Second Arab Bloggers meeting over
The Second Arab Bloggers meeting is just over here in Beirut. It has been an incredible opportunity to meet up and discuss with a bunch of very interesting folks coming from Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Syria, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, Mauritania, Egypt,Qatar, Sudan, etc.
We have run into a full week of presentations, workshops, talks and even games and I’ve learned so much from countries that I’ve never expected to be so active on the web 2.0 field.
Bloggers, activists, techno-enthusiasts, hackers, creative people: an incredible variety of mix in terms of backgrounds, skills and contexts but at the same time each of them with more than one interesting project/story to tell.
I’m grateful to Sami Ben Gharbia and the Global Voices team to have put together such a worndeful group people, and to Doreen, Alia, Heba, Corinne and the Heinrich Boll Foundation for having made this thing possible – it was not easy to organise such a meeting, and not only in terms of fundraising-.
It was the first time for me to attend a truly Panarab grassroot meeting and to be able to listen to it in its original language. I realised the power of this language, Arabic, that -even if spoken in so many different accents and local varieties- can link together people coming from 22 countries and let them share ideas and projects.
It’s true that Classical Arabic -or “fus7ha”- is still quite a “cold” language, that is perceived to be distant from people daylife and certainly not suitable for a tech meeting. But I’ve a little hope after this meeting, that a certain kind of “medium or standard dialect” (“3ammieh”) can be developed by each Arab country in order to be understood by the others.
Egyptian is widely understood by everybody not because it is easy (!) but because it has been “the” language of mass communication in the Arab world for many years. And now Syrian and Lebanese are widely understood because of TV.
I think that, despite they are harder to understand, even Tunisian and other North-African dialects could be more popular thru media in the future. They just have to be used, instead of using French (!). I believe that the beautiful Arabic language should be enhanced thru new digital media, but in its local lively versions -together with the Classical “official” one-. I hope that meetings like this could push people to speak more Arabic, learn more Arabic and produce more content in Arabic. Definitely it was like that for me!
And, again, a special thanks to Sami for having put such a network of people together.
I do believe “Panarabism” can happen only this way, thru this grassroots, bottom-up movements.
Shukran kteer wa ila liqa’, inshallah..
more pics are available thanks to Jillian C. York here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jilliancyork/sets/72157622874966605/?page=3
Joi Ito al Parlamento Italiano il 17 dicembre
Joi Ito, Ceo di Creative Commons e imprenditore fra i più illuminati del web 2.0, sarà a Roma il 17 dicembre alle ore 18.30 al Parlamento Italiano (ingresso libero previa presentazione documento d’identità) all’interno del progetto Capitale Digitale.
Un’occasione unica, in cui Joi parlerà di “Creatività, innovazione e business nella rete”. Ecco alcune informazioni sull’evento, seguito da un dibattito moderato da Riccardo Luna di Wired Italia al quale parteciperanno Franco Bernabè, amministratore delegato di Telecom Italia, Umberto Croppi, assessore alle politiche culturali e comunicazione del Comune di Roma, Juan Carlos De Martin, responsabile Creative Commons Italia, Nicola Formichella, capogruppo PDL della commissione politiche dell’Unione Europea e membro dell’intergruppo parlamentare 2.0, Antonio Palmieri, membro della commissione cultura della Camera dei Deputati, Stefano Quintarelli, CEO di Reeplay, Vincenzo Vita, vice presidente della commissione cultura del Senato e membro dell’intergruppo parlamentare 2.0.
Appuntamento alle 18.30 del 17 dicembre presso 18.30 presso la Sala delle Conferenze della Camera dei Deputati di Palazzo Marini.
L’evento viene trasmesso anche sul web all’indirizzo http://capitaledigitale.webcasting.it.
Joi Ito, uno dei 25 personaggi più influenti del web secondo il settimanale finanziario Business Week http://images.businessweek.com/ss/08/09/0929_most_influential/9.htm, fondatore di web companies come InfoSeek Japan e Digital Garage, nonché early investor di progetti web 2.0 di successo, come Twitter, Flickr, Technorati, Last.fm. sarà a Roma il prossimo 17 dicembre per tenere presso il Parlamento italiano una lectio magistralis dal titolo “Creatività, innovazione e business nella rete. Una prospettiva imprenditoriale”.
