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Nadeem Uddin

'Viagra cream' could prove safer - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8263307.stm

shared by Nadeem Uddin on 21 Sep 09 - Cached
  • Nadeem Uddin on 21 Sep 09
     
    'Viagra cream' could prove safer\nViagra\nSide-effects can include headaches, blurred vision and upset stomach\n\nA cream allowing erectile dysfunction drugs to be applied directly to the skin could one day make them safer to use, say New York scientists.\n\nStudies in rats suggest that Viagra, Levitra and Cialis could pass through the skin in tiny capsules, they say.\n\nThe research, published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine, could mean fewer side-effects, and even significantly speed up the drug's action.\n\nHowever, it could be a decade before creams are fully ready for use.\n\nThe arrival of erectile dysfunction treatments in tablet form has been one of the success stories of the modern pharmaceutical industry, with some estimates suggesting that tens of millions of men worldwide have used them.\n\nHowever, although they have worked for many men, they also carry the risk of side-effects such as headaches, blurred vision or upset stomachs.\n\nIn addition, men with severe heart problems, or who have just suffered a stroke, are advised to avoid the tablets altogether or use them with extreme caution.\n\nLess risk\n\nFor many, this could be solved by the development of the cream, with would confine more of the active ingredients of the drug to a single area of the body, rather than circulating them widely.\n \nThe response time to the nanoparticles was very short, just a few minutes, which is basically what people want in an erectile dysfunction medication\nDr Kelvin Davies\nStudy author\n\nThe research team at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine at Yeshiva University, in New York, used nanoparticles, each much smaller than a grain of pollen, and found a way to encapsulate particles of the drug inside.\n\nTheir early tests involved just a few rats bred to have erectile dysfunction later in life.\n\nOf these, 11 were treated with nanoparticles containing Cialis, a newer erectile dysfunction drug called sialorphin, and nitric oxide, a chemical also needed to wid
Christoph Zed

Venezuela bans Family Guy cartoon - 2 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8277129.stm

media flow glocalisation culture clashes globalisation localisation

shared by Christoph Zed on 28 Sep 09 - Cached
  • Authorities in Venezuela say they will punish TV stations if they continue to broadcast episodes of cult US animation Family Guy.
    • xinning ji
      xinning ji on 28 Sep 09
       
      what I think is that authorities are those who work for the government or politics. so the issue is based on the decision of the government rather than general publics. therefore, the interactive communication between different cultures are limited by the politics.
  • the show should be banned because it promotes the use of marijuana
    • Andrew Ooi
      Andrew Ooi on 04 Oct 09
       
      If anyone wants to ban anything cigarrettes should be first on the list. This demonization of cannabis has gone on for far too long. Cannabis/Hemp species have been used for thousands of years for medicine, fabric, paper, biodiesel (recently, but you can use almost anything to make it anyways). If anyone disagrees I challenge you to a duel.
    • Nora Ibrahim
      Nora Ibrahim on 04 Oct 09
       
      True that Andrew! :-)
  • messages that go against the whole education of boys, girls and adolescents
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • Televen avoided the fine by pulling the show and replacing it with Baywatch.
  • Venezuelan TV is known for filling its schedules with re-runs of old US series and Latin American soap operas
  • Christoph Zed on 28 Sep 09
     
    Interesting move, I guess the "localization" process overlooked a few issues. Personally I think "the family guy" does quite often cross lines that should not be crossed, (eg: when making fun of pedophilia) The show highlights a trend in western society to ridicule any value and/or anything "sacred".
  • ...1 more comment...
  • Nora Ibrahim on 04 Oct 09
     
    I am a HUGE fan on Family Guy since they started airing in States and recently have been watching the episodes from Season Seven (compliments of RMIT Library) back to back. I must say there are loads of 'jokes' used in the episodes which I found was bordering on 'so wrong'. The writers do make fun of every single thing and no one is spared, not even physically challenged people.
  • fina ramlee on 04 Oct 09
     
    I've watched it once and I didn't like it.Everything about it is so wrong but I guess it's now a trend to use cartoons as medium for silly jokes.
  • anonymous on 06 Oct 09
     
    Some people might capture the meaning wrongly. Perhaps Venezuelans view Family Guy as those who criticize the western value. Since Venezuelan TV is know to re-runs of old US series and Latin American soap operas, they tend to manage the conventional value instead of looking at the west in a modern society who gets ridicule by the writers.
Christoph Zed

BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Suu Kyi 'welcomes US engagement' - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8272931.stm

US Asia hegemony politics government

shared by Christoph Zed on 25 Sep 09 - Cached
  • San Suu Kyi says she welcomes US plans to engage with the country's military rulers
  • Suu Kyi also wanted the US to engage with the political opposition.
  • direct engagement is good
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • sanctions remained an important part of US policy but that "by themselves they have not produced the results that had been hoped for on behalf of the people of Burma"
  • US would be looking to employ both sanctions and engagement to "help achieve democratic reform" in Burma.
shi chen

How iPods killed the boombox star - 0 views

www.theage.com.au/...oombox-star-20090926-g75l.html

Ipod loss

shared by shi chen on 06 Oct 09 - Cached
  • We lost something valuable when private playlists replaced public noise
  • ''rock and roll ain't noise pollution''.
  • Rock and roll can be noise pollution.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • Today, playing music has become a much more private experience.
  • But things changed a little with the arrival of the Sony Walkman, and then a lot when we entered the iPod age.
  • In the iPod age, everyone has their own private soundtrack as they walk the streets, which means the streets themselves no longer have a soundtrack
  • With the white buds in our ears - a modern look that sends a clear message of ''do not disturb'' - we are oddly vacant in urban spaces even as we inhabit them.
  • The loss is not only the music we no longer hear, but all the acts of having music foisted upon us that we no longer experience - and what these acts mean.
  • shi chen on 06 Oct 09
     
    the sadness about using new technology
  • jermaine lee on 07 Oct 09
     
    From time to time, some Aussie teenagers play their music real loud on the train, through the use of their mobile, which is very annoying and disturbing to other commuters. I guess, even though ipod is widely used nowadays, it hasn't stopped the noise pollution completely~
Wye Keen Wong

UCLA Center for Chinese Studies: Changing Images of the Global - 0 views

www.international.ucla.edu/...article.asp

shared by Wye Keen Wong on 05 Aug 09 - Cached
  • They have come to recognize that the modern world is always changing, sometimes slowly, sometimes rapidly, sometimes suddenly.
  • assessing China's future place in the multidimensional global carefully because the consequences of bad mistakes could be disastrous.
  • He has objected to the use of the word diaspora to describe the migration of Chinese from China, because it is inaccurate and has been used to perpetuate fears of a "Chinese threat."
    • Wye Keen Wong
      Wye Keen Wong on 05 Aug 09
       
      I accept the term diaspora as is, though this statement has now thrown certain ideas I had into new lights. Clearly a issue of the politics of terminology - this demonstrates the need to define your interpretation of the teminology you use in statements/arguments. I wonder sometimes whether debate over the use of words and terminology themselves can detract from the 'real' issue - or perhaps they are inseparable?
Tony Sullivan

Background Briefing - 5 July 2009 - Cairo, a divided city - 0 views

www.abc.net.au/...2613439.htm

globalisation Egypt

shared by Tony Sullivan on 05 Aug 09 - Cached
  • Cairo
  • Mr Berry: When you walk in the gate it's nice. It gives you the impression that maybe you have a place in Australia maybe, maybe it feels like you in Australia, maybe somebody else, OK, maybe in Saudi Arabia, or anywhere else in the world, maybe in Italy, maybe somebody has the same feeling like Oh, this looks somewhere in Rome, somewhere in Greece
    • Tony Sullivan
      Tony Sullivan on 05 Aug 09
       
