That's right! The crew over at Harvard's Berkman Center (Ethan, Rebecca, Ory,) who collaborate on the group blog Global Voices Online have hit paydirt by getting a frontpage feature link at BBC News Online today. Now this may not be such a big deal for Rebecca MacKinnon of Rconversation and NKZone being that she is a former CNN Bureau Chief for Asia and all, but for Ethan Zuckerman (My Heart's in Accra ) and Harvard graduate student Ory Okolloh (Kenyan Pundit ) this should be well, really important. At least I think it is really important.
I am delighted that they received this mainstream media (MSM) press coverage from such a respected organization as BBC News Online. Congratulations folks. As for my regular readers I told you before to pay close attention to the blogs in my blogroll, not to my postings. This BBC article oughta beef up the online traffic to certain blog authors writing about Africa and other interesting regions of the world considerably. I wonder who has thought to track and record the traffic statistics?
While I am on the subject of Bloggers and the fear they are creating out there in the world at large, you should check out this April 4th article at BBC Programmes Click Online titled Blogging from East to West. Still think blogging is a leisure pasttime of an internet-saavy elite of white males living and working in the West?
Please watch Sorious Samura's documentary if you can find the time this weekend at CNNI (Europe) on Sunday, April 10th. Readers from the U.K., U.S., some African nations (with DsTV) and elsewhere may have already seen an airing of the documentary but if not then check your local TV listings. CNN's Christiane Ammanpour has a special feature titled "Return to Darfur" airing soon also but I cannot find anything about it on the (poorly designed) CNN website.
Here is an excerpt from Insight News TV about "Living with Refugees":
Adam has 2 wives, 8 children, no money and all his friends have been murdered. Sorious meets Adam at the Chad/Sudan border where he has been living on handouts - but he's outstayed his welcome. Even though he doesn't know how far it is, he's heading for a UN refugee camp further to the west in Chad. He agrees Sorious can follow his family on this journey. "You have come all this way to tell our story, you are our brother."
Never before has someone filmed an exodus of people in this way. As the journey progresses more refugees join the group – there's safety in numbers. Sorious is exhausted and cannot keep up. He follows their methods of survival, digging dry riverbeds for water and eating only once. Sorious speaks to Adam about what happened in Darfur, he breaks down "Please don't make me remember what happened, it's just too much."
1 comment:
I am interested in Samura's documentary. I am not really a TV person but I'll try to get more info on that. Thanks for links as well :)
On African bloggers getting attention, it's excellent news! This gives me hope, it just proves to people that we're not completely disconnected from the world and we have a lot to share.
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