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Meedan Core Team

(photo by Joi Ito)

Ed Bice

@edbice | ebice [at] meedan [dot] net

Ed is Meedan’s Chairman and founding CEO. A co-chair of the U.S.-Palestinian Partnership (UPP) and the Middle East Strategy Group, Ed has been presented variously at the 2009 UN Internet Governance Forum, Stanford’s 2005 Online Deliberation conference, the 2006 World Economic Forum on the Middle East in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, and at the Association for Machine Translation in the Americas (AMTA) conference. He is also a council member of the Middle East Programs and the Arab/US Media Network of the Aspen Institute and was an invited SBIR grant reviewer at the National Science Foundation. Joi Ito included Ed in his 2008 book Freesouls, portraits of 296 people working to build the open web. Ed and John Shore have co-authored a patent-pending approach to hybrid distributed natural language translation (HDNLT). Ed has published in national press including the NY Times, New Republic, and Mother Jones, and has been interviewed on national and international radio news programs like NPR, BBC, and CBS. He attended Carleton College where he received a B.A. in philosophy. When he is not online, Ed cooks, hikes, and skis with his wife and two young boys in Northern California.

Karim Ratib

@infojunkie71

Karim is Director of Engineering at Meedan. Currently living in Vancouver, Canada, Karim was born and raised in Cairo, Egypt to a French/Egyptian family. He considers himself a world citizen and wishes he could burn his multiple passports and roam the Earth without being stopped at borders. Not quite yet!

Karim first encountered computers with the Sinclair ZX Spectrum+ and never looked back. He discovered the world of open source while studying for his Master’s degree at Université de Montréal. Back in Egypt, he co-founded one of the first local open source-based software companies that he named OpenCraft. Making tons of geeky friends and being introduced to Drupal were well worth the trouble.

A self-described infojunkie, Karim is interested in most fields of knowledge and often ventures into wild speculation. His other passion is music, and he harbours a secret regret of not pursuing a musician’s career.

Chris Blow

@unthinkingly

Chris Blow is Director of Design at Meedan. Currently he leads Meedan’s research effort to improve educational technology for global engagement. Chris has led our work with Cambridge University to improve digital scholarship in cross-language collaborative research. As a technologist and critic, Chris encourages iterative, small-scale changes in web development projects, a message he bases closely on first-hand lessons learned from the Open Source movement and experience mapping crises. In his work with new forms of digital humanitarianism, Chris sees both latent dangers and an unrealized opportunity for civic participation. Chris has advised numerous projects addressing contemporary crises including linguistic segregation, religious conflict, homelessness, city planning, election monitoring, urban violence, racism, and food security. He frequently partners with the Kenya-based crowdsourcing pioneer Ushahidi. With the support of Meedan Chris forwarded the initial ideation, community building, and design of the Omidyar funded data sorting and markup project SwiftRiver. He is a consultant and speaker to leading research universities, the American Institute of Graphic Arts, and the Interaction Design Association. He is also a member of the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team, and an organizer with the CrisisCommons network. His colleagues believe that Chris’ study of jazz percussion accounts for the musicality that comes from his keypad through coding and design.

George Weyman

@georgeweyman | gweyman [at] meedan [dot] net

George Weyman is Senior Program Officer at Meedan.  George has been developing Meedan’s response to the Arab Revolutions, bringing multi-year support from the Swedish International Development Agency (Sida) for Meedan Crane – a citizen journalism project that seeks to build civic reporting capacity around Middle East media partners. Previously George worked with the University of Cambridge and a consortium of research centers to found Nurani, a digital initiative to support inter-religious discussion and scholarship on the web which won a prestigious UK Research Council Digital Economy grant in 2011. George has also led Meedan’s partner efforts with a range of nonprofits to provide translation services, consultation, proposal development and social media outreach, including US Institute of Peace, UNESCO, The Elders, and Social Media Exchange. George has developed media partnerships with the Guardian, TIME, and the Economist in which Meedan has provided translated reporting, on-the-ground commentaries and press reviews. He has presented at various conferences and events on translation and social media for social impact, including the Small Media Initiative, the Oxford Internet Institute, Translating and the Computer, and Action Week for Global Information Sharing.  He was formerly editor of the e-journal Arab Media & Society at the American University in Cairo and a researcher on Middle East media at the London-based media development nonprofit Panos. He has an MPhil in Modern Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Oxford and has also worked for various news organisations, including the AP, ITN and Kamera.

Tom Trewinnard

@Tom_El_Rumi | telrumi [at] meedan [dot] net

Tom is a Progam Manager at Meedan. Tom recently returned to the UK after having lived and worked in Cairo since June 2009. He moved to Egypt after graduating from the University of Manchester in Middle Eastern and Modern European languages, specializing in Arabic, Spanish and Portuguese.

