Google has the worst privacy policy of popular net firms, says a report.

Rights group Privacy International rated the search giant as “hostile” to privacy in a report ranking web firms by how they handle personal data.

I feel sick to my stomach when I see a multi-billion giant like Microsoft using “children refugees” as a cover up to market their latest web 2.0 businesses called live.com! While doing my search for my previous story, I came across a press release by UNHCR which said: “Microsoft launches “Click for Cause” initiative to [...]

Yesterday, Transparency International published the annual report, where it showed that most Arab states are among worst ranked (UAE - 31, Qatar - 32, Bahrain - 36, Oman - 39, Jordan - 40, Kuwait - 46, Tunisia - 51, Lebanon - 63, Saudi - 70, Egypt - 70, Morocco - 79, Algeria - 84, Mauritania [...]

Update Nov 2nd: Mahmood’s Blog is back!

It’s official, Mahmood’s Blog (http://mahmood.tv) will be blocked effective immediately, by the orders of the Bahraini Ministry of Information.

Together with 6 other web sites (listed below), the official memo was delivered to all the ISP’s in Bahrain this afternoon.

Mahmood is a prominent Bahraini/Arab blogger. His blog is the most [...]

Netscape, the brand that kick-started the dot-com boom only to lose the browser war to Microsoft, launched its latest reincarnation today with a portal focused on community-driven news. It�s not exactly a Digg clone. Submitted stories are voted on in much the same way, and the more votes a story gets the higher it appears [...]

Ok, let’s do something productive. It is called “Google-bombing for Alaa.” Here is the deal: http://freealaa.blogspot.com/

A team of bloggers from all around the world are teaming up to create a special blog about Alaa’s detention. Then bloggers from all around the world are asked to link to this page using the text “Egypt”. (Due [...]

Update 1: I’ll be on BBC Radio “World Have Your Say” tonight to talk about Alaa’a arrest.

Update 2: Kevin from BBC’s “World Have Your Say” writes in BBC blogs:

I contacted the Egyptian Embassy here in London to give them a chance to respond. I called around 4 pm, and their press secretary had already gone [...]

In deviantART, the Palestinian artists simply cannot select their country from the dA country list. “Free-Palestine” community asked deviantART to add “Palestinian territories” to the country list. The answer was: “deviantART does not tolerate Mob like mentality…”. dA then banned “Free-Palestine” members, and deleted all of their content. Members are seeking your help!

Some sad facts: Middle Eastern audiences are literally disconnected from the rest of the world and the rest of their countrymen. Less than four per cent of people in the Arab world are internet users, according to ITU data. The penetration rate is just 3.7% - in a region with an 8.59% penetration in landline [...]

Yesterday I was reading “Bloggers: an army of irregulars” by Paul Reynolds from the BBC. He talks about what big business and the mainstream media can learn from blogs :

For many in the “mainstream media”, as bloggers call us, weblogs are at best a nuisance and at worst dangerous.

They are seen as the rantings and [...]