SCARY

The unbridled extrajudicial killings of journalists and activists raging the country is beginning to attract the attention of the international community. To save face, the Philippine government has said that it is open to receiving help in order to resolve this issue. Last week, an EU delegation invited by the governemnt arrived to help provide technical assistance to strengthen the capability of Philippine institutions to address the intensifying pattern of extrajudicial killings. The EU Needs Assessment Mission (EU-NAM), headed by Ambassador Alistair MacDonald, met with various government agenices and civil society organisations during its 10-day mission.

So what did Ambassador Alistair MacDonald have to say about the Philippine Armed Forces and the Philippine National Police?

"...(T)here is a great need for more awareness of human rights laws, of international humanitarian laws, of the law of armed conflict, of how to deal with civilians who are not bearing arms caught up in the conflict or the counterinsurgency campaign." (http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view_article.php?article_id=74005)

WOH. My father (Bayani Alcala) is probably turning in his grave right now and saying he knew that since Marcos' time, but that it would happen again under a so-called democratic regime -- he didn't see that one coming. That there have been more than 800 victims since Arroyo assumed power in 2001, as what the human rights group Karapatan declares, is simply mind-boggling.

This 'gap analysis' was welcomed by police and military officials -- a very different reaction to what United Nations Special Rapporteur Philip Alston received, when he described the AFP as being in a 'state of denial' over the issue in his scathing report on the extrajudicial killings.

Scary. That's my reaction. This conclusion only substantiates the claims made by the Left that blames the military and the government's counter-insurgency policy as the cause of the extrajudicial killings.

Soldiers and police are supposed to protect the people, but if they have the vaguest notions of human rights and are in dire need of 'training', then I fear the worst. Governments are supposed to take the people in its wings -- opposition or not -- but if it turns away when those that disagree with it are murdered, then it ceases to be my government.

Scary.

Timi's List: top 4 most interesting concepts for me at the moment

1. Peer to peer production (P2P)
This is different from for-profit or public production by state-owned enterprises as it focuses on:
» Production of use value through the free cooperation of producers who have access to distributed capital.
» Product, in this context, is not exchange value for a market, but use value for a community of users.

2. P2P governance
Processes and decision-making are governed by the community of producers themselves, and not by market allocation or corporate hierarchy.


3. P2P property
Different from private property or public (state) property because it makes use value freely accessible on a universal basis, through new common property regimes

4. Web 2.0
Describes a second generation of web-based communities and hosted services — such as social-networking sites, wikis and tags— which facilitate collaboration and sharing between users.

- from notes / presentation on reboot 9 by Michel Bauwens

Timi's list: four grave issues hounding the Philippines

1. When Arroyo vowed on Rizal’s grave not to run for President
» It was Rizal Day in 2002 when GMA vowed to not run as president. After 279 days, she broke that promise.

2. The Hello Garci-gate scandal
» A political scandal and electoral crisis of immense proportions that involved incumbent president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. The Hello Garci phone call recording pointed out that GMA rigged the 2004 national election in her favour.
» Unleashed a tide of protest ringtones which inspired anti-Bush movement in the U.S.

3. Modern day Inquisition on activists, journalists or opposition from the Left
» The imprisonment of Representative Satur Ocampo shortly before the May elections, the imprisonment of Representative Crispin Beltran, and the persecution of the ‘Batasan 5’.
» Daily occurrence of human rights abuse and the culture of impunity in the country that has claimed 800 (and counting) victims of extrajudicial killings.
» The despicable and shameful display of cluelessness of National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales and ARMED Forces Chief Hermogenes Esperon Jr. for lashing out at UN rapporteur Philip Alston, who reported that: “there is a passivity, bordering on an abdication of responsibility, which affects the way in which key institutions and actors approach their responsibilities in relation to such human rights concerns.”