Tom was formerly a Content Producer for Meedan’s media sharing platform, before taking up his current role in July 2010. He has previously worked as Senior Editor for the Arab-West Report, producer at KIT Digital, and as a copy editor for various English-language publications in Egypt.

New media junkie, social translation enthusiast, Arabic addict, coffee fiend, bookworm. Online you may find him masquerading under online pseudonym Tom El Rumi, which refers to the aubergine and not the poet.

Anas Qtiesh

@anasqtiesh | aqtiesh [at] meedan [dot] net

Anas Qtiesh is a Program Manager at Meedan. Anas is well known online as a Syrian blogger, translator, and tech enthusiast. Interested in citizen journalism and digital activism in the Middle East and North Africa, he is a human rights and anti-censorship activist and a currently based in San Francisco. In his spare time, Anas works as a freelance translator and a research assistant at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society. He is also a Google Map Maker Advocate, Global Voices Online contributor, and a tech enthusiast that writes for Ardroid.com, an Arabic tech blog focused on everything Android.

Nosheen Ali

@nosheenali

Nosheen Ali is the Umang Project Manager at Meedan. Nosheen is a social anthropologist and development activist who aspires to create progressive change through grounded research and new media technologies. She has an undergraduate degree in Computer Sciences and a Ph.D. in Development Sociology, with publications on diverse topics including orality and human-computer interaction, environmental movements, mobile healthcare, and international education. Her dissertation research on citizenship struggles in Pakistani Kashmir exposed her to the profound role of poetic expression in cultivating pluralism and facilitating conflict mediation. Building upon this academic work on poetry and civic engagement, Nosheen is now spearheading a poetry and new media project at Meedan – Umang – which seeks to create an innovative platform for poetic dialogue in South Asia and the Middle East. Apart from her work at Meedan, Nosheen is also a Visiting Scholar and Lecturer in the Center for South Asia Studies at UC Berkeley, where she teaches on Muslim societies, Pakistan, and Kashmir.

Ahmed Mekkawy

@linuxawy

Ahmed Mekkawy is Meedan’s Systems Administrator. Ahmed is the founder of Spirula Systems, a tech start-up based in Alexandria which successfully defended Egyptian opposition websites such as The National Campaign to Support Dr.ElBaradei and the Demands of Change and numerous others from DDoS attacks during the Egyptian revolution. Ahmed Mekkawy is also an admin for the Egyptian GNU/Linux User Group (EGLUG) which serves the Egyptian Free/Open Source Community. Ahmed can be found on Twitter as @linuxawy.

Translators

Abdellah Aoussar

From the “White House”; Casablanca, Morocco. I first graduated from Hassan II University, where I studied English literature and linguistics (2004) and moved to King Fahd School of Translation to obtain a Master’s degree in Translation (2006). The world of media has always fascinated me, which motivated me to join Alittihad Alichtiraki daily newspaper, after benefiting from periods of trainings in different media institutions. At work, I often find myself combining between my two fields of interest: Translation and journalism.

By joining the Meedan community and family, I have discovered new aspects of citizen journalism, collaborative translation and, most importantly, new people with different cultures and backgrounds, which makes the richesse of Meedan.

Yaser Koseir

Originally from Kafrelsheikh, Egypt, Yaser Hassan M. ElKosair spent his early years living in a small village in his hometown of Desouq, then moved to the city of Kafrelsheikh where he completed his university study of English Language with honors. This provided him the opportunity to teach “English language teaching methodology” to university English language students for five years. He finished his Master’s degree in Teaching English as a Foreign Language and Multimedia Education in 2006 and is about to finish his PhD in this field.

More recently, he worked as Instructional Designer of Electronic Courses in the Kafrelsheikh University e-Learning Center. In addition, Yaser is a translation addict who has translated many scientific research and papers, worked for Meedan since the beginning (Feb. 2009), and joined Meedan’s Wikipedia scientific translation program, “Wikiarabi”.

Wesam El Sheikh

Wesam El Sheikh graduated from the journalism division of the Faculty of Mass Communication, Cairo University. Since completing her certification in media and legal translation at the American University in Cairo (AUC), Wesam has worked as a freelance translator in addition to her primary position as a news editor/translator in Egypt’s Middle East News Agency (MENA). Wesam also received training in many prominent Egyptian newspapers.

Nouran Ibrahim

Nouran Ibrahim lives and works in the Egyptian capital Cairo as a Teacher’s Assistant in the English Department of the Faculty of Al-Alsun (Languages), Ain Shams University. Nouran is studying for an M.A degree in Translation, and loves reading, writing, travelling, painting, photography and meeting new people. She has translated several books and is an avid believer and practitioner of translation and interpretation.