      Describes 'gated communities' for the affluent, being established in desert areas beyond the border of Cairo city.
  • Mr Berry: Golf, it's a very prestigious thing.
  • ...37 more annotations...
  • Not everyone back in Cairo is happy about the obsession with golf courses. Professor of Landscape and Architecture at Cairo University, Mohammad Refaat says they are a status symbol and the game doesn't come naturally to Egyptians
  • Mohammad Refaat: The first golf course that was created in these new developments was in Katameya Heights. It started - why is that? Because we started to have the Japanese in Egypt. The Japanese, they love golf, and we have several firms with Japanese managers, so it became a luxury to provide the service for them. But I believe that we're never going to be golfers as Egyptians, and I don't know, it's irritating now, because whenever you go, whenever you get a project, even in my private office, they say, 'Ah, the golf', and then we start doing the compound. The main idea of the golf from the owners' point of view is that to provide value for the people so that he can start to sell.
  • Mohammad Refaat: The thing is that I feel that we are Westernising ourselves. The thing is that due to the effect of the media, everybody wants to live in a Dallas, or in a Falconcrest or one of these things that we used to see when we're kids.
  • And they did not understand the Egyptian culture. If I speak about myself, I'd rather live in what we call the hara, or the alley, the old alley that we have, you know, when you have people all living in one street, of having all the services in the street, what we call the philosophy of the extended family. This is very, very Egyptian.
  • Anwar Sadat
  • opened up the country to the world, and very significantly, for the first time, all Egyptians could travel overseas.
  • Egyptians from all classes went abroad to get jobs in Gulf countries. They came back with money and with an appetite for things like shopping and luxury living. Some also brought back new ideas about Islam. It was more conservative and fundamentalist.
  • teachers, engineers, medical doctors, peasants, the large peasant migration
  • get passports, go and work in Jordan, in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, come back. Some of them also in Saudi Arabia perhaps never ever encountering women, right? And coming back with new notions of segregation, of headscarf, of Islamisation
  • Hagar Cohen: In Cairo today more and more women are segregated and wear the burqa, which is the full head and body cover. But everyone likes the shopping, and the new and glitzy malls are full of people in all kinds of dress
  • It can be uncomfortable now for women in western clothes, who don't wear scarves, because conservative men and women clearly show their distaste. This mix between consumerism and a very religious lifestyle is sometimes known as 'petro Islam'
  • Mona Abaza: They have different notions and variations of Islamic ideologies. There is a difference between a 16-year-old kid who is out of a family of 10 living in a slum, and a schoolteacher who lives long years in Saudi Arabia comes back, very much influenced by what I call the petro Islamic ideology, Saudi Arabian consumerists, very much into conservative accommodationist kind of religion, enjoying a shopping mall but at the same time dressing in Islamic code for instance. So marrying certain forms of consumer culture, but giving it a flavour that can look Egyptian, so that you convince yourself that you are different.
    • Tony Sullivan
      Tony Sullivan on 05 Aug 09
       