Joi Ito, che fra le varie cariche, ricopre quella di CEO di Creative Commons, l’organizzazione che si occupa di copyright nell’era digitale fondata dal Professore della Stanford University Larry Lessig, parlerà degli strumenti che rendono possibile lo sviluppo di innovazione e creatività nel business e nell’impresa.
L’argomento centrale del discorso di Ito verte sul fatto che innovazione, creatività e sviluppo economico procedono soltanto all’interno di un quadro sociale di capillare diffusione della cultura informatica e di Internet e di un quadro giuridico che garantisce la neutralità, l’apertura e l’avanzamento della tecnologia.
Il potenziamento dell’infrastruttura tecnologica, a partire da Internet, la sua neutralità e la garanzia della sua apertura sono elementi fondamentali per stimolare l’innovazione, la creatività e la competitività economica su scala globale di un paese.
Ito cercherà di tradurre la lezione della Silicon Valley in una serie di concrete “regole d’oro” da seguire per lo sviluppo di una sana scena imprenditoriale capace di rispondere alle crescenti spinte di un mercato globale sempre più competitivo.
Ito dimostrerà come la creazione di un ecosistema aperto dal punto di vista giuridico e tecnologico sia il pre-requisito da cui dipende l’innovazione d’impresa. Nel mondo digitale, l’innovazione richiede sempre di più protocolli aperti e standard giuridici adeguati al nuovo sistema economico. La questione della proprietà intellettuale e della sua protezione diventa dunque fondamentale per costruire un’economia digitale che si basi sui principi di interconnessione e scambio legali.
Creative Commons, organizzazione non profit diffusa in oltre 50 paesi, propone soluzioni per risolvere i problemi della condivisione dell’informazione digitale –e, conseguentemente, della tutela della proprietà intellettuale- in direzione di una maggiore flessibilità alla circolazione delle opere, garantita in modo legale e secondo le volontà espresse dall’autore. Gli strumenti forniti da Creative Commons servono da cornice entro la quale collaborazione e innovazione –che sono i presupposti per un’economia creativa- possano avvenire legalmente e abbassando i costi di mediazione richiesti nell’ ambiente del “tutti i diritti riservati” tipico del copyright classico.
Creative Commons è il copyright flessibile dell’era digitale che garantisce “alcuni diritti riservati” secondo la volontà del creatore dell’opera.
Joi Ito mostrerà come innovazione, creatività, impresa e benessere economico possono nascere e svilupparsi da questa economia i cui presupposti sono protocolli aperti e flessibili.
First Syrian Tweet up meeting!
…Well it’s not really the “first” (it’s the fourth!) but it’s the first I’ve attended ever in Damascus.
Meeting was supposed to start at 5 pm and finish at 7 pm on 29th nov. but it lasted until midnight!As everything in Damascus this came as a surprise: I think most of the people attending didn’t expect something peculiar to happen, we just went for curiousity to meet our online folks. A lawyer, a designer, a translator, a web developer, a bunch of geeks and Linux enthusiasts, people with very different backgrounds came. I’ve attended many online-offline meetings so far and my experience is that there is always a “cold” moment, a moment were the conversation has to be set yet, or sometime people simply don’t find sympathetic with each other.
But what I saw today in Damascus was so far the best discussion ever between people who didn’t know each other before and just enjoyed the taste of discovery and talking about technology, law, freedom, philosophy, society, art, life..so many topics and so many insights coming from so many different backgrounds. The meeting lasted hours of talks, food, drinks, smoke and so much fun.
That’s the magic of Damascus and Syrian people, something in their way of talking about stuff that is so enthralling. Thanks to @basselsafadi@mkayyali @aularon @Beshrkayali @MeXp_sy @linux_lady @zaherg @hosamakras @free_programmer and the others who were there at my first (and not last!) Syrian Tweet up!
Beirut Media Forum 2009
I’d like to republish this article from the Daily Star which reports about the Beirut Media Forum , a conference I just attended in Beirut.
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 Copyright (c) 2009 The Daily Star |
| Tuesday, November 24, 2009
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| Beirut forum explores impact of media on activism in the Middle East |
| By Farah-Silvana Kanaan Special to The Daily Star |
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BEIRUT: Media experts gathered Friday to discuss the interaction between media, web use and social, political and religious mobilization in the Middle East. The fifth Beirut Media Forum brought together the media-savvy for 10 lectures addressing obstacles facing socio-political documentary filmmakers and the rise of online social activism and citizen journalism in the Arab region. The forum, this year entitled, “Mobilizations on stage: The Image of the Real and the Verity of the Image,” is organized annually by the Institut Francais du Proche Orient, the Friedrich Ebert Foundation and the Orient-Institute Beirut.
