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Western Ghats Portal: Workshop on Biodiversity Informatics
The Western Ghats portal team is organising a one-day workshop to explore the contemporary state on biodiversity informatics on 25 November 2011 at Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and Environment (ATREE), Bangalore.
Blocking online content: Google gets more requests than govt
Allowing a peek into what kind of information is requested to be blocked online and by who, the Department of Information Technology (DIT), in response to an RTI (Right to Information) query, has provided some intriguing details, says Pallavi Polanki in this article published in Firstpost.com on 2 November 2011.
Learn It Yourself
The peer-to-peer world of online learning encourages conversations and reciprocal learning, writes Nishant Shah in an article published in the Indian Express on 30 October 2011.
India’s vanishing fingerprints put UID in question
A curious situation has come to light at the UID (unique identity) enrolment centres. Call it the phenomenon of vanishing fingerprints. You see, our unique fingerprints don’t necessarily last a lifetime and they can be damaged or destroyed and, in some cases, even non-existent. And that is not the best scenario for the first-of-its-kind project that endeavours to create a unique identity for India’s billion-plus population based on fingerprints and iris scans (or biometric data).
OA Week Day 2 - An Interview with Professor Arunachalam
Ninth Workshop on Media Economics
The Higher School of Economics and the New Economic School have joined hands to organize the ninth workshop on media economics in Moscow on October 28 and 29, 2011. All events are scheduled to take place in Marriott Courtyard, a hotel in the centre of Moscow within 10-minute walking distance from the Kremlin, the Red Square, and the Bolshoi Theatre.
Can Innovation Solve the Grand Challenges of Indian Society?
It’s nearly time again for Design Public the event, a high-level conclave on design, innovation, and the public interest. Our up-coming event will be in Bangalore on the 14th of October, and will be held at the National Gallery of Modern Art, which is housed in a century-old Manikyavelu mansion, which was once the property of the Mysore royal family.
Making a difference, online and offline
A new collection examines how technology and issues of connectivity are shaping the lives of ‘digital natives’—and how the Net can influence social change, writes Gopal Sathe in an article published in LiveMint on September 27, 2011.
Netizen's Guide to the Internet Governance Forum
The Truman Show, in Kerala
A webcast now allows you to see the goings-on in the CMs office 24x7.The idea is to promote openness,but theres still some way to go for it to make a difference, writes Sankar Radhakrishnan in this article published in the Times of India on
The Impact of Regulation: FOSS and Enterprise
Putting Users First: How Can Privacy be Protected in Today’s Complex Mobile Ecosystem?
Privacy, Security, and Access to Rights: A Technical and Policy Analyses
Privacy and security are often presented as zero-sum outcomes with respect to issues affecting Internet governance. This dichotomous treatment often results in policy outcomes that directly limit access and rights. The meanings of privacy and security, however, are not used uniformly and often vary with the regards to the issue at hand (i.e. financial crimes, copyright enforcement) as well as cultural and political context.
Digital (Alter)Natives with a Cause? — Book Review by Maarten van den Berg
‘Digital (Alter)Natives with a cause?’ is a collection of four books with essays published by the Centre for Internet and Society in Bangalore, India, and the Dutch NGO Hivos. The books come in a beautifully designed cassette and are accompanied by a funky yellow package in the shape of a floppy disk containing the booklet ‘D:coding Digital Natives’, a corresponding DVD, and a pack of postcards portraying the evolution of writing - in the sentence ‘I love you’, written with a goose feather in 1734, to the character set ‘i<3u’ entered on a mobile device in 2011.
Planning Commission, Census 2011 and India Post using social media to understand people's pulse better
Even as the Centre is drawing up guidelines to encourage government bodies to use social media, a handful of entities are showing how they can use Facebook, Twitter and more to connect with citizens better.
The Power of Information: New Technologies for Philanthropy and Development
Copyrights Amendment Bill to Be Tabled in Indian Parliament – Parallel Import provisions have Been Removed
This week, the Indian government’s Rajya Sabha (the upper house of Parliament) will debate the Copyright Amendments Act.
IBSA Seminar on Global Internet Governance
The seminar will take place at Fundacao Getulio Vargas (FGV) - Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, September 1-2, 2011.
India's social media "spring" masks forgotten protests
Irom Sharmila has been on hunger strike for 10 years to protest against military abuses, force-fed by tubes through her nose. But the tragedy for the world's longest hunger strike is that she is on the wrong side of India's digital divide.
