2011 Headlines

Time names Julian Assange Person of the Year
UN states use Wikileaks to disclose spending
Military spending reaches historic low
UK reopens BAE corruption inquiry
New Zealand only 33% pure and natural
Democrats stop arguing with each other, defeat Tea Party
US agrees to shut down Delaware secrecy haven
Japan, Norway stop whaling
China adopts strict enviro laws
Global warming sceptics admit "shills for oil"
SUVs banned worldwide
Solar now mandatory
Bono returns to Ireland tax home
Luxury sales plummet, aid skyrockets
Zuckerberg refuses Time 2010 award, praises Wikileaks
Taliban open girls schools
Men honour women

Osama Bin Laden Converts to Communism; Al Qaeda Announces Funding For Mating of Civilizations

Big Five at UNSC Renounce Nuclear Weapons; Formally Adopt Slogan "Make Love, Not War"

Pakistan, India Settle Disputes Through A Cricket Game; Peace Breaks Out After Match Ends in a Draw

US Elects Secular Muslim President, Pakistan a Christian

Saudi Arabia Becomes Republic; Democracy Ushered In

OPEC Announces Fund to Invest in Green Future: To Donate $1 Per Barrel From Profits To Fund To Be Managed By Third World Consortium

World Religions Declare Truce; Vow Not To Claim Superiority

Worldwide Ban on Beef and Mutton/Lamb

Countries Make Minimum Water Reserves Mandatory Underpinned By Recycling; Fair Water Use Laws Enacted

Most UN Members States Elect Women As Principal Leaders

EU Elects Transgender As Leader

Great Stuff, Warren! Pithy, cheeky, sensible headlines reflecting desirables.

Adnan Rehmat
Pakistan

Global food industry puts health before profit
Food processing using toxic chemicals is banned
UK promotes free university education to students who cannot pay tuition fees
GMOS are banned worldwide
New vaccine trials mandated for investigation by independent medical professionals and scientists who are NOT paid by pharmaceutical companies
Recyclying is mandatory in all developed countries and fines imposed are used to support recycling schemes in developing countries
Term developing country is abolished
Global branding is abolished for lcoal independent brands
People worldwide buy local products

I object to the Intelligent Soap Opera one on the grounds that there are plenty of them outside north America, Latin America and Europe... so it should read Intelligent Soap Opera in Developed World.

Donors stop supporting individual disease-focused programs. Instead, funds will be used to build national capacity and institutions for primary care and public health.

World's billionaires commit to give away half of their wealth to UN. Money will be used in sub-Saharan African countries for sustainable agro-industrial development.

US congress passed a resolution not to launch a preemptive war, ever again.

USAID is separated from State Department and its luxurious life style. It will now be totally dedicated to eradicate global poverty.

International law will require 70% of the profits made from extraction of natural resources to be used for education and health of the poor populations any where in the world.

MObiles band in public places world wide
Folk media gets internationals
Gold and silver prizes at the bottom rate
E wastage causes 110 types of health problems
TV forcasting allowed for only 3 hours a day
Petrol selling under ration cards

Aid Recipients Determine How to Use Donor Funds
Sharia Law Denounces Violence Against Women as Contrary to Islam
Male Adulturers Denounced by Islamic Leaders

Major TV networks in the U.S. and Europe will give control of programming to independent child rights organisations
Video game industry withdraws violent games listed by the American Association of Pediatrics
Advertising to kids declared illegal in Africa, South America and Asia, despite dissidence by North American advertisers

I´m a communication advertiser, and this site is awesome. My interest is developing in the social area. I´m beggining and don´t have more experiencie in this item, only with this page http://www.unavidadiferente.org.sv/ I´did it for OXFAM America in El Salvador, C.A. and learn about the violence gender situation. My expectation about this kind of communication es big, and I hope to learn more about other areas, like health, public policies, justice, democratic ad participation.Congratulations.

