Mobile blogging is the current trend from Europe to Asia! With camera/video phones becoming a permanent accessory in US phones (though it's been available in Asia for the past 6), real time multimedia blogging is here to stay. Case in point is this post, being written and submitted via my Treo 650.

Earlier today, on my Live Journal blog (for my family), I posted my son's birthday party pics & video clips. My family is scattered worlwide and we truly stay connected via our mobile phones.

In Asia, there is no excuse for not reaching anyone, because cell phone coverage there is ubiquitous. The cost of PC's is still very high for the working class and the electric grid so unreliable, that it's useless to invest in a desktop. Seeing a golden opportunity, Telco's capitalized on cell phone solutions, and used them to fill all their customers needs.

Today, in many countries around the world, the primary device for user connectivity is wireless internet connectivity - mainly through cell phones. The main reason has always been lack of a reliable infrastructure (for both land lines & electricity) and high cost of existing wired solutions.

In a report I read recently I learned there are over a trillion (yes, that's right) a trillion cell users in Asia w/online capability. That number is expected to double by 2010. Just to give you an idea of how advanced their mobile infrasturcture is, when I lived in the Philippines a 5 years ago, I was able to pay ALL my utilities via my cell. That's right: my elec, gas, tel, cell, pvt postal service, cable,...and even my rent (through a wireless bank transfer between accounts)!

In the last 3 months my most consistent medium for commuinication has been my cell. I'm currently not able to access close to half of my Bad Example Family from most, if not all, public internet places due to their content. As a result, I've been forced to either read them on my PDA or not read them at all.

A great example of this situation is my adoptive blog dad Harvey, of Bad Example. Due to content safe software and word filters the only place I can read him is at home. While my pc is being repaired I can't read him anywhere and so I tried on my pda. Unfortunately, I failed because his 3 column site is so complex & link rich, it's too large & slow to load. As a result, I've been forced to miss his naughty & very wity humor.

Europeans, following Asian bloggers, have streamlined their sites & made them multimedia friendly. Have you checked out Whimsy Capricious where you can post text messages directly onto her site. That feature is so commonplace in Asia, even online news sites have them in order to report up to the minute local events via a cell phone.

Even a newbie blogger can become an on-the-scene correspondent, by "mo-blogging" (using mobile phone/pda accessories). You might be at a trendy restaurant in LA, a protest march in New York City, or a three-day Phish concert in Seattle, almost instantly you can file a report or review in real-time and let the world know what's going on.

In fact, a number of UK bloggers & 2 American bloggers, who were in London at the time of the first bombing, scooped the BBC & CNN in reporting that these were terrorist attacks and posted accounts with pics, and footage of videos taken by cell phones, as the events occurred. Later in the day, the BBC bought rights to broadcast a number of these cell phone feeds to put them on the air and link to them online.

So in an effort to expand your audience and help you prepare for the inevitable & current revolution - that of mobile blogging and reading, I hope you will consider returning for Saturday's post: Easy Syndication for the Masses. Essentially it will be a how you can create a site environment & promote your site to capture the widest possible audience... IF that's your interest.

See you then!

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Looking forward to it. I have family everywhere (including Japan) and would love to make it easier for them to read my blog.

Cool! Can't wait.

Prime Minister Chirac has officially raised the French terror alert level from “Run” to “Hide ” .There are only two higher levels in France -they are ” Surrender ” and “Collaborate ” .

The rise was precipitated by a recent fire which destroyed France’s white flag factory - effectively crippling their military capability.

[via Xset]

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My husband blogged about that last week. What a riot.

Eighteen months ago, I started writing about corruption at the highest levels in the United Nations organization, which extended to vendors and subcontractors. I would link to some of those posts now, but when my old blogspot site was hacked into, I lost most of them. In those posts, I wrote about the corruption involving Kofi Annan’s son and Boutros Gali’s son, as well as other high-ranking UN officials in the Oil for Food program.

On Monday, Paul Volker released a full report on Part 1 of his investigation on the Oil for Food program’s bribery and corruption scandal, which is believed to involve a number of senior officials. One official, Alexander Yakovlev, has already pleaded guilty in Federal court to charges of bribery, after being stripped of diplomatic immunity. Benon Sevan, the former head of the Oil for Food program, continues to be in hiding somewhere in Cyprus, he is expected to receive indictments this week.

