It is not often that someone who lives in the Bronx, one of the boroughs of New York City, can take a local Bronx bus to hear the Berliner Philarmoniker perform. This is, however, the rare treat that was part of Carnegie Hall’s recent Berlin in Lights festival.  Berlin is the city where the wall symbolizing the Cold War division of Germany was brought down. It is quite a special city for this reason alone. Adding to this distinction, however, is the fact that it is in Berlin that I have found that creative people from both the East and West of Germany and of Europe have been drawn. Thus I was delighted to see the announcement that there was to be a festival which would bring some of Berlin to New York City.

For the festival, there were over 50 performances in various venues around New York City. … weiter lesen

 A recent article I have written for Telepolis takes up the issue of the false reality the U.S. press presents to the public with regard to Iran’s nuclear program. The article is titled, “Injecting a Synthetic Reality? Framing the narrative on Iran’s Use of nuclear energy”. The url is

http://www.heise.de/tp/r4/artikel/26/26630/1.html

 The false framing of reality by the neoconservatives in the U.S. is a significant tactic they use to accomplish their political objectives. Unless there is a press to adequately challenge their activities, the public is left under the cloud of deception. A press that presents an accurate presentation of reality is critical for the public. This is why it is so important that there be a ‘New News’ to counter to false narratives presented as the news by those with hidden agendas. The public will have a more effective means to oppose these hidden agendas if they are understood.  See for example, Robert… weiter lesen

On September 18-19, 2007 there was a conference in Potsdam, Germany at the Hasso Plattner Institute to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the first international email connection from China made possible by researchers from Germany in collaboration with Chinese researchers.

As part of the conference, several speakers were invited to discuss various aspects of Internet development. I was invited to give a talk about the Netizen Movement and its Impact. I chose to focus on what impact netizens and the Internet are having on journalism.

A text version of the talk is online. The url is:

http://www.columbia.edu/~rh120/other/misc/talk_netizen_journalism.doc

The powerpoint slides are also online. The url is:

http://www.columbia.edu/~rh120/other/misc/talk_netizenmovementslides.ppt

In the talk I offered some background about how the phenomenon of netizens was first discovered and some of the forms that the phenomenon subsequently took.

Then I presented several examples of what I would call ‘netizen journalism.’

These included the creation of the Korean online newspaper OhmyNews in South Korea, the German online… weiter lesen

Something that would have seemed impossible just a year ago occurred at the United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday, October 31, 2007. A resolution supporting reunification of Korea passed by acclamation. Just a little over a year ago, in October 2006 North Korea was the subject of sanctions from the Security Council and the two Koreas seemed world’s apart.(1) What has happened since is significant.

Wednesday’s action in the General Assembly was a surprise it seemed even to the majority of the nations who took part in it. A number of ambassadors from various countries spoke. Their remarks demonstrated concern for and interest in the success of the process that the two Koreas have been part of in their efforts toward conciliation and reunification. The international community approved a resolution supporting the motion toward reunification of the two Koreas and applauding the 2nd inter-Korean Summit held October 2-4 2007 and the joint… weiter lesen