Patrick Hazard, anthropologist and director of the London International Documentary Festival was skeptical about documentary filmmaking being a tool to jump-start social change.
“Documentary filmmakers are usually surrounded by this mystique of being independent thinkers and actors. They often have this romanticized idea that they are merely bearing witness and giving voice to the voiceless when, in reality, they are quite a conservative bunch vis a vis the political status quo,” Hazard said, adding funders often exert considerable influence over film content, which “automatically creates a tension between ethical concerns and economic interests.”
“In my experience, those economic interests are usually the key concern for most parties involved,” he added.
Naomi Sakr, director of the Communication and Media Research Institute Arab Media Center at the University of Westminster in London, meanwhile spoke about ongoing structural changes in the Arab media industry and advances in digital technology on documentary films. According to Sakr, the expansion of television channels has sparked a demand for content that attracts young and elite viewers. At the same time, more young directors are filming more cheaply and discreetly and are using alternative means to distribute their products. “A result of this phenomenon has been a rise in films exploring socio-political issues that were previously rarely acknowledged in the agenda of conventional Arab news media,” she said.
Sakr said one of the biggest issues in the Middle East was that many documentaries often did not end up being screened. One such example is “Jihad on Horseback,” a highly critical 2003 documentary about the conflict in Darfur, produced by Al-Arabiyya television. The film was never aired by Al-Arabiyya because of a private campaign against it by Sudanese politicians, although it was later bought and distributed by the International Crisis Group.
“Cooperation between political powers is crucial to a documentary film being made and screened,” Sakr said. A filmmaker’s personal connections with local political leaders or other influential personalities, known in the Mideast as wasta (nepotism) also plays a key role.
Italian political scientist Donatella Della Ratta spoke about the Arab social web by discussing her findings on how online networks were re-shaping offline action in the Arab world. The social web, she explained, is viewed as the second generation of the web and relies heavily on user-generated content, communities, networking and social interaction. It “offers two key elements ingrained in the Western political system of democracy, namely representation and mediation.” The social Arab web is empowering citizen journalism and civic participation by giving voice to “ordinary people,” Della Ratta said.
This form of citizen journalism was used during Lebanon’s June parliamentary elections by the Sharek961 website. The site enabled Lebanese citizens to promote transparency by sending in eyewitness reports on all election-related incidents or issues through text messages and the website. However, as Della Ratta admitted, the percentage of people in the Arab world who engage in such forms of social activism, or even have Internet access, is relatively low. “I would argue that in the Arab world you will find a qualitative rather than a quantitative audience, small in size but young and educated,” she said.
Christophe Varin, director of the Center for the Study of the Modern Arab World at Universite Saint-Joseph, expressed doubt that new media was leading to political mobilization in Lebanon. Varin has analyzed YouTube videos in relation to political mobilization since the so-called Cedar Revolution protests in 2005. He argued that YouTube, rather than providing a platform for civic participation and activism, was mostly another outlet for violence.
“The comments posted under YouTube videos are often used as a platform for linguistic violence,” he said, noting that many web users similarly post videos to solely express their opinions rather than in the hope of inspiring real debate or consensus. But Varin did agree with Della Ratta that a new form of citizen journalism has been catapulted into society, filling the gaps created by traditional media. “The Lebanese new media are going through a de-politicization process,” he said.
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Copyright (c) 2009 The Daily Star |
Creative Commons Jordan launch and first Arab world Salon to be held on 15-16 nov in Amman
Creative Commons is finally due to launch in Jordan next sunday 15th nov with a big gathering of law experts from all across the world and the Arab Region. Ziad Maraqa and Rami Olwan, CC Jordan leads, have organised a conference at Talal Abu Ghazaleh business Forum that will frame the debate around the launch of CC Jordan in the broader context of copyright reform, and will focus on how CC could be applied to business, artistic, entrepreneurial activities in the Arab world by showcasing case studies as the CC AL Jazeera repository.
Science Commons will be introduced for the first time in the Arab world.
The conference will start at 10 am at the Talal Abu Ghazaleh Business College at the German Jordanian University, Mekka Street, Amman. Conference will be opened by Ministry of Justice Aiman Odeh, and will feature opening remaks of Joi Ito, Ceo of Creative Commons, and Talal Abu Ghazaleh. Then the Jordan team will present the work they have been doing over the past years on the translation and porting process.
