New Media and Translation: Cairo House of Translation lectures and workshops postponed

My talks and seminar in Cairo next week have been canceled – all thoughts and prayers to friends in #egypt for peace and progress — ed bice (@edbice) December 6, 2012 We’re sad to announce that the next House of Translation event – in collaboration with the AUC’s Center for Translation Studies and Egypt’s National Center for Translation – has been postponed following recent events in Cairo. We’ll post more information when it’s available, and in the meantime we’ll be translating tweets from #Egypt on our Twitter feed. Tweets by... Read The Rest →

On the Meedan Radar – November 2012

- A new wave of Checkdesk-ian fervour swept the interwebs as intrepid journos set about debunking fake #Sandy pics. Top of the pile are Alexis Madrigal and the Atlantic, who wrote about their experience: http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/12/10/if-you-cant-beat-em-subvert-em-countering-misinformation-on-a-viral-web/264366/ “We also drew heavily on our community, asking for help, and incorporating our networks into the search. People could see us thinking on their screens, and I think they saw that we were approaching this task fairly and with the pursuit of truth as a goal. I know that sounds high-minded, but you can’t do... Read The Rest →

Open Up!: How can Open Data, Civic Engagement and Technology Make Governments More Accountable?

Transparency advocates from as far afield as India, Africa and the Middle East gathered in London on Tuesday to share their experiences working on open data and civic engagement projects in some of the world’s most gruelling political environments. Attendees at the Open Up! event in London’s ‘Tech City’ spoke eloquently about their attempts to put technology to the goal of greater openness and citizen empowerment in their countries, despite what some reported as profound infrastructure constraints, government hostility and even harassment. Highlights included ‘Yemi Adamolekun‘s introduction to Enough is... Read The Rest →

Meedan 2011 Annual Report

We are delighted to present the Meedan annual report for 2011, published today on Issuu. You can view this below, download or share. The report covers Meedan’s partnerships, technology development and programmatic focus through a year of tumultuous change in the Middle East. In presenting this report, we are grateful to the brilliant design work of Meedan Designer Maya Zankoul. We hope you enjoy it. Open publication – Free publishing – More arabic Share → Tweet

Okki Dokki – Checkdesk Partner Meeting Dokki, Cairo

Once again typing away from the regular environs of the winged metallic tube – to be exact, these words come to you from seat 31A here on the Lufthansa brand transport experience, headed westward, my home direction. The past two weeks have been very good for Meedan. Most significantly and to the point of this post, we held our first partners meeting for Phase 2 of the Checkdesk project. From October 16-18, we brought the entire Meedan team (less Aaron, Andy, and Zainab it must be noted) together with an... Read The Rest →

Meedan partners with Syrian citizen news outlet Al-Ayyam

Meedan is working with the news newtork Al-Ayyam to bolster public voice, free expression and accountability in Syria. In a joint initiative that is designed to be responsive to critical and fast-changing needs on the ground, we seek to strengthen the role of citizen journalists to act together as a watchdog documenting the actions of the Syrian regime and armed groups operating in the country. Our objective is to provide a model for an investigative, citizen-led media in Syria and a building block of future reconciliation efforts. The partnership is... Read The Rest →

Meedan wins multi-year Arab Partnerships grant to support citizen journalists in Middle East

Hot on the heels of success in the IPI News Innovation Contest, Meedan has won a multi-year grant through the UK’s Arab Partnerships fund towards the development of a fact checking workbench and training program for citizen journalists in the Middle East. The funding will support Meedan’s development team to build on the success of the citizen-led liveblogging platform  it developed for Al-Masry Al-Youm, one of Egypt’s leading independent newspapers.   This platform supports the Al-Masry Al-Youm community to share and mark-up newsworthy content with the newspaper’s journalists, who can then quickly... Read The Rest →

Six Steps for Fact Checking Citizen Media

Anyone can be a publisher today – thanks to the web. As a result, there are so many more sources of news and information, which makes fact checking all the more critical in fast moving news stories.  When disinformation gets into the news cycle, it can lead to people being put in harm’s way.  Here, then, is a set of six tips to help you get it right. 1. Who is the original source? Every piece of news has a source – the person who told you the news.  Who... Read The Rest →

Meedan wins International Press Instiitute News Innovation Contest 2012

Meedan Checkdesk, a platform facilitating collaborative journalism for Middle East new media, has been named as one of 14 winners of the 2012 IPI News Innovation Contest. The award will support Meedan designers and developers to tackle one of the very thorniest problems of the social web: how news teams can better verify breaking stories from the Middle East using citizen reporting. We are honored to count IPI as a funding partner, putting us as it does in the company of some very high profile grantees, including AFP Foundation, Media... Read The Rest →

Global Censorship: Case Studies from Syria and Egypt

“The ubiquity of the Internet has added an additional layer of complexity to issues of government censorship.  It is both an unrivaled tool for speech and an incredible tool for monitoring and surveillance.” The above paragraph is an excerpt of the description of the Global Censorship Conference that was held at Yale Law School March 30 – April 1. I had the pleasure of being on a panel with Lina Attalah, Managing Editor of Al Masry Al Youm (AMAY), discussing case studies of censorship. The panel discussed censorship in different... Read The Rest →

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