Tribute to Cyberactivism:

We understand cyberactivism (as we have seen in class) as a group of techniques of communication, which are used basically on the Internet, associated to collective action or civil disobedience. We also have studied the dimension of its action, and the very high importance that has in countries as Cuba or North Korea. So, because of the relevance of this way for fighting injustice, I must write this post focusing on the action of Anonymous and Wikileaks, and the relation between them.

“Knowledge is free. We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.” With this motto, Anonymous defines its philosophy. They fight against those who don’t want freedom in the network, especially against the censorship that the copyright frames (this means a direct connection with my last post). They attack unconditionally to anyone who violates the liberty of expression. The most recently Anonymous attacks have been to Tunisia websites during the political crisis this country suffered, or to Egyptian ones during the revolution against Mubarak. Attacks to Governments websites boosted the revolution, and maybe, thanks to them, these countries could live in a democratic system in a short period of time. This kind of examples brings into light the necessity of the existence of these organizations.

Wikileaks is another organization which tries to get a more transparent world. They publish documents that show non-etic activities of governments, religions or big companies. With the motto “We open governments”, the main objective of this organization is to show the population the information that governments hides. I think that Wikileaks has a very important role in the network society. I am not sure if they could be defined as cyberactivists, but they have the same (or more) importance than them. It also exist a strong debate about if it is journalism or not… From my point of view it is not. It is something much better.

Why Wikileaks and Anonymous? I like that they fight for the same purpose without having any kind of relation between them. I find in the help that each organization offers to the other one a very beautiful fidelity on their ideas, on their objectives. And this is not very usual in the world we are living in nowadays. The terrible attack that Wikileaks had suffered since the publication of thousands of documents about the miseries of our politicians is the worst act of censorship I have ever seen in “democratic” countries. It is unacceptable. A group of people who has worked for years with the purpose of make a more transparent world, and who has had the courage to show the information that lots of countries hide, does not deserve such a treatment. They look like terrorist, when they are completely the opposite.

And then, when Wikileaks was being attacked by Visa, Mastercard, governments, etc. appeared Anonymous to defend de freedom of expression, attacking . We must be firm against those who wants to control the world by silencing cyberactivists.

The need to seek for new business models in the network...For the media.

As I wrote in my previous post, I am very sure that Internet is not 100% well used. Internet is something so much big, that it offers millions of opportunities (although the most octogenarians continue building barriers to not see them).

I have started to write this post in order to the lots of critics that the very famous "Ley Sinde" has received. Since this polemic law was born, the debate around the network and its possibility or not to be used by the big owners of the media, is omnipresent. And it is a debate, which is from my point of view completely unnecessary because the need to modernize the nowadays system of distribution is undeniable, and Internet is the best item that we dispose to do it. This law means a terrible involution, and tries to restrict something with so big and with so much power, that it is doomed. As this picture shows (obtained from www.ultimonivel.net), this law is a waste of time:

I will not criticize the law, because there are lots of people that have already done it. I am only going to declare that Law is not up to date with the status of the Internet, and is far behind the actual needs of the network. And this is, again, undeniable. But this is not the intention of this post. I would like to deep in the reflection of how we could use the Internet in order to improve the poor system we are suffering now, and which only looks for the benefit of the big owners of the media. Because this is one of the objectives of this subject: discover the network.

Watching some videos at Youtube about the possibilities of taking the media business into Internet, one model seems to me the protagonist. It is a model that is has already been used by Spotify, which is a platform that offers free music with advertising , and also proffer a premium account (5 euros per month) without publicity and no time limit. I think it only has one problem, and it is that it does not permit to download the file. I dream with a platform of the same characteristics for films and TV series. I noticed that the webmaster of "seriesyonkis.com" is developing a new platform, a free one in this case. It is his way to fight with the worst law ever made. It is not a business model for the artists, but a good way to answer to that people who do not want to evolve to something better.

In conclussion, as David Bravo says in one of his best interventions: you can continue travelling by a Flintstones car, but let us travel by plane. Let us get the best use of the Internet, and stop stealing the users.

The use of the Internet.

Maybe, the Internet network is what the Ilustrators dreamed during their existence: the global access for information, culture, and knowledge. And I say maybe, because somebody could say that the access to the Internet, and the content that it supplies, is not global. And it is completely true, as we I am going to show below.

Taking a look at www.internetworldstats.com (web that I highly recommend to visit), I found some relevant information about the problem. The difference between the percentages of population that uses daily Internet of USA and Africa is shameful: 77% against 10%. I think it is not necessary to determine which percentage belongs to each country.

I could throw up more and more devastating data of this terrible gap, that not only exists in the use of Internet, even this probably is one of the less important gaps between developed countries and not developed ones. But I prefer to think about the reasons of such a problem, and look for solutions. I do not like a Globalization System that needs the poverty of millions of people for the wealth of some of the owners of the world. If we talk about the use of the Internet, we are talking about "culture and information poverty", which from my point of view, is not less devastating than other ones. So, this system, would be the most important reason of the gap.

This digital divide, is the root of many problems. As the American citizen has the possibility (and sometimes the power) to know how the world is going on and control the information that the network has, the African citizen has no idea about the "other world". It become impossible for him to know the world they are living in, the enormous differences between the life he is suffering in Africa and the life others are enjoying. This So, this digital divide could be (and I am sure it is) a very powerful weapon to control the worlds model operation, and its maintenance.

In conclusion, the Digital Divide is a problem to be solved by us, who are aware of the problems this world has. Internet would be a very useful thing, and I dare to say that it is the most important humanity's discovery. But it could not become as good as it could be if it does not arrive at all the world's homes.

Lo tenía que contar.

¿Qué quieren las mujeres?

Es una de las preguntas que me he estado haciendo desde que la bendita adolescencia llegó a mi vida. Adolescencia, que trajo consigo incontables varapalos, numerosos desengaños, y desilusiones amorosas de tal calibre, que prefiero no recordar. Y todo, por una misma razón: estas malditas mujeres a las que no hay ente racional capaz de comprender. Pero hace poco, muy poco tiempo, encontré la respuesta a tantos sinsentidos, a raíz de una conversación con una gran amiga, una amiga "de las caras". Y esa respuesta es la que me ha lanzado a abrir este blog. Aquí dejo el secreto, que muchas mujeres, esconden como si la fórmula de la Coca-Cola se tratara:

Yo: No en serio, ¿qué cojones queréis las tías? Es que de verdad, que no lo entiendo. ¿Queréis que os invitemos, o que no os invitemos? ¿queréis que nos cuidemos, que usemos cosméticos y nos planchemos el pelo, o no? ¿encima o debajo? ¿queréis que os felicitemos por vuestro cumpleaños, o no porque no os gusta cumplirlos? ¿de qué va esto?

Ella: Mira Alberto, voy a confesarte algo importante. Pero no se lo cuentes a nadie, es máximo secreto.

Yo: De acuerdo (esto lo susurré).

Ella: Nosotras...No tenemos ni idea de lo que queremos.

Yo: ¡Joder!