Other speakers include Diane Peters (General Counsel of Creative Commons), John Wilbanks (VP of Science Commons), Prof. Brian Fitzgerald (project lead of Creative Commons Australia at Professor at Queensland University Of Technlogy, Brisbane).
On the 16th Creative Commons will celebrate the first ever CC Arab Salon. Event is due to kick off at 6pm @Al Balad Theatre in Downtown Amman.
The Salon will feature media organisations, artists, bloggers and creative people from the Arab world who have used CC licenses and would like to share the results of opening up their work.
The Amman Salon is going to be a major step going towards fostering the creation of original Arabic content and encouraging the people to share it with the entire world. To this extent, the enthusiastic support of the Royal Film Commission who is co-organising the event under the Royal Patronage of Prince Ali bin al Hussein has been extremely key and encouraging.
A big thank to the enourmous efforts of the wide variety of passionate people and hard workers that were involved in organising this, and of course to the pioneer artists from Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt and Qatar that are going to showcase their “CC under” works! and thanks to the Jordan Open Source Association that has designed the logo of the Salon and set up an online contest to vote the most popular option which proved to be this one:
And that’s the final programme of the Salon. It’s going to be lots of artists and lots of fun! Spread the word and join us in Amman!
CC SALON @RFC SCHEDULE
Opening greetings: HRH Prince Ali bin al Hussein, Chairman of the Royal Film Commission
Greetings and overview on CC: Joi Ito, Ceo Creative Commons
Use of CC in the Arab world. The pioneers:
CC for media:
Moeed Ahmad, Al Jazeera (Qatar)
Nora Younis, Al Masry Al Youm (Egypt)
CC for visual artists:
Naeema Zarif (Lebanon)
Ahmad Ali (Syria)
CC for comics:
Maya Zankoul (Lebanon)
CC for a creative economy
Nadine Toukan and Yusuf Mansur, Urdun Mubdi3 (Jordan)
CC for filmmakers:
Cyril Aris and Mouna Akl (Lebanon)
CC for Social Media Community Projects
Ramsey Tesdell and Lina Ejleilat 7iber.com (Jordan)
CC for user generated content and Internet start ups:
Laith Zraikat, Jeeran (Jordan)
CC for poetry:
Emad Nasser, Seejal (Jordan)
CC for geeks:
Bassel Safadi, Discover Syria (Syria)
Eman Jaradat, Jordan Open Source Association (Jordan)
Music remix and live act by Rejon (US-China)
Al Jazeera launches new programme grid for 13th anniversary
I’m just back from a nice but very short trip to the Gulf which included Doha, too. It is always interesting to pay a visit to Al Jazeera Channel which is like “home” for me, after so many trips over there for books, articles, conferences. This time I’ve found “men at working” over there and this sounded like a major renewal. Indeed, it is. The folks over there explained that Al Jazeera’s 13th birthday party -which is in November- will be celebrated with big changes, both in the programme grid and at the channel headquarters where a brand new building has been added overlooking the big satellite paraboles.
I’ve just got these two press releases from their PR office which contain more info about the new grid which will be broadcasted by tomorrow. Being a fan of the Al Jazeera New Media folks for all that they have been doing in the domain of social media, Internet, interaction between “old” journalism and new partecipatory social news, I’d like to underline that a “new media flavour” will be added to “Minbar Al Jazeera”, one of the oldest programme of the channel. Viewers will be abled to interact live and express their views thru social media platforms like Twitter or Facebook. But that’s just one thing that we’ll be seeing by tomorrow. Stay tuned..
Press Release
Al Jazeera Channel Launches a ‘New Look’ and New Programmes on its Thirteenth Anniversary
October 30, 2009, Doha Qatar: Al Jazeera Satellite Channel has just finished preparations to launch a new look and a new cycle of programmes to coincide with its “Al Jazeera Day” celebrations on November 1st, the day on which the Network will also celebrate Al Jazeera Arabic’s thirteenth anniversary as well the sixth anniversary of the launch of Al Jazeera Sport Channel and the third anniversary of Al Jazeera English and Al Jazeera Documentary channels.
This Sunday night’s edition of “Al Hasad” (“Harvest of the Day”), Al Jazeera Arabic’s main news programme, will have a new look and color scheme and new theme music. The changes include a newly redesigned studio incorporating a video wall and other state of the art technologies.