As the investigation continues, the focus will now move to the Security Council staff and members. The committee has already requested Annan’s notes, as well as Security Council meeting minutes related to sanctions against Iraq in the years before the 2003 Iraq invasion, for possible conflict of interest.

Here’s what angers me the most, the failure of the UN to live up to its responsibilities and charter time and again, especially in the face of dire human crisis. We began to see their disregard for human life in Uganda. We continued to see their ineffectualness in Somalia. We are now seeing the UN's analysis/paralysis in Nigeria, where thousands have already died, and where it is expected that hundreds of thousands more will starve to death over the next few weeks. This is in spite of the self-delusional attempt to end poverty and famine through the world-wide Live8 concerts, which featured Kofi Annan as one of its speakers.

The true crime here, and the crime no one will be prosecuted for, is the continual victimization of the youngest victims through greed, corruption, abuse of power, and in-action. In doing so, the UN secured an Aushwitz-like death for thousands of the world’s poorest and most vulnerable children.

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no matter how many discussions we have about this it's stil hard to believe that such a trusted institution would coverup such crimes.

this is very disturbing and sad

After reading the accusation of Docs sans Borders I'm very angry! Thanks for continuing to bring this to our attention.

With the help of our illustrious Pixy, Paul, Ogre and Phin, I was able to get my sidebar up (when you’re viewing my site in a maximized screen). THIS WAS EXACTLY WHAT I WANTED! WOOHOO! ALL HAIL THE MUNUVIAN GENIUSES WHO VANQUISHED THE EVIL MERCURIAN FORCES!

Can you tell I’m happy? Well, heck yeah. Now I will boldly go forth, defying once again the Mercurian forces, to finish:
- adding my category archives (which eventually will be in a drop down list)
- creating a PDA format of my site (so I can check up on Colin’s posts)
- creating an Atom RSS feed format (so I can be read as easily and widely as the Instapundit!)
- fixing color schemes for active and visited links
- fixing all font sizes (my description size is driving me nuts!)
- creating drop down lists for some of my link sections (like News Briefs & On the Left)

There’s more, but that should take care of my idle time till the end of August. In the interim I'll try to find time to do some sports blogging about:
- Larry Brown coming to coach the NY Knicks (yes, good for us!),
- Hockey season (finally!) resuming and Gretzky coaching the Phoenix ___?
- Bertuzzi returning to the NHL
- The NJ Devils loosing 2 of its top players, causing it's post season chances to look bleak at best!

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I can't imagine why you would want to see what Colin is posting. GRIN

Looks very sharp indeed! Nice work!

I think the new look is smashing!

Yay!

Any idea where I can get the code for that "list of munu sites" drop-down box?

As you might have noticed, I've been trying to use that "computer high geek" knowledge to finish the vision I had for the site a while ago.

Unfortunately, every time I implement a new phase of my changes my carpel tunnel acts up, so this will be slow going. I'm currently working on getting my sidebar back up on the right side of the screen again (right now it's at the bottom). What I had intended to do was to adjust the Index Template so that I could easily set up both, an Atom RSS feed and PDA version of my site, to make it more accessible for readers to view my site in different formats.

So, till I get everything fixed up and/or Mercury retrograde cycle ends and begins to move forward again (8/15), we'll have to live with my bar being at the bottom.

If you ask me, it's karmic retribution for my hubris of posting my "high geekiness" score. This post will remain at the top until things are fixed

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LOL! Good luck!

LOL! You made my day.

I thought Colin had done it.

I see a sidebar on the side... is it fixed, or am I hallucinating again?

Here, here! It's about high time this was done somewhere. Tolerance of these individuals has only netted the spread of hatred through out the world.

AP has has the story here and Reuter's story is here

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Kudos to "Ian Johnston, the Chief Constable of the British Transport Police," who having been taken to task by a local human rights lobby group for saying "his officers won't be wasting time searching 'little old white ladies' on the Tube," has gone ahead with detainments and searches.

Unfortunately here in NYC the NYCLU has filed a federal lawsuit to stop searches of riders as they enter the NYC subway system.

"A plaintiff in the suit, Joseph Gehring, says the searches have forced him to fear the police." Interesting, I guess he either fears terrorists less or wasn't living in NYC on 9/11.

I'll keep you posted as things develop.

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[Via Laughing Wolf]

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You big geek! :)

Off-topic - all your posts seem to be displaying inside your sidebar?

Messed with your template lately?