4. Growing hunger
» I won’t even talk about the hunger for justice, human rights and genuine development. I’ll just focus on the most primary form of hunger – literal hunger and the inability to satiate that hunger.
» According to an Inquirer article in 2006, “…almost 700,000 families (about 3.5 million people), 4.2 percent of the population, reported experiencing severe hunger, which was defined in the survey as going hungry often or always in the past three months.”
» In a land where food is so tightly interwoven into the fabric of our social life and cultural expressions, it is truly ironic and heartbreaking that the food-loving Pinoy is falling more deeply into the throes of hunger.

Timi's List 3: top 10 food I didn’t get to eat or only ate once!

» Balut at penoy (ate only on the eve of departure) – 1x / quail eggs – 1x
*Balut is a fertilized duck egg with a nearly-developed embryo inside that is boiled and eaten in the shell. The perfect balut is 17 days old.
*Penoy is the younger version of balut -- but with no duck embryo.

» Tawilis (comes only from Taal) – 0x. Bangus (Milkfish)- 1x
*Tawilis a freshwater sardine found exclusively in the Philippines. It is unique in that it is the only member of the family Clupeidae that is known to exist entirely in freshwater. It's found only in a single lake on the island of Luzon in the Philippines. Taal Lake, a large body of water in the province of Batangas that used to be the caldera of an ancient volcano.

» Pochero – 0x
*Beef, pork, chicken or fish stewed in tomato sauce with bananas, stringbeans, cabbage and chickpeas

» Tinola – 0x
*Dish cooked with chicken, wedges of green papaya, and chili pepper leaves, in broth flavored with ginger, onions and fish sauce.

» Sotanghon guisado ni mommy – 1x
*Noodles with chicken and chinese mushrooms sauteed in garlic (lots of it!) and fish sauce

» Talaba (Oyster) / tulya (Clam) / tahong (Mussels) – 1x
» Sisig - 1x
* sizzling dish made from parts of pig’s head, liver, brain and usually seasoned with kalamansi or chili peppers.

» Red Ribbon’s Mango Cream Pie – 1x
» Becky’s Kitchen – Coffee Cream Cake -1x
» Ube (sweet purple yam), macapuno (sweetened grated coconut) cake – 0x

Timi's List 2: top 10 food I really got to enjoy during my vacation:

» Kaldereta ni utol
*spicy beef or goat stewed in tomatoes, potatoes, chorizo, carrots, chili

» Dinuguan (meat stewed in beef or pork blood, vinegar, onions, garlic and citron)
» Inihaw – pinoy style (charcoal-grilled liempo (pork), manok, baka, atay)
» Beef steak ni mommy
» Fast food: Jollibee (better than Macdo!), Sbarro, Starbucks
» Seafood – bihod (tuna egg), grilled fish, mussels
» Fruits and Fruit juices (calamansi, mango, dalandan, buko and lansones! (I haven’t had lansones in almost six years!)
» Paho (small aromatic mango variety used in salads)
» Kakanin (rice delicacies)

Timi's List 1

Four jobs I’ve had before coming to Holland
1. Copywriter at J.Walter Thompson
2. Instructor / Lecturer at DLSU and UP-Manila
3. Co-owner and Communications Manager of Suara Design and Communications
4. Head - Rural Communications Training (Philippine Peasant Institute)

Four places where I’ve lived
1. Tanauan, Batangas
2. Malate, Manila
3. Pandacan, Manila
4. Diliman, Q.C.

Random lists in my mind 1

You must have probably heard of, or visited Craigslist – a centralized network of online urban communities, which includes FREE classified listings for jobs, housing and other goods. This enormously popular community website was founded by Craig Newmark in 1995. He observed that people on the net helped each other in a friendly and social way, listing answers and references to queries and giving recommendations. Being new to San Francisco, he wanted to create a similar list for events in his community so that more people can be made aware of the local happenings.

Craigslist has grown now into a website that gets 5 billion page views per month, and has reached an annual revenue close to $25 million last year. There is no doubt that it can earn even more with ad revenues the way other newspapers earn their bread and butter. But it doesn’t appear to be interested in making more profit as it continues to charge only companies, not individuals.