In addition, the management has also introduced important changes to its content based on findings from a recent opinion poll conducted by Nielsen, a leading international research company that specializes in viewer conduct and TV ratings. The sample survey included 27,000 viewers from 14 Arab countries.
Commenting on the ‘New Look’ and new cycle of programmes at the Al Jazeera Channel, Wadah Khanfar, Director General of the Network stated, “The changes are aimed at making the channel’s programmes more dynamic and more interactive to attract new audiences, especially the youth.” He further added, “The new programmes will provide much more in–depth analysis and the new changes to the channel’s studios and on-screen graphics will reflect Al Jazeera’s commitment to deliver to our audiences the best in broadcasting while maintaining Al Jazeera’s authentic style which they have become accustomed to over the years.”
Along with the new look there are a number of additional changes introduced to news programmes as well. The main news programmes, “Midday” and “Harvest of the Day”, will adopt more in-depth analyses and a faster rhythm with the new style aimed at giving the channel’s reporters and correspondents in the field a greater role in coverage and a closer engagement with its audiences through social and human interest stories. The channel will continue broadcasting its “Maghribi” North African bulletin daily at midnight Makkah time. In addition, a new weekly sports bulletin will be shown at 2:30 Friday afternoons.
One of the most important changes in programmes will include the channel’s talk shows. The new programming grid will see the introduction of two new talk shows. The first called “ Fi Alumq”, Arabic for “In-Depth”, will host intellectuals, analysts, and strategists to discuss issues from different angles in news and current affairs presenting in-depth analyses of major issues pertaining to the region and the world. The programme will be aired at 10 pm every Monday night and will be introduced by Al Jazeera’s well-known anchor Ali Al Dafiri. Another newcomer to the grid “Al Milaf” or “The File” will deal with political and social issues that are of key interest to the Arab world and the world in general. The programme will have packages and discussions that go beyond the surface and look at the essence of issues rather than focusing on overt controversies. “The File” will be aired at 10pm on Friday nights and will be introduced by Sami Kluaib.
Al Jazeera’s viewers will also have a chance to enjoy more football related coverage through a weekly programme called “Dunia Al Kura”, or “The World of Football”. This programme will cover the different football events in a non-traditional style prepared by a team of sporting specialists. It will be hosted by Muhammed Sa’adoun Al Kuwwari at 8pm Monday nights.
“Minbar Al Jazeera” (“Al Jazeera’s Platform”), the programme which gives a voice to the voiceless will also see several changes to its look with a more interactive format allowing the audience to have a greater ability to express their views by engaging through social media such as Twitter and Facebook.
All times noted above are GMT +3
Press Release:
New Documentary Series “Al-Islamiyoun” (the Islamists) To Be Aired On Al Jazeera
October 25, 2009, Doha, Qatar: As part of its new program grid starting on November 1st, Al Jazeera Satellite Channel will air the new series “Al Islamiyoun” (the Islamists).
Extending over 18 episodes, the program is the first documentary series presenting an in-depth analysis of political Islam and its development in the contemporary era. Drawing on a rich body of historical events, the series includes over 70 interviews with politicians belonging to different schools of thought in addition to a number of analysts and intellectuals from more than 12 countries.
The first part, which covers almost half of the series, presents a historical approach to the phenomenon of political Islam, starting from its foundation up to the 1960s. This is the period when most of the original Islamic movements emerged in a number of Islamic countries.
The second part covers the subsequent rise of political Islam and its diverse expressions extending beyond the founding movements. The documentary shows rare archival pictures of some of the most important events.
Preparations for this unprecedented and comprehensive documentary series spanned over almost four years and included an extended production team with the participation of a select group of researchers and intellectuals. This ground-breaking work adds to the previous achievements of Al Jazeera in the field of documentary production such as The Lebanon War, The Story of a Revolution, and Al-Nakba.
The program will start airing on Friday November 6 on Al Jazeera Satellite Channel, and on Saturday November 7 on Al Jazeera Documentary Channel.
Oriente.com a Roma il 13 ottobre per “Capitale digitale”
Il meglio del web 2.0 arabo si dà appuntamento a Roma la settimana prossima per “Oriente.com“, il secondo incontro del ciclo “Capitale digitale:idee per il futuro“, un progetto prodotto e curato da Telecom Italia, Wired Italia e la Fondazione Romaeuropa.