I like to send what I feel important for International Development Headlines. It is " Empowering people to participate in Governance" Most of the problems today are because people are distanced from governance and also they getting distanced from governance.

All people in all the world refuse to fight.

Agricultural Research Abandoned - Food Comes from the Stores

Huge Savings at World Bank: Key Share Holders Impose Churchill's War Cabinet Model and Install Filing Cabinet

IMF Governance Reform Break Through: Managing Director Post now Hereditary

Basel V: Banks Commit to Paying Interest on Current Accounts at 2% below LIBOR

Obama Condemns Senator Charlie Wilson's Support for Taliban

Chinese Government Offers Asylum for Mugabe in Exchange for 1,000,000 Ha Farm Land

Secret Plans of FED: First 10 Million Dollar Note in Circulation by 2014

Republican Majority Pushes "Education for All Americans" Initiative beyond 2014

European Commission Reduces Red Tape in Half. (Lengthwise)

Youngest Awardee of Nobel Peace Prize: North Korean Kim Jong-un for not Invading South Korea

Ministry of Health amazed to learn breastfeeding is a renewable natural resource

New Zealand discovers affordable health care begins with sustained breastfeeding

Infant formula manufacturers shocked that their products increase morbidity and mortality

Mobile is playing a vital role in getting information about the availability and brand name of inputs and weather. it is also saving the time be knowing the information sitting in the distant places. uniqueness is that illiterate farmers are also able to get new knowledge.
I have observed that most of the farming families have the mobile. so it has to be used for roviding the agricultue and livestock information through message. what i have observed that most of the farmers are not getting input in time and cheaper rate. women are still not getting due credit in development programmes. they are just working and not have new knowledge and due to that they are able to participate in the dicision making process. what I feel you organization can give more emphasis on involement of women in decesion making process through ICT.

Avertising targeting children under the age of 13 will become illegal in the U.S. after legislation to be adopted by Democrats and Republicans in May 2011.
Using violence in TV programs for children becomes illegal. Major networks agree to ban violence in TV programs between 6 AM and 10 PM, seven days a week, 52 weeks/year.
Canadian Government website will post major studies about the impacts of screen exposure on young people's mental & physical health.

HIV positive women and men head up key positions in the Caribbean HIV response.

Gender equality mainstreaming in HIV response in Caribbean island states boosts women's empowerment and men's power sharing - linked to staggering drop in HIV infection rate.

Warren -- here are my New Years thoughts...feel free to use as you wish:

MEDIA AND CONFLICT: Looking Back at 2010 and What's Ahead for 2011 By Shedon Himelfarb
http://www.usip.org/publications/media-and-peacebuilding-trends-in-2010…

A Taliban video is released, showing a US solidier captured in Afghanistan.
Google confronts censors in China. Jihad Jane is arrested in Pennsylvania for using online chat rooms to recruit terrorists. Wikileaks uploads 400,000 classified US military documents on the Iraq war, and 250,000 confidential State Department cables.

Hardly a day goes by when we don't hear about media being used in new ways either to promote peace or to promote conflict. Modern warfare is as much a battle for public opinion as it is for territory or wealth; it has become a truism to say that media has become more powerful than ever before.

So what were the really big stories of 2010, when it comes to media, conflict and peacebuilding? In my view, there were three real standouts.

The first is the unprecedented use of crowd-sourced data pulled from multiple platforms (sms texts, twitter, mobile phone calls) combined with mapping and geospatial information systems (GIS) to provide new "ground truth" insights on everything from disaster relief in Haiti to election violence monitoring in Kenya's referendum. There were lots of news stories about an organization called Ushahidi -- whose all-volunteer band of crisis mappers based in Boston scanned text and tweets to help direct relief workers thousands of miles away in Port-au-Prince -- making them the best known of the pioneers. But their very real impact has spawned a movement, and there are now countless other organizations finding innovative applications for the information provided by nearly ubiquitous mobile phones in hot spots from Beirut to Baghdad.

