Stories from February, 2012
Russia: Harm Reduction Web-site Blocked by the Government
At the beginning of February Russian Government blocked a web-site of the Moscow nonprofit organization Andrey Rylkov Foundation on the request of the Federal Drug Control Service (FDCS). This was the first case of enforcement of a new domain seizure rule which allow the law enforcement agencies to request domain seizure without a court order.
Blogs4Aid: Campaign To Stop Violence Against Women In India
To address the growing number of violence against women in India, Shemeer Padinzjharedil (29), a construction engineer and former software developer, decided to act. He has built an Ushahidi based crowdsourced site titled www.maps4aid.com where anyone can report violence against women. Maps4aid has started another campaign, Blogs4Aid to spread the reports collected by Maps4Aid and increase awareness.
Greencore: Highlighting Mongolian Voices On Environmental Degradation
Greencore.org is an NGO from Mongolia which conducted a survey in Matad soum of Dornod Aimag between April to October 2011. The project engaged local people who participated in filling out CRC (Citizen Report Cards) which contained 13 questions on how they think about the environmental degradation in this area. Their reports were primarily shared in their blog which is in Mongolian language.
Languages: International Mother Language Day in Mali
Mali recently celebrated the annual International Mother Language Day on February 21 in Bamako. Blogger and Rising Voices grantee recipient Boukary Konaté discusses his hopes for the role of technology in promoting the use of the 13 indigenous languages in Mali.
The Tiziano Project: Helping Local Community Journalists Showcasing Their Stories
The Tiziano Project is a multimedia website and an outreach effort focusing on training citizen journalists in conflict, post conflict and underreported regions around the globe. It is currently creating a collaborative journalism platform to portray the stories of citizen journalists worldwide in a visually sophisticated way to have a greater impact on the viewers.
Congo In Focus: Empowering Congolese Students via Citizen Journalism And Multimedia
Anne Medley, a photojournalist and videographer based in the United States, and the Congo Initiative developed a multimedia journalism education project to empower Congolese students to tell their story to the rest of the world. The workshops took place in 2010 and the outcomes of the projects are featured in the ‘Congo In Focus” site.
Ségou Connection: Introducing The Internet To 800 Villagers
The Ségou Connection "cruise for Internet literacy" on the river Niger, in Mali, in partnership with the Loire-Niger UNESCO heritage project has completed a two-week training tour of schools on the banks of the river, with very positive results. Boukary shares highlights of his Internet literacy cruise.
Digital Divide Data: Helping Build Human Capital From Disadvantaged Societies
Inspired by the IT outsourcing success of India Jeremy Hockenstein co-founded Digital Divide Data by establishing a Data Entry operation in Cambodia in 2001 focusing on youths from the poorest and most under-served segments of the population. DDD provides opportunities for orphans, rural migrants, and the disabled and thus is different than other business houses.
Ukraine: Blogging as a Kind of Soul Therapy
Ukrainian harm reductions activist and a blogger Victoria Lintsova in an e-mail interview shared with Rising Voice her thoughts and ideas on how blogging helped her and her organization.
A Quick Look at the Rising Voices Microgrant Proposals
From Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, Rising Voices received 1175 proposals from 124 countries. Here is a quick look at some of the demographical information from those proposals, including countries represented, focus areas, and terms from the project descriptions. This diversity demonstrates the ongoing interest and need in bringing citizen media to local underrepresented communities.
Rising Voices 2012 Microgrant Update
Rising Voices received 1175 proposals from more than 120 countries for the 2012 microgrant competition for citizen media outreach projects. Over the next six weeks, we'll be reviewing each proposal to select which projects will join our grantee community. Announcement date is expected in mid-March. Thanks to everyone that participated.
Ukraine: A Sad Story from The Life of the Substitution Therapy Patient
Recently two Ukrainian bloggers focused on harm reduction issues posted a story of a patient of the opiate replacement therapy from the town of Shostka. The patient appeared to be in a serious trouble, and despite that fact the main reason of the problem was his behavior, the other patients did everything they could to help him.
Ukraine: Online Interactive Map Helps Fight HIV
Private Ukrainian Charity Elena Pinchuk ANTIAIDS foundation in partnership with the Ukrainian office of Google launched the news social service maps.antiaids.org. The new service will help Ukrainian Internet users easier and faster to find the sites of HIV testing in their region as well as condom vending machines.
