Notice to Visitors: The Follow by Email Feature
Yesterday, whilst blogging, I noticed that Blogger had added another feature: the ‘follow by email’ feature. Naturally, in order to test the feature, I signed myself up.

I received my first email from Blogger this morning. However, even though all my posts were listed for yesterday, much to my disappontment, there were no hyperlinks to take me to the postings. Readers need this feature, I believe.

Therefore, I consider this to be unsatisfactory. Blogger will surely have to improve this feature soon. I consider hyperlinks to be essential if the newsletter is to be satisfactory. Until Blogger makes this improvement, I am removing this feature from my blogspot. I shall place it back there once I know that the improvement has been made.

I am sorry if this disappoints. But I am sure that you will agree with me: a newsletter without hyperlinks is next to useless.

Kind regards,

Mark

Amnesty: Qatari Blogger Detained
AL JAZEERA ENGLISH: Human rights group says Sultan al-Khalaifi has been held incommunicado in Qatar since March 2 and risks being tortured.

Amnesty International says a blogger and human rights activist has been detained incommunicado in Qatar and is at risk of torture or other ill-treatment.

The UK-based human rights group said Sultan al-Khalaifi was arrested on March 2 by around eight individuals in plain clothes, believed to be members of the security forces.

According to information received by Amnesty International, al-Khalaifi had told his wife earlier that day that state security had contacted him, asking him to report to them, but that he did not know why.

The reasons for his detentions and his whereabouts are unknown, Amnesty said in a statement on Friday, adding that it is believed he is being held in the custody of state security.

Amnesty said al-Khalaifi is the founder of a rights group which campaigns primarily on cases of detention in Qatar, but is legally registered in Switzerland. >>> Al Jazeera | Saturday, March 05, 2011

Keywords
Please note that Blogger is acting strangely this afternoon. There must be server problems, since it is not possible to place keywords under the posts. As soon as Blogger’s problems have been resolved, the appropriate keywords will be placed under each one. – Mark

'Skank Model' Blogger to Sue Google
ninemsn: A New York fashion student who called a model a "psychotic, lying, whoring ... skank" on her blog plans to file an $18 million lawsuit against Google for revealing her identity, according to reports.

Rosemary Port, 29, was sued by 37-year-old model Liskula Cohen over an alleged defamatory post on her anonymous Google blog account.

Google was forced to reveal Port's identitiy after a Manhattan Supreme Court judge rejected her claims that blogs should not be regarded as fact.

"When I was being defended by attorneys for Google, I thought my right to privacy was being protected," she told the NY Daily News.

"But that right fell through the cracks. Without any warning, I was put on a silver platter for the press to attack me.

"I would think that a multi-billion dollar conglomerate would protect the rights of all its users."

The New York Fashion Institute of Technology student said she plans to file an $18 million lawsuit against Google. >>> ninemsn staff | Monday, August 24, 2009

'Jewish Ahmadinejad' Blogger Arrested
THE JERUSALEM POST: The Iranian blogger who claimed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has Jewish roots is being detained by the authorities after he was arrested along with 150 university students earlier this week, according to sources in Teheran.

Dr. Mehdi Khazali, who reportedly participated in several recent opposition demonstrations, was reportedly summoned to a special court convened for religious figures, detained and transferred to an unknown location.

The son of a prominent, conservative pro-Ahmadinejad ayatollah, Khazali wrote on his Web site earlier this year that the president - a Holocaust denier and relentless critic of Israel - was of partially Jewish origin, asserting that Ahmadinejad had changed his family name from Saburjian, and calling for the origins of the Saburjian family in the town of Aradan to be investigated.

The assertion featured in the bitter presidential election campaign, when rival reformist candidate Mehdi Karroubi challenged Ahmadinejad in a live TV debate, reportedly stating: "My full name is Mehdi Karroubi. What is your full name?"

Ahmadinejad gave his full name, according to an Al-Arabiya TV report, but left out one surname which is said to indicate Jewish ancestry. >>> Sabina Amidi | Friday, July 03, 2009

Hat tip: JihadWatch >>>

In Egypt, a Blogger Tries to Spread 'Culture of Disobedience' among Youths
LOS ANGELES TIMES: Mohamed Abdel Aziz's Facebook group that opposes Mubarak's rule has drawn 76,000 followers. Though its calls for nationwide strikes have flopped, he remains determined.

Reporting from Cairo -- An activist in a police state should know when to sprint.

Mohamed Abdel Aziz has bolted from trouble a number of times, including dashing from security forces closing in on a demonstration in the port city of Alexandria. His less mercurial moments have three times landed him in police stations, but upon each release he has returned to his computer, opened his blog and conspired in cyberspace to end President Hosni Mubarak's 27-year rule of Egypt.

That's an unlikely prospect. But Aziz, a thin man in black clothes with a wristwatch shimmying up and down his arm, is a founder of the 6th of April, a protest movement that draws from a Facebook group of nearly 76,000 people, mostly high school and university students. The movement opines, plots and Twitters, though it has yet to generate feet in the street: Three of its calls for nationwide strikes drew more police than protesters.

"No one knows when the trigger of revolution will be pulled. The state is oppressive, but ordinary Egyptians from all over sympathize with us," said Aziz, who likes to recall the passions that roused his countrymen's 1919 revolution against the British.

"When we started using Facebook it was a novelty," he said. "Calling for a national strike was a novelty. It was like lighting a candle in a dark room. But this is still an oppressive state, and people are scared." >>> By Jeffrey Fleishman | Wednesday, April 29, 2009