Berkman Buzz: November 15, 2013

The whole “Digital Natives must know how it works” thing is an illusion – the Web comes more and more pre-packaged and people see less and less incentives to look inside the box. That’s not good. That’s the path towards being increasingly dependent of mechanisms we don’t understand. That’s not the path towards freedom. That’s one of the many reasons why I admire the Mozillians’ constant efforts to open the box, and show how the Web works to enable people to keep on building it.

Another friend's birthday today. Another reason to celebrate the really great ccFree "Happy Birthday" alternative: http://bit.ly/GNU-HBday
—Lawrence Lessig (@lessig)

Internet Monitor is delighted to announce the publication of “Measuring Internet Activity: A (Selective) Review of Methods and Metrics,” the second in a series of special reports that focus on key events and new developments in Internet freedom, incorporating technical, legal, social, and political analyses.

“Measuring Internet Activity,” authored by Robert Faris and Rebekah Heacock, explores current efforts to measure digital activity within three areas: infrastructure and access, control, and content and communities.

This year, Paul started walking one of the greatest stories imaginable: the spread of the human race from the Rift Valley of east Africa across the globe.

Our team at Center for Civic Media has become part of Paul’s global pit crew. Nathan Matias helped Paul debug his power problems, matching Paul with Richard Smith, a power expert with the One Laptop Per Child project. Richard discovered that Paul was using a power inverter suited for use with a car battery, not Paul’s lightweight solar panels. A “solar camel” named Fares now powers Paul’s laptop and cellphone, with only the minor inconvenience that the shiny panels sometimes scare other camels at oases.

This is a well-known story to DMLP readers, but it bears repeating today. On October 1, 2007, a lawyer named Simon Glik saw members of the Boston Police arresting a suspect on the Boston Common in a way that he thought was excessive, and began recording the police from several feet away. The police didn't notice him at first, but eventually approached him and asked him if his phone was recording audio along with the video. When he informed them that it was, he was arrested and charged for aiding the escape of a prisoner, disturbing the peace, and unlawful recording under the Massachusetts wiretap act.

"Humanizing the Web" http://t.co/t4r1NvC31K
—Jonathan Zittrain (@zittrain)

Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest storms in recorded history, has killed thousands in central Philippines. According to our local authors many more are stranded, without food, water and aid, in a wasteland that used to be their homes. Aid is simply not arriving quickly enough to these communities that survived Haiyan, locally referred to as Yolanda.

A week after the super typhoon hit the provinces of Leyte and Samar, in the Visayas islands, we'll be talking to our Philippine authors and an aid worker about how the country is coping with the disaster, the progress in rescue operations, and what we – the concerned international community – can do to help.