Technology: Iraqi bloggers

Cecile Landman and Jo van der spek wrote about the work with Iraqi bloggers for the incommunicado conference in Amsterdam in June 2005. The streamtime project started with radio transmissions in Iraq, but this became impossible mid 2004 and so they decided to dedicate to linking with Iraqis in Iraq and the diaspora. Bloggers were linked by the streamtime site. The blogs are interesting because they offer insights, information and stories and cover a wide spectrum of opinions. Streamtime reposts a daily selection, and encourages exchanges between Iraqis (even face-to-face). The Iraqi blogosphere is attacked by rough and aggressive comments, forcing some to close down the comment sections. The challenge of streamtime is reported to be about moderating different perspectives; the editiorial guideline is for instance that unarmed resistance is justified. By linking to every blogger, mailing and chatting, streamtime has started to work as a real network. The latest development is to propose collective posting on one subject on the same day, as well as phone calls for weekly web-transmissions.

I think it's an interesting example of how you may facilitate a blogging community and some practical ideas of interventions (collective topic on a given day, linking blogs on a website). The article does not say whether the Iraqi bloggers were already blogging or whether they were stimulated to do so.