Karimova gets schooled in Twitter debate

How does she manage it all?

Even though her schedule must be packed, Gulnara Karimova, an ambassador to the UN and daughter of Uzbekistan’s President Islam Karimov, still seems to find time to lecture human rights activists, though not too successfully. Read More »

Hungary: Government limits FOIA transparency law

In an unexpected move last week, Parliamentarians in Hungary took action to change the country’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) in an effort to limit the scope of data accessible to the public under the law. Read More »

U.S. calls Ukraine the pirate king

U.S. officials are calling Ukraine the world’s “worst abuser of intellectual property rights,” charging that Internet piracy there has gotten so bad that even government agencies are using illegal software, according to AFP. In response, U.S. trade officials said they are considering trade restrictions against Kyiv. Read More »

Azerbaijan legislating civil web discourse

Just as Azerbaijan is being criticized in the Freedom House report, the country’s legislature is considering a measure that would punish untoward statements on the Internet, EurasiaNet.org reports.
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Dimon Don’t Cry

The Russian Prime Minister, Dmitry Medvedev, doesn’t like his online nickname “Dimon,” but whatever we think of Dimon’s playground problems how does one stand up to online bullies? And why are so many of them Russian?

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Estonia’s Winny Puhh makes 1 million new Internet friends

The members of Estonian rock band Winny Puhh bear (ahem) little resemblance to the red-shirted, honey-loving cartoon character, but they’ve managed to win over Internet audiences with a 2013 Eurovision-qualifying performance regardless.
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Kazakhstan climbs up the post-Soviet IT heap

In the annual Global Information Technology Report of the World Economic Forum, Kazakhstan has outshone its Central Asian neighbors – and Russia – to rank 43 of 144 countries, EurasiaNet.org reports. Kyrgyzstan, on the other hand, ranks at the bottom of all post-Soviet nations, at 118.     Read More »

Latvia whizzes in as Wi-Fi wonderland

Estonians often boast that free wireless Internet access is available throughout their country — even in remote forests and along deserted beaches. And now neighboring Latvia will be able to tout the same thing. Read More »

How successful are websites in Russia? Ask the police

He’s the Mark Zuckerberg of Russia, creating the Motherland’s most popular social networking site, Vkontakte. And two years ago, Pavel Durov refused Russian security authorities’ order to remove an opposition group from the site. Read More »

Social Media in the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict

Wikipedia’s suicide mission against Russian censors

Smoking cannabis is dangerous business for people the world over. In Russia, just writing about it online is apparently enough to run afoul of federal anti-drug police, as that nation’s Wikipedians learned last Friday, April 5, 2013. It was then that state officials first informed Wikimedia Russia, the Wikimedia Foundation’s local chapter, that the government has placed its “Cannabis Smoking” article [ru] on its blacklist of illegal websites. Read More »

Makers of Grozny-fire spoof video will help in cleanup

Two men who allegedly posted online a video making light of a skyscraper fire in Chechnya last week got a taste of the fury of the Russian republic’s leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, Radio Free Europe reports.   Read More »

CA overlooked again as Twitter crowdsources translation

Twitter has opened up its code for translation into more than 50 languages. This is a great opportunity for users all over the world to contribute to and adopt the platform in their own language.  Yet one region, as seems to be a growing trend, seems noticeably absent. Read More »

Hackers find refuge in Soviet Internet relic

Following the release of stolen information of several top American officials and celebrities 11 March, a little-known Soviet corner of the Internet is coming in from the cold. Read More »