“Oriente.com” vuole aprire una finestra di discussione sul mondo arabo digitale. Dopo la recente acquisizione del portale arabo Maktoob da parte di Yahoo!, gli occhi dei venture capitalist del mondo intero sono puntati sulle start up arabe. La Giordania è stata ribattezzata “Silicon Valley araba”, con la sua popolazione giovane e sempre più impegnata a dare vita a nuove start up che operano sul versante dell’innovazione tecnologica e della creatività online. La Regina Rania è una dei “twitterati” più famosi del mondo, mentre la cultura dei 140 caratteri si impone anche in lingua araba, grazie a Watwet, il Twitter arabo. In tutto il mondo arabo i giovani –il 70% della popolazione araba è sotto i 25 anni- usano il web per costruire innovazione, aprire nuovi business, fare politica, mobilitare alla causa ambientale.
“Oriente.com” apre il dibattito su questo nuovo mondo arabo digitale, riflettendo sulle dinamiche del web 2.0 e sulle possibili collaborazioni all’interno del Mediterraneo con tre illustri ospiti provenienti dalla Regione:
- Laith M. Zraikat (Giordania) è co-fondatore e chief product officer di Jeeran.com, la più grande online community del mondo arabo, 1,5 milioni di utenti registrati e oltre 7 milioni di visitatori al mese. Jeeran è una sorta di “Facebook” all’araba, dove gli utenti si scambiano contenuti da loro prodotti, rigorosamente in lingua araba. Fondato da Laith con un gruppo di amici del college, Jeeran è il perfetto esempio di un modello di start up “alla Silicon Valley” che però si sviluppa tenendo conto del contesto arabo da cui proviene e opera.
- Nadine Toukan (Giordania) viene dal mondo della produzione di fiction, ha lavorato presso la Royal Film Commission giordana dove ha curato il programma “Emerging Arab filmmakers” insieme al Sundance Institute. Nadine sta sviluppando l’offerta di contenuti multimediali per la società giordana Arabtelemedia, vincitrice di un Emmy award per la sua fiction tv “L’invasione”. Blogger appassionata, è co-fondatrice e tribe-leader di UrdunMubdi3 (Creative Jordan), un social network dove le discussioni online diventano progetti operativi sul versante della creatività e dell’innovazione. Il suo prossimo progetto è uno show multipiattaforma sull’imprenditoria e le industrie creative in Giordania.
- Habib Haddad (Libano) è il co-fondatore di Yamli.com, una start up che fornisce strumenti per il potenziamento dell’uso della lingua araba su Internet. Il World Economic Forum ha recentemente insignito Habib dell’onorificenza di Young Global Leader 2009, e il suo nome compare fra i 30 più promettenti degli imprenditori arabi under 30, secondo la classifica di Arabian Business. Habib divide il suo tempo fra il Libano e Boston, dove Yamli.com ha sede.
Ho il piacere e l’onore di coordinare quest’incontro, la prima volta che a Roma si discute di questi argomenti. Devo ringraziare Salvo Mizzi per aver appoggiato il progetto e Gilda Morelli per aver fatto si che ci potessimo davvero incontrare tutti a Roma (non è mica facile far viaggiare gli arabi, anche se sono imprenditori di successo..). Sono orgogliosa che la mia città ospiti un meeting di questo livello e spero che sia occasione per porre le basi di un dialogo imprenditoriale, all’insegna della creatività e dell’innovazione nel Mediterraneo. Abbiamo più che mai bisogno di una nostra “via mediterranea al web 2.0″ che tenga conto delle specificità dell’imprenditoria mediterranea. Aprire un tavolo di confronto con il mondo arabo, che si sta dimostrando molto attivo sul versante delle start up tecnologiche, rappresenta un primo, concreto segnale.
Appuntamento all’Opificio Telecom, Via dei Magazzini generali 20/A, 13 ottobre dalle 18 alle 20.
Arab 2.0 to be featured in Rome next 13th October
Thanks to Salvo Mizzi from Telecom Italia project “Capitale digitale” we will have the pleasure to host a very special conference in Rome next 13th October 6-8pm at the nice location of Opificio Telecom, Fondazione RomaEuropa Via dei Magazzini Generali 20/A.
This meeting -the second one of the cycle “Città digitale”- is named “Oriente.com” and will feature 3 very interesting names of the emerging vibrant scene of Arab web 2.0. Have a look at their bios:
- Laith Zraikat, the co-founder and chief product officer of the Arabic web portal Jeeran .
