FN: Frederick Noronha’s blog

Del.icio.us is a useful, social-software tool for sharing your bookmarks. (For more about social software, check this interesting Social Software Blog.

Wikipedia says:

Social software enables people to rendezvous, connect or collaborate through computer-mediated communication and to form online communities. Broadly conceived, this term could encompass older media such as mailing lists and Usenet, but some would restrict its meaning to more recent software genres such as blogs and wikis. Others suggest that the term social software is best used not to refer to a single type of software, but rather to the use of two or more modes of computer-mediated communication to engage in community formation.[1] In this view, people form online communities by combining one-to-one (e.g., email and instant messaging), one-to-many (Web pages and blogs), and many-to-many (wikis) communication modes.[2] In many online communities, real life meetings become part of the communication repertoire. The more specific term collaborative software applies to cooperative work systems.

Also see my del.icio.us links here. In particular, please do take a look at the Free/Libre and Open Source Software links in education and others related to FLOSS.

Del.icio.us is a useful, social-software tool for sharing your bookmarks. (For more about social software, check this interesting Social Software Blog.

Wikipedia says:

Social software enables people to rendezvous, connect or collaborate through computer-mediated communication and to form online communities. Broadly conceived, this term could encompass older media such as mailing lists and Usenet, but some would restrict its meaning to more recent software genres such as blogs and wikis. Others suggest that the term social software is best used not to refer to a single type of software, but rather to the use of two or more modes of computer-mediated communication to engage in community formation.[1] In this view, people form online communities by combining one-to-one (e.g., email and instant messaging), one-to-many (Web pages and blogs), and many-to-many (wikis) communication modes.[2] In many online communities, real life meetings become part of the communication repertoire. The more specific term collaborative software applies to cooperative work systems.

Also see my del.icio.us links here. In particular, please do take a look at the Free/Libre and Open Source Software links in education and others related to FLOSS.

Fascinating collection of Indian laws (and “bare acts”) from the National Law School here. Via a wiki:

We intend putting up texts of as many legislations and bills as we find. This page is under construction, so please keep checking back if you can’t find the text of the Act you’re looking for.

Have been trying to update some of my blogs in recent days. Here’s a list of the ones am working on: blog on free software and non-profits in association with Tacticaltech.org; on Indian documentary film; on Goa; and another on Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS) in India.

Then, there are also some badly-needing-to-be-updated blogs on FLOSS in Asia; the BytesForAll theme; journalism in Goa; books on Goa; keeping track of some other Indian and South Asian blogs; alternative views from India, and a new-attempt at keeping track of radio-related issues in India.

By Frederick Noronha
fred at bytesforall.org

For Leif Packalen (59) it all started when his Finnish friend in Tanzania wrote in to ask if Leif had anyway of transferring useful dairy-cattle ideas from Ethiopia to the poor who so badly needed it. Leif’s romance with the scraggly line has gone strong for over a decade-and-half. Now, he’s spreading the message across parts of Africa and South Asia.

For Leif, and his New Delhi-based pen-and-ink friend colleague Sharad Sharma, comics are not just something trivial that entertain kids. These drawings say much more than the proverbial thousand words of the picture — more so when large sections of people still can’t read or are sticken by poverty, illiteracy and a crying need for information that reflects their reality.

Leif Packalen started World Comics and Sharad Sharma picked up and extended the idea via worldcomicsindia.com. While Leif — a former commercial attache in Africa for the Embassy of Finland — has held training camps in half-a-dozen African countries, Sharad has been spreading the idea across half-a-dozen Indian states in this sub-continent sized country, and other parts of South Asia.

In end-November 2005, both teamed up in Goa’s sleepy Madkai village, to host a training-for-trainers camp, which they hope will spread the idea, to more of those who can use it.

Put briefly, their idea is remarkably simple — yet effective. You don’t need to be an artist to express yourself in drawing. “If you have a good story, you can manage with less skillful drawings. But if you have a lousy story, there’s no drawing that can rescue it,” Leif told a dozen-and-half trainers-in-the-making at Goa.