Blog Daddy, Harvey of Bad Example broke the news about blogger supporting photos (with some major limitations) in this post. Now I'll break the news about Blogger's Mobile Photo/Blogging feature, which I've been using for the past few weeks now, since my computer has been out of commission. [I'm currently visiting with my mom's and I'm using my sister's computer to post this.]

Anyway, being that I had a camera phone w/video capability I decided to test both my camera-phone and their hosting capabilities out. So I decided to resurrect my old blogspot spite temporarily to engage in an experiment of sorts. Well, after only a few tries I loved it. Espeically since my pc accessibility at the moment is limited as Colin explains in this post

So far I love it. I just snap, email or mms with a subject line (which is the post's title), then write as long or short a text message (which is the body of the post) as I want to and then send it to blogger... they do the rest. Later I can go in and edit what I've written or delet the picture from the HTML code. Now the question that's not addressed in their info is size capacity of photos and/or total photo storage capacity. Hmmm, must explore!

To view my first efforts please visit: lettersfromnyc.blogspot.com. Feel free to leave a comment there.

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Blogger Mobile imposes a 250K limit per photo, which is mentioned on this page:

http://help.blogger.com/bin/answer.py?answer=1031&query=limits%20account&topic=0&type=f

Regular Blogger Image uploading doesn't appear to have a limit.

In the Spring ’05 issue of The Wilson Quarterly, an international opinion magazine published by Princeton University’s Center for Int’l Relations & Diplomatic Scholars, William Powers writes a lengthy article on the 7 Steps to Big Media’s Salvation (free). I summarize his views here for your consideration, and then take issue with his viewpoint.

1. Relax. Nobody likes a whiner, particularly one who doesn’t know how lucky he is. You’ve been around for centuries, and you’re more powerful now than ever before.

2. Enjoy yourselves. …traditional news outlets have become joyless things. Most American [broadcasts and] newspapers are dull, fearful creatures. In contrast, blogs and other online news sources often possess an attractive, intelligent vibrancy… because it connects us to the great throng of humanity.

3. Be natural. Enough already with your pretensions to objectivity and neutrality. Everyone has leanings, passions, and, yes, biases. By claiming to be superhuman—bias free—you come off as weirdly subhuman. In all honesty, sometimes you have the public personality of an android. Striving for perfect fairness is a fine goal. Just don’t act as though you achieve it on a regular basis.

4. Don’t patronize. One reason young people say they avoid newspapers and other traditional news media is that what’s offered by those outlets has no apparent connection to the world they live in. To them, the news doesn’t look or sound like life but rather like some false approximation of it. Swear off demographics. Hire journalists of all ages, and deploy them in unexpected ways. In journalism, there’s no such thing as generationally correct work. Have an octogenarian cover blogs. When David Broder retires from The Washington Post, give his column to the sharpest 27-year-old you know. The results could be strange and wonderful.

5. Make trouble. It’s a fact: Nobody respects a suck-up. Why did it take the surprise attack of 9/11, and a war launched partly on the basis of bad intelligence, for you to wake up to the problems in the U.S. intelligence agencies? That story was an investigative journalist’s dream, and you missed it. You were probably in a strategy meeting about how to regain all those eyeballs no longer trained on you.

6. Only disconnect. There’s a widespread sense in the news business that contemporary audiences want their news delivered strictly in quick hits…The baby boomers are about to start retiring, and they’re going to have a lot of time on their hands. Tiny news bites won’t fill the hours or satisfy their need. [Can] you old-media types wait for someone else to make this happen—bloggers?

7. Don’t give up hope. When television started to take off after World War II, radio seemed doomed, and nearsighted futurists confidently wrote the medium’s obituary. There’s a chance that you traditional media will get another shot at this supposedly lost generation of news consumers. If you play your cards right, you might even turn “serious” newspapers and news broadcasts into badges of maturity and arrival. …Defy the mavens of media marketing. Live dangerously. Be bright and sophisticated. And people may surprise you.

My first issue with Powers, a former Washington Post journalist and current National Journal writer, is that his prescription come a little too late, as the messengers of Old Media have already “jumped the shark”. Old Media and their talking heads and personalities, have been relegated (as their own declining revenues proves) in ever increasing numbers to the role of supplementary source of news for a growing majority of news followers that then turn to the web for substance and cross-referencing information.