      Also discussed in relation to Salafism, a quietist social current encouraged by Saudi Araba, in 'The fever under the surface', The Economist 25 July 2009, p11-12, part of a special report on the Middle East.
  • the gated communities inside. the more upmarket, the faster they're selling, and they have names like Beverley Hills, Hyde Park and Dreamland.
  • Another kind of cultural reference for all of this is old Egyptian movies from like the 1950s you know, black-and-white films, where the setting was very, very often the Pasha's villa, which always had a very grand staircase, and a very grand entrance. This is the sort of lifestyle that Egyptians haven't had access to since the 1950s because of the crowding and so on and so forth. So now it's sort of become a lifestyle option for wealthy Egyptians that wasn't really there. So you can now have your own Pasha's villa.
  • Hagar Cohen: Dina Hussanein says she isn't comfortable living in a place with a name like 'Beverly Hills'. Dina Hassanein: That's a very sad thing, because we have a remarkable history and civilisation and yet, you know, we can't think of any Arabic word of our own that we could use to name the places. So I can tell you, Beverly Hills Egypt is nothing like Beverly Hills California
  • Hagar Cohen: Dina Hassanein is a modern woman. She lives on her own, and has a fiancé who lives nearby. She is very beautiful and smartly dressed in Western clothes. She has a job which involves interaction with all sorts of people
  • Hagar Cohen: Dina Hassanein and other residents have to rely on Old Cairo for almost everything, including shops, restaurants, and health services. There are also no local street markets, little shops or stalls, or workshops. In some places, the rules even forbid them. Big supermarket chains can be found easily, but you have to drive to get to them
  • Said Sadek: And you have rulers who believe in gated communities. Mubarak himself, lives in Sharem el Sheik or Borg el Arab, isolated, always isolated. The ruling elite in Egypt are isolated. And so you can tell by this political orientation of the elite that this is what they want, an isolated community because they cannot meet the demands of the masses. There are 40% of Egyptians below poverty line, earning less than $2 a day. And so this abject poverty amidst people who have a lot of money, may drive people to be envious
  • Very poor quality housing found in slums and shanty towns is expanding in Cairo
  • r Cohen: What in terms of sewage and garbage services? Are they available? Manal Tibe: We are talking about no water, so don't talk about sewage and garbage
  • Hagar Cohen: Manal Tibe says that the government isn't doing anything to improve conditions in slums, but has been very generous to private developers of gated communities. The desert land is subsidised by the government as well as the price of fuel, electricity and water. And that makes expenses in gated communities very low.
  • Manal Tibe: More hatefulness from poor to rich people and also to the government. Now, poor people that they want revenge, and this is being interpreted in some crimes against rich people.
  • Hagar Cohen: Dina Hassanein is missing city life, but at the same time she says that she doesn't fit in there any more
  • Dina Hassanein: It's not that I don't want to live there, it's just that our realities are very different, the places that we go are very different. If I were to walk into a slum I might get torn apart. You can't just walk in wearing normal clothes like we do into a place like that. I can barely walk down the streets without getting harassed actually, because it's a much more conservative society, so it's just different, it's almost impossible for these worlds to intermingle.
  • Hagar Cohen: These two very different worlds are on display inside some of Cairo's shopping malls. Western music there is piped through just as it is in any Australian city. This shopping mall is in the suburb of Giza. It's one of the most exclusive ones in Cairo. There's a care there serving Caesar salads and cappuccinos. Just across the road is the Giza Zoo, which is a popular hanging out venue for poorer families
  • This shopping mall
  • It's only a few days before Christmas when we're here, and in this Muslim country, it's ironic that Christian carols are playing throughout the atrium. Mona Abaza: It's a mix of definitely well-to-do Egyptians, and lots of expatriates, foreigners coming. You can see the Christmas decoration. During Ramadan they make Ramadan decorations, tents and Islamic style, and in Christmas they put Christmas decorations
  • Mona Abaza: There is this idea that the old downtown city is now slowly being depopulated by its, let us say, middle class. It used to be a very important commercial centre. It is now losing out this significance, because the centres have been now little by little moving out. So the idea is to get out of the city, because as if it's the inside is rotten, and it's very interesting how the poor can easily look at the lifestyles of the rich. Now this is evidently a bit of a problem for the rich, so that is why they opted for the American Dream, which is getting out and walling off.
  • Mona Abaza: If you look at it just visually, the problem is slums. One can easily say that the view is that as if the whole of Cairo is consisting of slums. Now the past 20 years, the neo liberal ideology of the government is to try and handle the problem of slums, and the way they handle it is as if it's an evil, a cancer that has to be drastically eliminated, with violence, because they consider and they believe that in slums, that we have the breeding of terrorist ideology, Islamist, poverty, violence etc. Now all this is quite often very over-exaggerated. I mean it's a form of discriminating the poor, that's clear. But you have the issue also of the city now experiencing a new form of cleaning up geared towards of course the encouraging of tourism and sites of consumption. So the cityscape is taking place as a huge space for consumer culture and tourism
  • Hagar Cohen: The American University, where Professor Abaza lectures, has also moved out to the desert and is now based in a town called New Cairo. She says it's a bad move, because a whole generation of well-off young people will be isolated, away from historical Cairo or the old Egyptian culture
  • Mona Abaza: You might be astonished but my students, 18 years old, 19 years, have never for instance known anything about downtown, have never even gone to downtown.
  • You will find the American fast food and the Egyptian fast food, and Italian, Mexican. Upstairs there is a McDonald's and Kentucky
  • Towheid Wahab: There is a rule here in the University. There's no mosque, there's no church, there's no temple, there's no monastery. All the people here are equal to do their religion by their own
  • Max Roderbeck: There are good reasons why they want to move, because you get a nice amount of space, you can re-brand yourself with a new image of being something that looks very modern instead of something that's fitted into a shabby old neighbourhood. There's certainly a trend, I mean there are quite a lot of institutions that have moved out.
  • Max Roderbeck: The danger of Cairo being hollowed out is pretty real. And I mean, some of the things that a city needs to be vibrant, seem to be already been pulled out of the centre of Cairo. I've seen other places where downtown becomes either a hollow shell, or ends up just being a sort of transport hub, you know, a sort of junction of roads and things. And I think it's a very real danger with Cairo.
  • Hagar Cohen: Somehow, Cairo has always managed to function as a lively city, says Max Roderbeck, but this time around, things are different
  • These satellite towns were developed in this way because of the government's quick sale of the land to private hands. They wanted to make a return quickly, and big villas and golf courses were in demand. But they don't work as lively urban centres, says environmental architect, Abbas el Zafarany
  • Tony Sullivan on 05 Aug 09
     