Laith started Jeeran with his friends during their college years to make it the largest online community for user-generated-content in the Arab world.
Now, with more than 10 years of experience in the online space, Laith serves as Director of Innovation, overseeing the design and development of innovative web services which propel Jeeran’s community of around 1.5 million registered users and 7 million unique visitors a month. Jeeran is now a growing family of 50 smart and dedicated individuals who thrive on the challenges they face. The Jeeran network has grown over the years and spans millions of pages of purely user-generated-content.Jeeran has also successfully launched two sister sites and is an early investor in the number one Arab comedy portal. A self taught technologist and entrepreneur, Laith has never had a job but enjoys creating jobs while pursuing his dream of building Jeeran into a major player in the global web space. Laith holds a Bachelor of Dental Surgery from the University of Jordan. Enjoys coding, design, hiking, cycling, and reading. Plans to one day fly a commercial jet and own an island.
- Nadine Toukan, co-founder of Creative Jordan (Urdun Mubdi3)
Nadine produced on the multi-award winning feature film, Captain Abu Raed, and developed the capacity building division for the Royal Film Commission where she curated programs for emerging Arab filmmakers with Sundance Institute, USC’s School of Cinematic Arts, and the AM Qattan Foundation. She curated the first corporate social responsibility forum for the mayor of Amman, and piloted the mobile film experience for the Arab Children Congress. She is currently working on the launch of a slew of Jordanian content channels for the International Emmy Award winning company Arab Telemedia Group. She is also the co-founder and tribe leader at UrdunMubdi3, and along with her partner, economist Yusuf Mansur, they are producing a multiplatform show on entrepreneurship and creative industry companies in Jordan. She mantains a blog http://www.arabianmonkeytales.com and a very active Twitter profile @nadinetoukan.
- Habib Haddad – co-founder Yamli.com
Habib is an entrepreneur and recently co-founder of Yamli.com, a startup focused on empowering the Arabic language on the web. Today, he drives Yamli’s vision and product strategy. The World Economic Forum recognized him as a Young Global Leader in 2009, he is also part of the 2009 “Thirty under 30″ list by Arabian Business. Prior to Yamli he co-founded INLET (International Network of Lebanese Entrepreneurs and Technologists), to promote entrepreneurship in the Arab world. During the July of 2006 war he founded Relief Lebanon to support relief operations. His past work experiences also include AMD and Mok3 a Boston startup out of the MIT. Habib advises several young entrepreneurs and startups from the MENA region and often speaks about early stage development and entrepreneurship. He holds a Bachelor of Computer and Communication Engineering from the American University in Beirut and a Masters in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California.
I’m very proud to be the coordinator and the host of such a meeting and I’m looking forward to welcoming Laith, Nadine and Habib in my home town. A big thanks to Salvo and Gilda from Telecom Italia to have made this possible. It was a lot of hard work, even in terms of logistics and particularly the visa issue. I hope this meeting will help our local community to understand the Arab world better and to start thinking about it as a vibrant place, plenty of young talented people, creativity and business opportunities.
See you in Rome on 13th, inshallah 
The Arab social web and Creative Commons at Picnic Festival in Amsterdam
I’m heading to Amsterdam to Picnic Festival (23-25 sept) which I am sure will be a lot of fun.
Tomorrow I’ll moderate the session which has this charming title of “The Arab social web” and will feature Moeed Ahmad, the Head of New Media at Al Jazeera channel, and Mohamed Najem, co-founder of Social Media Exchange, a very interesting Lebanese ngo focused on social media and development who took part at Sharek961 the social monitoring process for Lebanese elections. There’s currently a lot of interest on this “social web” topic and how it is developing in the Arab world. And it will be very interesting to see how it will be perceived not only by the web 2.0 fans gathering at Picnic from all over the world, but also by the Dutchs, who are currently living a very “troubled” relation with the Arab-Muslim world (see also the recent episode of Dutchs prosecuting Arabs over Holocaust cartoon).
On thursday 24th we are going to have a Creative Commons special workshop focused on how to share and remix audiovisual contents. Moeed is going also to join and chat about the Al Jazeera Creative Commons repository project launched during the Gaza crisis. Paul Keller, Creative Commons’ public project lead in the Netherlands, is going to coordinate this. Gonna be a lot of fun and interesting insights!
