prosecutor's office of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug, Siberian region where most of Russia's oil comes from, filed a suit against a local Internet provider that refused to block “extremist” Web site, Regnum reported. However, there's no federal law that requires providers to block the sites.

Egypt: DC Rally for Kareem Amer

  24 February 2010

Supporters in Washington DC held a rally in support of jailed Egyptian blogger Kareem Amer. Kareem has been in prison for three years as part of a four year sentence for insulting Islam and Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak.

Caucasus: Lezginka dance

  24 February 2010

Orxanbey posts a video on YouTube of what is described as an Azeri guy and and an Armenian girl dancing to the Lezginka (national dance popular in the North Caucasus), location unknown. Wearing the national flags of Armenia and Azerbaijan, Because of the still unresolved conflict between the two countries...

Armenia: Working conditions

  24 February 2010

Adrineh Macaan details the trials and tribulations of working in Armenia. The blog says that conditions are inconvenient and lacking, hours are long, and salaries sometimes take months to be paid.

Armenia: Safe Sex

  24 February 2010

Unzipped: Gay Armenia posts photos of what could be the first ever publicly available condom dispensing machine in Yerevan, the Armenian capital. The blog says that more are needed.