On simple A4-sized paper worked, non-profit groups and tribal young men and women find an alternative to searching for that elusive access to the media. Leif’s message is: wall-poster comics can be put up anywhere. Wall-poster comics create local debate. Wall-poster comics are simple to make, and inexpensive.

“The idea is to enable people who have something to say, to convert their ideas into comic-format. This can then be transferred into a wall-poster or a brochure,” he explains.

Sharad says that “anyone from eight to eighty” can work on this idea. And, he has the creative work of Lakhindra Nayak of Jharkhand, Deepak from Uttaranchal, Champalal of MP, Sujata in Orissa, Noel from Tamil Nadu, Zuala of Mizoram and Rina of Nagaland to make his point.

In largely-literate Finland itself, this media is being harnessed largely for marginalised groups. Immigrants, refugees, minorities. “But I must say, our international work takes most of our time,” adds Leif, who incidentally studied business administration and international marketing. He also worked in a development cooperation project in Tanzania, after being an embassy official in Nigeria and Sudan.

So, he’s not an artist?

“I’ve trained myself,” he corrects you speedily. “On realising the power of comics, I went to a comic-making course. Then, to drawing classes. In fact, I started drawing only at the age of 42, and had not drawn anything before that. Adult (continuing) education is very good in Finland.”

Drawing, he believes, is a skill you acquire only by drawing. “It’s not a gift from god. I took a degree in commercial art in 1998, at the age of 52.”

Sharad Sharma, an artist who has worked with Indian mainstream television, has been extending Leif’s idea, and his slogan of ‘comics power’. But he’s been not just stopping where Leif left off, and invites keep coming across South Asia for him to conduct trainings. “This is my 25th workshop in one year. We have been busy (and can only manage (to spread the idea) by) training more trainers,” says Sharad.

Leif adds: “I’ve been quite many times to India. But WorldComicsIndia has become very strong. So, now, I mostly come here to learn. My vision is to see this method of grass root communication being exported from India to other places.”

“We develop pictorals on parenting issues,” says Rina Nath of Kolkata. From the poor urban quarters of Manchester (UK) come two community workers Kezia Lavan and Kath Taylor who say: “We hope to use this idea in building more community participation (among those marginalised in an affluent society). We had a wonderful workshop with World Comics in May this year.”

Meanwhile, in Mizoram, the idea is being moulded to preserve almost-forgotten folk tales, and pass these onto local children, in the more-than-catchy comics form. In Tamil Nadu, some of the victims of the December 2004 tsunami were also encouraged to use the comic form to get an alternative media voice for themselves.

“Most of the time when the word ‘comics’ is uttered, people think it’s for kids. But anyone from eight to 80 can participate (in the training). It’s not even necessary to be an artist,” reassures Sharad. Involving women is important, he stresses. Men take to comics more easily, but women hold the key in development.

Sharad encourages trainers to get neophytes to write a story, break it into manageable parts, translate words into visuals, place the text on a rough draft, boldly knock out all but the bare-minumum of wordage, and so on….

For their work, they already have something to show. It’s an 28-page booklet subtitled ‘Wall-poster Comics: A Great Campaign Tool‘. It carries cartoons in the Mizo language, tips of how to get your message out, and suggestions on how to ‘text’ your drawings. Then, there also are stories of afforestation in Jharkhand, the neighbour’s pig from the North East, drug-addiction issues, the story of an eye-doctor from Madhya Pradesh, and a Jharkhandi story of elections… from a people’s perspective. You wouldn’t think a line-form more associated with entertaining affluent and middle-class kids could actually talk all these issue.

Villagers can surely pick up the rudimentary elements of drawing. They do need some tips on how to reflect the moods in an egg-shaped face. Or how to depict people and motion. Drawing movement, sound and other effects is also briefly explained.