Amena el-Shafie

Amena El-Shafie is an Egyptian, who majored in English and German in the the Faculty of Al-Alsun (Languages), Ain Shams University. She graduated in 2009 and has worked as an English instructor ever since. Translation is a passion for Amena, who started working in Meedan as an English Translator in mid-2010, but also enjoys working as an Arabic Translator at times. Amena has a unique phobia of cameras and flashes (hence the strange picture), but enjoys taking pictures nonetheless. She is a bookworm who has set a goal of finishing over 100 books before the end of this year. Amena loves the correct pronunciation of her name (آمنة, Aaa-min-a not a-meeen-a).

Rania el-Maraghy

Graduated with honours from the Faculty of Al Alsun (languages) in Cairo, Egypt. Has worked as a translator/interpreter ever since her graduation. For Rania, translation is not merely a career, but a gateway for cultures, ideas and fields. Translation means leaving no stone unturned searching for communication and meaning. Has worked as a fulltime translator for many international organizations, including Plan International, Gulf Center for Strategic studies, Tetrapak, De Laval, and Fatafeet Channel. Has obtained 3 translation diplomas so far and currently pursuing her MA. She believes translation is one of the most interesting jobs in the world since one can translate, and hence learn an array of things ranging from recipes to exploding mines! Likes reading,walking, and cooking. Enjoys some feline traits like eating fish and tuna whenever possible!

Shaimaa Abdelhamid

Shaimaa Abdelhamid was born in Egypt, where she has lived for 11 non-consecutive years. traveling along with her father on assigned diplomatic missions to several countries. Travelling often exposed her to various cultures, and allowed her to interact with diverse educational and governmental institutions. Shaimaa has a Bachelors degree in Mass Communication from George Mason University (USA). She loves reading, music, travel, and working out.

Ghaydaa Fahim

Ghaydaa Fahim graduated from the University of Calgary in Alberta, Canada, with a major in Economics and a minor in Management and Society. After graduation, Ghaydaa worked for HSBC’s Egypt headquarters for a few months before deciding to switch to a publications/writing/editing/translation career. She worked for a number of local media and public relations agencies as a copy writer and translator and served as an intern in Akhbar Al Youm. She currently works as a senior writer and editor in one of Egypt’s leading universities, and will be pursuing her master’s degree in January of 2012. In her spare time, Ghaydaa does freelance translation work, listens to music and likes to spend time with family and friends.

Fadhila Bux

Originally Indian, Fadhila’s interest in the Middle East began politically with activism for Palestine in her early teens. Then, after meeting some Yemenis visiting the UK, her interest developed into one of cultural and linguistic intrigue. She took a gap year at 18 and travelled to Yemen, residing in a small Arabic speaking boarding school. Fadhila resolved to learn Arabic in order to be able to communicate with people in the Middle East in their native tongue, and thus returned to the UK to begin her studies at the University of Manchester. She spent a year in Alexandria, Egypt, and has travelled extensively across the Middle East as she has a keen interest in the historical sites of the region. Seeking to consolidate her language skills, she went on to study a master’s in translation and interpreting.

News Site Content Producers

Riham Ibrahim

Riham is an avid reader whose fields of interest are politics, philosophy, self-help
and humanistic psychology. She graduated in 2010 after studying Journalism at the Faculty of Mass Communication, Cairo University. Riham intends to pursue a writing career that would enable her to make sense of the world.

Michael Nevadomski

Guam native and South Florida transplant, Michael Nevadomski first came to Egypt in September 2008 with the pilot year of the C.V. Starr School in the Middle East. After graduating from Middlebury College, he returned to Alexandria to teach advanced English at the Egyptian-American Cultural Center in Roushdy, and also worked as a walking tour guide for Backpacker Concierge — leading group excursions through Alex, Cairo, the Delta, and the Northern Coast, specializing in WWII-era Egypt. In 2009 he was a featured guest speaker at the Alexandria Book Fair, where he presented Arabic translations of Lawrence Durrell’s poetry. For the past two summers, he has headed the residential life program at the Middlebury-Monterey Language Academy of Arabic, now based at Oberlin College in Ohio.

Blogger, Durrell fanatic, café connoisseur, and avid chess player, he serves as a Arabic Content Translator and the Meedan Project Manager to the US Institute of Peace’s ongoing campaign, “Promoting Dialogue in Iraq’s Disputed Territories.”

Kate Goodin

Kate Goodin is a Meedan Content Producer. Born and raised in Berkeley, California, Kate graduated from Brown University in 2008 with a degree in Comparative Literature: Literary Translation, focusing on Latin to English translation. A semester abroad in Cairo inspired Kate to study Arabic and develop skills in Arabic-English translation.

Kate joined Meedan after a year in the American University in Cairo’s Arabic Language Institute as a Fulbright Student. Kate is an Arabic enthusiast, fascinated by language, translations and the ways they intersect with ideas about culture and identity. Also engaged with media, feminism, and dance, Kate swears she will start a bilingual blog one of these days.