    The complexities of globalisation evident in Egypt's largest city and its surrounds
Christoph Zed

Chris Anderson on the Economics of 'Free': 'Maybe Media Will Be a Hobby Rather than a J... - 0 views

www.spiegel.de/...0,1518,638172,00.html

shared by Christoph Zed on 29 Jul 09 - Cached
  • Sorry, I don't use the word media. I don't use the word news. I don't think that those words mean anything anymore
  • But the problem is not that the traditional way of writing articles isn't valuable anymore. The problem is that this is now in the minority. It used to be a monopoly, it used to be the only way to distribute news
  • Newspapers are not important. It may be that their physical, printed form no longer works.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • The Google idea is fantastic. But you can only do so much with text. It's very good for transactions, but it is very poor for brands.
Nadeem Uddin

Aussie PM is a serial killer: US TV host - Yahoo!7 News - 0 views

au.news.yahoo.com/...-is-a-serial-killer-us-tv-host

shared by Nadeem Uddin on 05 Aug 09 - Cached
  • Nadeem Uddin on 05 Aug 09
     
    Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has been labelled a serial killer on US TV.
  • anonymous on 06 Aug 09
     
    I can't believe that viewers would agree or even accept comments of a supposed news anchor who poses topless for mens magazines! Has she even looked into the reasoning behind the culling of feral animals that are harming natural Australian habitat or is she to busy thinking about cute stuffed toys and her image to bother?
Maria D'Amato

Aussies call an end to just phoning on mobiles - 0 views

www.smh.com.au/...-on-mobiles-20090929-ga33.html

shared by Maria D'Amato on 08 Oct 09 - Cached
  • Using mobiles for just calls and texting is a thing of the past, as a third of Australians now check emails on their handsets and more than 70 per cent access mobile entertainment and information services.
  • In spite of the global financial crisis, the use of mobile phone services has continued to grow in the past year as more Australians buy internet-enabled smartphones, the 2009 Australian Mobile Phone Lifestyle Index reveals.
  • In last year's survey, just 7 per cent of respondents accessed social networking sites from their handsets, but this figure has jumped this year to 32 per cent, with half of those accessing the sites daily.
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • General web browsing is also on the rise, with 21 per cent of respondents visiting websites on their mobile phones at least once a day.
  • Half of Australians used or bought entertainment services on their mobiles at least once a month, with games, ringtones and music downloads the three most popular categories.
  • Accessing the web, video, music and information on mobile phones was now well and truly mainstream.
  • The survey showed mobile phone service use was now "a commodity as opposed to a luxury for many Australians".
Christoph Zed

BBC NEWS | Technology | Europe's net refuseniks revealed - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8184189.stm

internet usage europe online behaviour downloads

shared by Christoph Zed on 04 Aug 09 - Cached
  • more than one in four Europeans had never used a PC
  • People above the age of 65 and the unemployed were the least active online
  • Nearly 70% of people under the age of 24 use the internet every day, compared to the EU average of 43%. But this same group is reluctant to pay to download or use online content, such as music or video, with 33% saying that they would not pay anything at all.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • make access to digital content an easy and fair game
  • Christoph Zed on 04 Aug 09
     
    I wonder how the east-west divide impacts this, keeping the expansion to eastern European countries in the last few years in mind.
Christoph Zed

BBC NEWS | Business | Emerging economies 'get new role' - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8274046.stm

usa politics economics g20 brazil china russia EU hegemony globalisation

shared by Christoph Zed on 25 Sep 09 - Cached
  • The G20 group of leading and emerging economies will take on a new role as a permanent body co-ordinating the world economy
  • more power to emerging economies, rather than to the developed powerhouses of the G8 group.
  • Senior EU officials later announced a deal to shift the balance of voting in the International Monetary Fund to benefit growing economies like China.
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • police fired rubber bullets at protesters
  • The G20 is going to be the new body counsel that will be the coordinating body for international economic cooperation
  • financial regulatory reform was the most important agenda item for summit, but that addressing global economic imbalances was also a priority
  • US proposal calls on economies such as China, Brazil and India to boost domestic consumption
  • US and Europe would encourage more saving
  • That's not a sustainable financial situation for the US and that's why we're in the process of adjusting
jung moon