The main cause of this deminse is not the medium or the style but Trust. The sensationalist rather than detail rich content of news stories during the presidential campaign, and later the Abu Graib and Newsweek/Koran toilet stories. simply ushered your demise as a primary source of questionably reliable information. Your ever increasing retractions and apologies do little to resuscitate your status quo or ingratiate you to the masses.

Sorry Mr. Powers, but you and Old Media are so deeply entrenched in a format and with relationships (such as advertisers, pollsters, media rating companies, image and rating consultants), that all of you have become impervious to the moribund state you find yourselves in. Your inability to change, let alone recognize the sign posts of your diseased and fevered state, have been everywhere this past year, your reluctance in making substantial changes have made the inherent obvious now a certainty.

In not heeding McLuhan or blogoshpere’s warnings, all of you Old Media Types have successfully enshrined your fate and sealed your demise. Ample proof of this can be found not only in the consistently declining circulation of every major newspaper, but also in David Sifry’s report (for Technorati): State of the Blogsophere. It is here that the we see the masses actively creating a community of explorers searching the horizons for truth, where “a new blog is created about every second,” with about “80,000 [blogs] created daily.” This brings the total of active blogs to 14.2 million, a hefty number of truth seekers if you ask me.

Mr. Powers, just as the masses rescued the bible from it’s high priests, these same knowing masses have seized the web as purveyors of knowledge and availed themselves of blogs as their scribes and agitators for truth.

Here's a newsflash, which I'm sharing with Outside the Beltway readers: Old Media is dead; consider this post your formal obituary. Blogs are here and have taken their place!

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Good comments and analysis, but I'm sort of cowering from the "tone" I hear in your "voice" every time you say "Mr. Powers." *G*

Welcome back on-line.

Ditto on the good comments and analysis. I think the MSM is sort of in denial about the power of Blogs. From 'pajama' comments to Rathergate; they just don't understand it. I'd like to pass along a phrase that I read on La Shawn Barber's Corner (http://lashawnbarber.com) about blogging:

'how fortunate we are to have such an effective, affordable-to-the-masses, new medium like blogs'

Yes, blogging is bringing a 'voice' to the masses.

Keep up the good work!

Guest: You see, Miles, if you gently apply pressure to the shaft while lightly grazing its base, the rocket will launch rather effectively.
Miles: But what about the danger of another explosion?
Guest: Oh, I am sure of it.

Earlier: Is That a Rocket in Your Pants or Are You Just Happy to See Me?

[via Gawker]

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Heh - my caption would be...

Nyah, Nyah... mine's bigger than yours!

*grin*

Teresa stole my idea:

Blue shirt: My rocket is bigger and thicker than yours.

Red shirt: Shut the hell up

Thought I'd share this item from the London Times with you:

"Over the past fortnight Israeli intelligence agents have noticed something distinctly odd happening on the internet. One by one, Al-Qaeda’s affiliated websites have vanished until only a handful remain..."

write Uzi Mahnaimi and Alex Pell.

Someone has cut the line of communication between the spiritual leaders of international terrorism and their supporters. Since 9/11 the websites have been the main links to disseminate propaganda and information.

The Israelis detect the hand of British intelligence, determined to torpedo the websites after the London attacks of July 7.

The web has become the new battleground of terrorism, permitting a freedom of communication denied to such organisations as the IRA a couple of decades ago.

One global jihad site terminated recently was an inflammatory Pakistani site, www.mojihedun.com, in which a section entitled How to Strike a European City gave full technical instructions. Tens of similar sites, some offering detailed information on how to build and use biological weapons, have also been shut down. However, Islamic sites believed to be “moderate”, remain.

One belongs to the London-based Syrian cleric Abu Basir al-Tartusi, whose www.abubaseer.bizland.com remained operative after he condemned the London bombings.

However, the scales remain weighted in favour of global jihad, the first virtual terror organisation. For all the vaunted spying advances such as tracking mobile phones and isolating key phrases in telephone conversations, experts believe current technologies actually play into the hands of those who would harm us.

“Modern technology puts most of the advantages in the hands of the terrorists. That is the bottom line,” says Professor Michael Clarke, of King’s College London, who is director of the International Policy Institute.

Government-sponsored monitoring systems, such as Echelon, can track vast amounts of data but have so far proved of minimal benefit in preventing, or even warning, of attacks. And such systems are vulnerable to manipulation: low-ranking volunteers in terrorist organisations can create background chatter that ties up resources and maintains a threshold of anxiety. There are many tricks of the trade that give terrorists secure digital communication and leave no trace on the host computer.