Anyway, its commitment to the users is not the main reason I’ve brought up Craigslist. It’s more about what I think is the fascination for lists in general, and how lists are being used as sharing functionality in many websites, both commercial and community.

Almost all retail stores online – whether they’re selling music, games, phones, books, food, tickets, etc – use lists to drive browsing and attract consumers’ attention. Not only is it maximised in interactive media, but it also has been on radio, print and TV for a long time now. Remember Top 40 hits? Or top stories of the last year that are always reviewed on New Year’s eve? And how about all those lists we had to come up with when filling up someone’s ‘slambook’ when we were in elementary school: list of friends, favourite food, favourite songs, favourite books, favourite movies, etc.

In the internet, lists take the form of My Playlists for music; My Friends or My Photos in instant messaging or online photo sites; My Contacts in professional careers sites; My Wish List, Purchase List, Top 10 products and Recommendations in retail stores; My Bookmarks or My Tags in collaborative filtering communities (like del.icio.us). And of course, we cannot talk about lists without Google - the longest list online.

In this fast-paced society, lists are loved – and actually used – because it gives us a quick overview of things without having to search in depth. It allows us to see the bigger picture and look into the details that interest us. With this in mind, I thought I’d start my own list and let readers scan my mind.

As I am still pining for my last vacation and still have a (good) hangover from the abundance of delicious food at the Philippines Independence Day Picnic, I’ll start with Pinoy food lists ;-) and go on to a mix of personal and political ones.

Paul Potts won!

Britain's got talent! Paul Potts has won!!! ;-)

And yeah, I was still moved to tears the second time around.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blwyFKn2aLk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJi--Tr_UCM

I love cats

Used to have 23 cats at a time back in the Philippines -- and those were just the ones living with me and my friends. We had to find homes for a whole lot more, because, as you can imagine, it was getting a bit crowded ;-p

I love cats and I miss them all - winoli, pao-miaw, boinky, tiger, malat, catman, junior, bigface, puti, snowy, oange, alien...so many more...

Cats rule! (They do, they choose you if they want to ;-p )

Cats make me happy ;-) http://lolcats2.com/

Spread the love, spread the music

http://www.blogger.com/www.we7.com is stoking music fans' passion with its music download and sharing concept, which allows you to get free music AND also pay the aritst.

> It offers users free songs tagged with 10-second advertisements, which are played before the music track starts. Four weeks after downloading, We7 gives the user the option of downloading an ad-free, DRM-free version. SpiralFrog, scheduled to launch in Canada and the US
> later this year is also a similar initiative. < (--Springwise News) From their website: > The real secret of We7 is our Web 2.0 based, 'pat.pending' MediaGraft engine.
As its name suggests, the MediaGraft engine uses intelligent recognition of users' choices and demographics to select, then 'graft' a highly pertinent audio or video advert onto each digital entertainment track selected.

The result is powerful 'Off-Web' promotional messages for advertisers, 'paid for' free music and video downloads for downloaders, and payments for music rights owners.
In its simplest form, We7 provides a Web 2.0 "shopping cart" platform for music. The difference is, when the user checks out, there's nothing to pay! The user interacts with the system via an AJAX-based web interface to create a personal media schedule. <>

The power of music

PAUL POTTS MOVED ME TO TEARS....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1k08yxu57NA

reboot 9.0

One of the most inspiring events I've experienced this year!
So many ideas that moved me-- big, small, familiar, unheard of.

I left reboot with more questions than answers. Which is when I know that I've been touched.

"reboot is a community event for the practical visionaries who are at the intersection of digital technology and change all around us...
2 days a year. 500 people. A journey into the interconnectedness of creation, participation, values, openness, decentralization, collaboration, complexity, technology, p2p, humanities, connectedness and many more areas.
Applied towards us as individuals, citizens, teachers, culture workers, entrepreneurs, creators and change makers.
See this years sessions, connect with the participants or join the conversations around this years sessions." -- http://www.reboot.dk/index.php