Asia Times Online :: South Asia news - 'Native English' is losing its power - 0 views

www.atimes.com/...HI15Df01.html

english' china culture international globalisation communication

shared by jung moon on 05 Oct 09 - Cached
  • Even as the English language continues its meteoric global rise, native speakers such as the North Americans, British and Australians will soon become a rare breed, overwhelmed by the many millions who have started speaking English as their second language.
  • the new lingua franca in what is now often called a flat world.
  • "So the balance of power is changing, and when the second-language speakers adopt English language as their own language or as a second language, they actually take control of it, mix it and use it with their own language, developing new forms, vocabulary and ways and using English."
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • "China now produces over 20 million English speakers each year, and possibly within a few years, there could be more English speakers in China than in India."
  • Graddol's findings predict that by 2015, there will be about 2 billion people from Asia and non-English-speaking Europe learning English.
  • However, that is not necessarily good news for native English speakers. Instead, it could come as a big blow because "they can no longer look the other way, celebrating the rising hegemony of their language".
  • As English becomes more widely used as a global language, it will become expected that speakers will signal their nationality, and other aspects of their identity, through English, Graddol says. Lack of a native-speaker accent will not be seen, therefore, as a sign of poor competence.
  • jung moon on 07 Oct 09
     
    I hope someday I can speak 'Konglish (Korean English)' in everywhere. :D
Christoph Zed

Big Brother Is Watching Your Blackberry: How Wired Gadgets Encroach on Privacy - SPIEGE... - 0 views

www.spiegel.de/...0,1518,637640,00.html

shared by Christoph Zed on 29 Jul 09 - Cached
  • And so, to the surprise of buyers, Amazon erased the two books -- which had been paid for and delivered -- from the electronic reader.
  • In the age of networked digital devices, it seems that values such as the sanctity of the private sphere, the protection of our private property and the inviolability of our correspondence no longer count for very much
  • All of these devices can be remotely modified at any time through software updates. So you could say that an iPhone doesn't really belong to you -- at least not in quite the same way that your refrigerator or bicycle does.
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • Hence Apple -- like Amazon -- reserves the right to remotely meddle with your iPhone at any time and without the consent of the user, in order to delete objectionable applications. All with the best of intentions, of course
  • A shift to tethered applicances also entails a sea change in the regulability of the Internet" (author's emphasis). The "dangers of excess" will no longer come from viruses or hackers anymore, "but from the much more predictable interventions by regulators
  • We will need to get used to the fact that these "curious technological hybrids" will never fully belong to us -- even if we have paid a lot of money for them.
Christoph Zed

War Profiteers?: Study Reveals Germany Is World's Third Largest Defense Exporter - SPIE... - 0 views

www.spiegel.de/...0,1518,553755,00.html

economics germany export defense military EU Europe globalisation markets

shared by Christoph Zed on 30 Aug 09 - Cached
  • Germany Is World's Third Largest Defense Exporter
  • Once one of the world's most aggressive powers, Germany today likes to project a pacifist image
  • a report released yesterday by the Bonn International Center for Conversion (BICC), a German think tank, reveals a different side of Germany's relationship to war.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • Germany, it turns out, exports nearly a billion euros worth of military goods each year ($1.55 billion) to developing countries.
  • That makes Germany the European Union's biggest military goods exporter, and worldwide it's behind only the US and Russia,
  • The BICC's annual report, guest-authored by former UN Chief Weapons Inspector Hans Blix, focused on the rise of military spending all over the world, a development that the end of the Cold War was supposed to reverse. Instead, global spending on weapons and armies rose by 15 percent between 2001 and 2006. Today it tops €650 billion ($1.1 trillion). A third of that is spent by the US.
  • "We see a revival of Cold War politics without the Cold War -- a Cold Peace, if you will."
  • "Apart from America there are a number of fast-growing countries -- like China, India, Indonesia and Pakistan, not to mention Russia -- where the global trend towards militarization is showing itself most clearly,"
Isabella Han

Orientalism - 0 views

www.english.emory.edu/...Orientalism.html

shared by Isabella Han on 08 Sep 09 - Cached
  • Isabella Han on 08 Sep 09
     
    This article is related to the one in our reader. I hope you find it useful.
Rika Ninomiya