Ironically, the most readily available sources of accurate online information on bomb-making are the websites of the radical American militia. “I have not seen any Al-Qaeda manuals that look like genuine terrorist training,” claims Clarke.

However, the sobering message of many security experts is that the terrorists are unlikely ever to lose a war waged with technology.

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"However, the sobering message of many security experts is that the terrorists are unlikely ever to lose a war waged with technology."

Ironically, if they win, the technology will cease to exist...

By the way, Colin, even though you're only guest-posting, please don't feel like you have to hide your stuff in the extended entry all the time.

Read this & think it over:

http://badexample.mu.nu/archives/032793.php

We need to hire some hackers to hack into their websites and start sending them spam filled with pron.

I agree. Spam. Lots of it. Spam and bacon.

[via my inbox]

1. Life is sexually transmitted.
2. Good health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.
3. Men have two emotions: Hungry and Horny. If you see him without an erection, make him a sandwich!
4. Give a person a fish and you feed them for a day; teach a person to use the Internet and they won't bother you for weeks.
5. Some people are like a Slinky.....not really good for anything, but you still can't help but smile when you see one tumble down the stairs.
6. Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing.
7. All of us could take a lesson from the weather. It pays no attention to criticism.
8. Why does a slight tax increase cost you two hundred dollars, but a substantial tax cut saves you thirty cents?
9. In the 60's, people took acid to make the world weird. Now the world is weird and people take Prozac to make it normal.
10. AND THE # 1 THOUGHT FOR 2005:
We know exactly where one cow with mad-cow-disease is located among the millions and millions of cows in America but we haven't got a clue as to where thousands of illegal immigrants and terrorists are located. Maybe we should put the Department of Agriculture in charge of immigration.

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First on the blogcrawl!

"Men have two emotions: Hungry and Horny"

Don't forget "tired" :-)

Oh, and "drunk"...

WHEEEEEE!!!

"life is sexually transmitted" I will have to remember that for when I am soberer.

likne collin but I miss michelle... where are you michelle... colme bakc!

Glocarawal!

Percent of the world's cell phone users who report that they have stopped in the middle of a sex act to answer a ringing phone?

14. (source: Beliblog)

Having a partner that's considerate enough NOT to answer a phone during sex?

Priceless

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You have GOT to be kidding me.

A couple of times while using the restroom I have often heard someone in the stall next to me answer a cell phone; therefore, I have reminded friends to NEVER talk to me on their cell while doing that.

So, thanks! Now I have something else to remind them to NOT be doing when talking to me on their cell phone!

14% ??? What is their problem? Holy crap that's depressing.

Yay!

Yay I say, for British Police, Scotland Yard and my fellow countrymen who helped apprehend the 4 bastards who didn’t get to blow themselves. I was first alerted to the arrests when a colleague of mine cancelled a teleconference we had scheduled due to police activity in the financial district where he works.

In checking the London Times online I read the account of the arrests and how they tried to coax these bastards out of the flats. It was then I began to create elaborate revenge fantasies for these 4. To hell with their rights. In this I want the old West kind of Justice… no wait, worse than that. As I entertained different ways of handling retribution my way, all of the scenes in my head seemed too bloody unsatisfying.

In discussing the arrests with one of my neighbors this evening she shared with me what she would like to see happen, To start, “Tazer electrodes should be shot directly into and attached deep in their testicles. Metallic clamps should then be applied to their nipples that connect with metal wires to the metal rods on their testicles.” [cringe.. shiver... now we’re getting somewhere!]. She continued, “After a light mist has been sprayed on their bodies, they should be strapped at the neck, arms, wrists and legs to a table so they’re unable to move when the electodes are activated at different intensities and for different lengths of time. They should do this in order to enhance the terror and anticipation of their next shock. Only after a few hours of this should the interrogation begin. One hour of torture should be given for each bombing death; only then will I be happy.”

Yes, now I’m satisfied!

As for my neighbor, I just kept looking at her as she walked away with a satisfied smile. There has always been something that has both intrigued and terrified me about this woman. It’s the reason I’ve held back from asking her out. As I touched my chest on the elevator going up to my flat I wondered if her fantasy could be modified slightly to provide pleasure instead of inducing pain. Hmmm, something to discuss the next time I run into her.

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Vegetable peeler - disassemble terrorists one layer at a time...