The second big story of the year, in my view, isn't nearly as welcome as the first. We saw an alarming almost exponential rise in the ability of repressive regimes to monitor online and mobile-based information flows.
Where the internet was once a haven for citizen journalists and dissident voices in otherwise closed societies, we saw very effective crackdowns and intimidation of online activists. Lots was written about Iran, China, Burma, but it was happening in many more countries as governments invested ever more resources in their own technical capacities.

Thirdly we had Wikileaks, whose full implications are still unclear. It brought to the fore the struggles between transparency and security, participatory media and editorial stewardship that are the hallmarks of the times we live in. Clearly we still have a lot more maturing to do as a society when it comes to managing some of the ethical issues that new media can spring on us.

What's Ahead

As for what's ahead for 2011 I think first and foremost we will see innovative efforts to work out some of the impediments we faced in leveraging this brave new world of crowdsourced data. We need better ways of verifying the information as well as protecting the citizens who get engaged.

And speaking of citizen engagement we could well see a big jump in citizen to citizen diplomacy across this next year -- as universities and even high schools step up their efforts to integrate international awareness into their curriculum. We are seeing all sorts of interesting uses of skype, ichat, and other online video platforms to connect students around the world in meaningful international experiences.

Another frontier will be in using the information from online and mobile platforms in more predictive ways. In other words I think we are going to see governments and others in the conflict management world seeking to do a version of what the corporate world has been working hard at: combining cutting edge analytics with crowdsourced data, to anticipate both needs and events. Already there has been a lot of discussion about mining Facebook chatter, tweets and SMS texts in order to predict where mass violence might occur.

Finally we will continue the convergence of new and traditional media like tv and radio, but with the added element of smart phones at the center of it all. It won't be long before these mini computers overtake the mobile phone market even in the most remote places. Most analysts say it is still a few years off but I'm not so sure when I look at the pace of adoption already in places like Afghanistan. And then what happens when tv, radio and the internet become commonplace on our person? Will we become the best informed societies thanks to the information available or the most polarized societies as we gravitate to the networks (media and social) that share our biases? Here's where a good old fashioned crystal ball would come in handy.

Sheldon Himelfarb, Phd.
Associate Vice President
Center of Innovation: Media, Conflict, & Peacebuilding United States Institute of Peace

More educational media production to combat negative social and socio-economic news content

Digital planet needs to become more inclusive!

Hello Warren Feek

HAPPY NEW Year to you!

Thank you for the mail, sharing some interesting presentations!

This is what I wish to Present, as my NEW YEAR Observational Piece... and you may see what could be done about circulating the matter... as deemed fit!

PRESENT DAY REALITY IN TROPICAL (DEVELOPING) NATIONS

If we look at every Tropical nation … be it Congo/ Zaire, Indonesia, Ecuador, Sri Lanka or even India … almost all of them have great volumes of renewable resources; very high rainfall; very high populations; and a basic availability of almost all the needs of the people. Further, the western world (with the US leading in that) virtually depend on all of these nations for their different needs (in terms of many basic materials such as Sugar, Coffee, Tea, Vanilla, Flowers, various minerals, and even petroleum). Also, the west depends on the “cheap” labor of the Tropical nations for many of their needs (both within and without). A situation has been created whereby almost all the tropical nations have their entire economy being made to be dependent on some form of “exports” as decided and “dictated” by the western nations. It would be ironic to note that countries such as Brazil, India, and Sri Lanka are more interested in “exporting”Coffee/ Tea/ Rubber/ Vanilla … rather than develop own vegetation specie such as Coconuts, Babassu, Jack Fruits, and Palmyra. The different governments vie with one another in subsidizing “exports” so that each would compete with the other in supplying at the “lowest” rates to the western world, relegating their own better resources! For example, the Indian Government would go out of the way in subsidizing Coffee growers’ requirements than supporting Jack Fruit growing or Coconuts; so also is the case of Sri Lanka, Malaysia and so on. Similarly, a country like Kenya or Ethiopia have many local species that are to be developed rather than organizing agricultural practices based on alien hybrids, as needed by the western nations. The same thing holds good in the case of other farm practices such as animal husbandry, poultry, fisheries, etc.