Beyond them and us - 0 views

www.theage.com.au/...them-and-us-20090605-by7x.html

International student Melbourne

shared by Rika Ninomiya on 31 Jul 09 - Cached
  • how do we foster a sense of community for international students in the short time they are here? And in turn, how do we bridge the often unintentional divide that underpins their experiences?
  • High-density housing is deliberately geared towards the international student market, at the expense of a broader mix. Orientation programs for international students and local students often run at different times. International students pay the full cost for transport, while domestic students get half-price concessions. And at some institutions, separate queues and counters even exist.
  • With their proximity to Melbourne and RMIT, they give students few opportunities to venture out of their comfort zone, explore the rest of the city, and perhaps build new connections. Some have few communal spaces - not exactly conducive to interacting with life beyond the campus zone.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • "We need to understand different cultures and perspectives as part of how we do business and relate," says Mr Campbell. "So there's actually a public good in all of this."
  • Rika Ninomiya on 31 Jul 09
     
    Interesting article discussing how international students experience or not experience Melbourne fully during their stay here in Melbourne.
Wye Keen Wong

Chinese film directors' withdrawal from Melbourne festival supported at home_English_Xi... - 0 views

news.xinhuanet.com/...content_11760493.htm

shared by Wye Keen Wong on 29 Jul 09 - Cached
  • Jia Zhangke and Zhao Liang, had withdrawn their films from the festival in protest at the inclusion of a documentary about Rebiya Kadeer, leader of the World Uygur Congress (WUC), which the Chinese believed to be behind the deadly July 5 riot in Urumqi, capital of northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region
    • xinning ji
      xinning ji on 30 Jul 09
       
      It is the hot topic during these days, not only in Australia but also in China. This Xinhua News is governed by Chinese government. Basically, it serves for government.
    • Wye Keen Wong
      Wye Keen Wong on 05 Aug 09
       
      Article in today's AGE on apge 3 about Rebiya Kadeer who is in Melbourne to attend the film's opening
  • had attracted more than 4,000 comments. Almost all of the postings were in support of the two directors.
  • Only a couple said Jia was trying to earn publicity, but they were immediately criticized by others, defending Jia as a talented director who had always been low-key .
    • xinning ji
      xinning ji on 30 Jul 09
       
      It is a kind of strategy the press used in PR. It is trying to convince the publics what is the right decision Jia made. Also the word "only" it used is trying to say that nearly all Chinese support Jia, and no one has disagreed.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  •    Jia said in a letter to festival organizers that the Urumqi riot had caused many deaths and many people believed the WUC headed by Rebiya Kadeer had unavoidable responsibility for the violence
    • xinning ji
      xinning ji on 30 Jul 09
       
      I would like to believe it is the truth. What Jia did was not imposed by the government, because I watched this riot on TV, and it made every Chinese upset and hurt. It was terrible to see the violence, in which innocent people were killed and beat on the street, many shops and restaurants were robbery, and cars were burned. What they did was not going in an appropriate way to ask the government for the independence. they really made social disorder and ruthless
  •  "However, the Melbourne film festival organizers have turned it into a political drama by inviting Rebiya Kadeer, a political liar," he said.
    • Wye Keen Wong
      Wye Keen Wong on 05 Aug 09
       
      Is a separation beween art and politics ever possible?
xinning ji

Four days in North Korea. - By Sarah Wang - Slate Magazine - 0 views

www.slate.com/...all

shared by xinning ji on 10 Aug 09 - Cached
  • they couldn't use their computers or mobile phones—they weren't even allowed to bring them into the country.
    • xinning ji
      xinning ji on 13 Aug 09
       
      look, it is the digital divided in globalization. it is the unequal technological development around the world. there is the gap between rich and poor, developed and developing. it shold let us consider the global problem in the spread of information.
  • katherine ong on 10 Aug 09
     
    A North Korean visit
fiona hou

BBC NEWS | Middle East | 'Racism' claims at Lebanon beach clubs - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8200001.stm

Lebanon migrant Human Rights

shared by fiona hou on 14 Aug 09 - Cached
  • fiona hou on 14 Aug 09
     
    The BBC's Andrew North reports on how migrant workers are allegedly being turned away from many of Beirut's thriving beach clubs.The Lebanese office of campaign group Human Rights Watch says a majority of beach clubs it surveyed are preventing many migrant workers from Asia and Africa from using their facilities.
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