The draft of the country’s new media laws has moved on to an advisory council for final approval, and has been expected at least for the past year. In March, Hamad bin Abdulaziz Al Kuwari, Qatar’s Minister of Arts, Culture and Heritage, publicly stated that social media would be covered by the new media laws as “it is the most important form of free expression in the present world.” Now, as AP reports, Qatar will seek wide leeway that could see consequences for online items considered a threat to ‘state security’, and it further outlaws news, video or online posts that violate the ‘sanctity’ of a person’s private life, regardless of whether it is slanderous. The new measures seem to resemble those enacted in other Western-backed Gulf states such as Kuwait and Bahrain, which have sharply increased arrests linked to social media posts that insult or otherwise undermine rulers. In Bahrain, the government has gone through great lengths to project a positive public perception, and has been intolerant of activism over media such as Twitter since it first began to experience a swell in demonstrations brought on by the Arab Spring. Bloggers in Bahrain, as well as in Kuwait, have been subject to prosecution for comments deemed seditious or ‘blasphemous’ against the monarchies. In September of last year, for example, a high court in Bahrain sentenced prominent independent blogger and human rights activist Abduljalil Alsingace to life imprisonment on charges of ‘plotting to topple’ the country’s leadership. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, in 2012 Bahrain saw some of the worst conditions for journalists in the country since King Hamad bin Issa al-Khalifa assumed power in 1999. CPJ documented three journalists’ deaths, dozens of detentions, deportations, and smear campaigns. In the case of Qatar, Jamie Ingram, a Middle East analyst at IHS Global Insight, sees similarities between the country’s new online media regulations and those of other Gulf nations. “The law in Qatar and the UAE are strikingly similar … the UAE enacted this legislation in November of last year and Qatar’s now following suit. They’re very concerned by the potential for unrest and there have been restrictions on freedom of speech and this law is simply acknowledging modern technology and catching up to technological developments,” Ingram told RT. While very quick to react to breaches s of democracy in other nations, the West has been reluctant to openly criticize its allies in the Gulf region as the need to maintain the status quo. “Western countries still want to see stability in the region and the continuance of the status quo, so this overrides any concerns that they may have. Yes, they have attempted to put some pressure on Bahrain, for instance, but overall they want to see the status quo maintained,” says Ingram. … Read More
Data’s Transformation
Two cloud-based software companies, GoodData, which does business analytics, and Box, which stores data, have announced a joint product. The real big deal is what products like this say about the change in thinking about information, from a static fact to a potential source of unknown insight. … Read More
I had to punish myself
Dear Cary,You said in your column that you want letters … so I think I might send you a few. I have some things I’m sorting through that I suspect your intuition/insight would be especially helpful with. They have to do with the past, addictions and creative growth. So, here’s one. This is about an ex and moving past the past.About 3.5 years ago I started dating someone I met through work. I broke up with my then-boyfriend of three years, with whom I lived, to be with the new guy. At the time I felt a few things: 1) that it was a soul mate connection, larger than me; 2) that I didn’t really know why I was doing it because my current boyfriend was wonderful and I loved him; 3) that I didn’t deserve to be treated well, and because the new guy reminded me so much of my alcoholic father, I knew he would treat me badly and at a deep level I wanted to be punished. I wish I could say No. 3 was a barely conscious or subconscious voice that I only later recognized, but I actually articulated that feeling, pretty much verbatim, to the boyfriend I was leaving. Well, the relationship turned out as one might expect. In addition to the alcoholism — over which he was in denial, and in fact there is a whole lot of addiction and a whole lot of denial in his family — he was verbally and emotionally abusive. There were lots of other problems too, but anyone who is familiar with dysfunctional/addictive relationships can probably fill in the details. I played my role in the dysfunction as well. We lasted about eight months. Most of that I was miserable, we had epic fights, I stayed because I told myself I needed to take my punishment, and by the time we broke up my self-esteem was in such shreds that I was cutting myself. I should add that I was in my mid-20s at the time and he was 10 years older. I finally broke up with him when I tried to interrupt one of his hours-long tirades by explaining (again) that it was not OK with me to be screamed at and called names, no matter how angry he was, and he responded with the following: “I get to yell at you when I’m angry.” It wasn’t until that moment that I realized I could explain and explain, but his behavior was not going to change because he thought it was an OK way to behave. If I thought it was not OK, it was on me to leave. So I did, and I got into a 12-step program, and I worked my program, and I went to therapy, and I got on with my life. I am much happier and healthier now than I have ever been, and I’m still growing, and I am in a healthy loving relationship of over a year. Continue Reading… … Read More
The myths of happiness
WHEN MY CHILDREN WERE YOUNG, my wife and I focused our child-rearing efforts on nurturing intellectual enthusiasm, self-discipline, kindness, empathy, honesty, and ambition. I don’t think we spent 10 minutes worrying about whether our kids were going to be happy. Of course they were. How could they not? They had loving and attentive parents who got along well with each other and grandparents who doted on them, they went to good schools, and they lived in a warm and supportive community.As my kids got older, approaching the age of the students I taught, a light bulb suddenly went on in my blinkered brain. Most of the kids I taught were just like my kids. They had parents who loved them, came from good communities and schools, had been nurtured and protected throughout their childhoods. Yet plenty of these kids didn’t seem to be happy. They were anxious, they were depressed, they were unenthusiastic about their work, and they were uncertain about their futures. I suddenly realized that happiness is not something to be taken for granted (I can hear you saying “duh!”). When I came to this blinding insight, my parenting aims turned on a dime. I also discovered that my wife had appreciated this all along, and that equipping our kids to be happy had always been part of her parenting agenda.Continue Reading… … Read More
“Foo Fighters” frontman Dave Grohl thinks that “Foo Fighters” is a very stupid name for a band
Apparently, “Foo Fighters” frontman Dave Grohl does not like the name of the band that he started in 1994. Speaking candidly on stage at the Austin Convention Center during SXSW on Thursday, the former Nirvana drummer admitted that “finding a good band name is still the hardest fucking part” of founding a band. “Foo Fighters is the stupidest fucking name,” he said, according to NME.That wasn’t the only surprising personal insight Grohl dropped: he also admitted that Psy’s viral sensation “Gangnam Style” “is one of my favorite songs of the past decade.”Continue Reading… … Read More
What was the price of silencing Whitney’s greatest love of all?
Though it was speculated about throughout her entire career, the truth about Whitney Houston’s private life may never be fully known. But a year after the death of the diva, new details keep emerging that offer insight into her lesser-known side – and the lengths to which she, and her family, went to protect it.FBI files spanning from 1988 to 1992 released Monday reveal both the obsessive fans Houston occasionally needed protection from — and, cryptically, the extortion plot that threatened to expose the details of the singer’s ”romantic relationships.” The files have been heavily redacted, but they show that a person purporting to have “intimate details regarding Whitney Houston’s romantic relationships” threatened to reveal them “to several publications” unless she was paid $100,000. The sum was later “raised to $250,000. The person agreed to sign a confidentiality agreement once the amount was paid.Continue Reading… … Read More
Report: Anonymous Aliens: Colonial Marines Dev Says Gearbox …
Today, a new mystery source's testimony echoes previous reports , while adding new insight to the game's messy creation. … Read More