The strangest phenomenon is that 100% of the education systems and education needs of all the tropical nations are tuned to “supply” manpower to the western world … mainly the US. Virtually every nation subsidizes their entire human resources development so that ONLY the Western nations are benefited. Every local university and institution would vie with one another in proclaiming that their curricula and courses would make sure that youngsters who take up such courses would have the “best chances to get FOREIGN jobs”. The net result is that while on the one hand there are no “educated” people within ones own nation to “think, plan, work and develop” own nation, on the other hand the greatest of the world resources (Human Resources) would be made available virtually FREE to the western world … finally resulting in less than mediocre people working within own native land!

Adding salt to the wound, almost all the economics development activities in the tropics are so organized and the government regulations so oriented that “imported” and alien systems and processes alone are encouraged. For example, in a country like India, whereas there are no real support and “tax benefits” to entrepreneurs who want to develop Local resources such as Bullock cart systems, Local vegetation systems and local medicines, the entire Western based Wind Mills, Solar systems, Biomass burning systems, Lighting systems, Construction methods… and the like are subsidized through Tax concessions and other doles. Here, we need to recognize that resources such as Bullocks and other farm animal systems are not merely to be brushed away as foolish or things of no consequence; but suffice it to note that if India were to develop the entire farm animal potential to supplement their energy needs, the total Biogas based power in India would be a whopping 45,000 MW to 50, 000 MW!!! The net results of such skewed policies of the Developing nation Governments are TWO NEGATIVES: One, local resources get relegated to second fiddle; Two, the ultimate economic benefits accrue ONLY to the Western world...

More at: http://pvhramani.wordpress.com/2010/03/02/why-are-we-in-the-tropics-und…
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Thanks once again, and best regards

HARIHARAN PV
Chief Promoter & Mentor
AGRO-BIOGENICS(Clean-Tech) Private Limited
http://agrobiogenicscleantechpvtltd.com/
http://zerowastezerocarbon.wordpress.com/
http://cr4.globalspec.com/member?u=11231

for me governance and effective service delivery at all level is more important to make government accountable. New media technologies has huge potential for change. i would like to follow and contribute to this.

1. Boko Haram denounces bigotry and call for peaceful religious co-existence
2. al-Bashir announces trial of Janjaweed over Sudan's atrocities
3. World leaders apologise for the atrocities in Iraq
4. Wind of true change blows across francophone Africa - independence announced!
5. World nuclear powers declare end of arms race, destroy all existing stocks
6. OECD countries announce huge technology transfer to industrialise developing countries
7. America's billionaires start blockbuster campaign against junk food
8. UN condemns immigration bans; asks all historic non-natives in Africa, the Americas and Australia to return to their original home
9. UN proposes plan to make the world one-nation by 2061

for me governance and effective service delivery at all level is more important to make government accountable. New media technologies has huge potential for change. i would like to follow and contribute to this

That's true. The strangest phenomenon is that 100% of the education systems and education needs of all the tropical nations are tuned to “supply” manpower to the western world … mainly the US. Virtually every nation subsidizes their entire human resources development so that ONLY the Western nations are benefited. Every local university and institution would vie with one another in proclaiming that their curricula and courses would make sure that youngsters who take up such courses would have the “best chances to get FOREIGN jobs”. The net result is that while on the one hand there are no “educated” people within ones own nation to “think, plan, work and develop” own nation, on the other hand the greatest of the world resources (Human Resources) would be made available virtually FREE to the western world … finally resulting in less than mediocre people working within own native land!

Mine are:

Mideast Peace

North Korea

European countries going bankrupt

Terrorism

and some more. I usually get my news fix from Google News or forums like http://forums.canadiancontent.net/news/