The end-message is simple: this simple idea works. If only more could get down to try it out. ‘Adivasis neh jeeti ladayee‘ (Tribals won the battle) is the title of one theme about the story of the Tawa Dam project in Madhya Pradesh. “When you’re using comics in this way, there should be an insider element in it,” says Leif. And the voice does come across. ###

Radio Free Nepal is a blog which protests the coup by that country’s King earlier this year.

It says: “King Gyandendra of Nepal has issued a ban on independent news broadcasts and has threatened to punish newspapers for reports that run counter to the official monarchist line. Given that any person in Nepal publishing reports critical of ‘the spirit of the royal proclamation’ is subject to punishment and/or imprisonment, contributors to this blog will publish their reports from Nepal anonymously.”

Incidentally, a Google search for nepal + blog thows up on the top spot, even if the latest entry there currently dates to mid-September 2005.

There’s also United We Blog! for a Democratic Nepal, along with this article Nepalese bloggers, journalists defy media clampdown by king.

Technorati’s search on Nepal throws up a total of 43,443 posts. But it’s hard to say how many of these are related to human rights and democracy issues there. Maybe a small percentage. Life’s like that.

Minal from Mumbai has this blog called Indian Recipes, subtitled “recipes for all manner of Indian food”. Currently on the top is one for “experimental veg biryani” which goes with a warning: “This is not the authentic vegetable biryani you will get in hotels. This preparation was experimented on me for my quick lunch at college. It worked wonders and remains a favourite dish among my friends and
family:-)”

writer-in-exile’s blog on IFFI, the International Film Festival of India and some comments: “Remind me next time never ever to think that things can go smoothly when the Government is in charge. Total chaos reigned at IFFi yesterday and at 3 p.m. when we entered we were told that we could not collect our media accreditation passes as the counter had shut at 2! wow, and no one informs us. I even attended the press on in Mumbai and there too this was not mentioned. And if you didn’t have your media card you couldn’t collect an invite! God alone knows what ingenuity I had to use to get an invite and how the photographer entered is another story. Anyhow, that confusion done, we settled down to two and a half hours of speeches (festival director, Jaipal Reddy, CM of Goa, Dev Anand, Chiranjeevi and then the performances: Amisha Patel, urmila Matondkar, Blaze, Meera, Prachi Shah, Dino More and his leading lady from Holiday and the three girls from Garam Masala plus Himesh Reshamiyya and Hema Sardesai. But the best part of the evening was the two-hour Brazilian film Olga. It left me speechless with a lump in my throat. What fantastic acting. It’s based on the true story of a a natural-born German woman Olga Benário Prestes, who falls in love with a Brazilian communist leader Luís Carlos Prestes”

A journo from The Hindu in Chennai has been keeping this blog, called Whyte Space which is currently maintaining a “Goa Journal”.

It cautions the reader: “The views expressed in this blog are my own and are NOT endorsed by my employers or organisation. Also, this blog may contain explicit language not suitable for children So kids, if you’re caught reading this, your Momma’s gonna whip your ass.”

Sudhish Kamath, a 28-year-old film-maker has been covering the International Film Festival of India-2005 at Goa and one of his reports is titled IFFI Panaji: where lines between art and commerce blur.

Some recent jottings (or photos) include Spot the park bench!, INOX, Behind the scenes, Making of IFFI, King Momo’s date, King Momo’s desi date, Portuguese Item number, Portuguese flavour and there’s probably more to come…. They don’t has space for such comment in print, do they?

Saltwaterblues’ blog entry about a holiday in Goa, male bullies, pig slaughter and the like: “In many way this was a disappointing trip. No lighthouse at Aguada, no nanga-punga’s at Anjuna Beach, no Martin’s Corner at Betalbatim (which they say serves the best food in Goa), no Palolem (really beautiful beach), no Jazz House (awesome jazz joint at Candolim). All I did was eat lots of fried fish, drink lots of beer, and take long walks on the beach.”