Month: May 2007

I often write my posts ahead of time and then let them sit for a while before I go back and review them at least few times. Writing isn’t my best skill. I do enjoy it, but I am a bit slow. I’ve always been envious of people who open their blog, make a nice post, and close it down. That’s a talent.

Just recently I have finished writing the draft for an article called “Anatomy of a Community Builder web app”. In this article I am dissecting the common web apps used for websites like Flickr, Facebook, or MySpace. I am also proposing the building blocks of an open source modular community builder.

Turned out that I really enjoyed writing about this topic so the article is now more than 10 pages. Editing and refining this article would take some time specially for a slow writer like me. The time spend on this article has reduced the frequency of my posts here too. I think while I am working on refining my article, I will also start working on a blog post about “Web Application Architects”, this way my blog doesn’t go stale.

I don’t think I would put the entire community builder article here. Perhaps I will publish it as a case study on my company website, and then make a little blog announcement for it. I can’t wait to read your comments about it.

[tags]community builder, open source, web application architect, rastin mehr, rmd studio, writing, web application[/tags]

Rebekka Guðleifsdóttir is an Art Student and a very talented photographer on the Flickr. Rebekka had posted a plea for help on flickr about a theft case involving an online retailer selling copycat art. She requested that people send the retailer letters concerning the issue, but in response, her original post was deleted by flickr admins.

Photography by Rebekka Guðleifsdóttir © all rights reserved

Rebekka’s deleted post had 450 long and meaningful user comments about how selling other people’s stuff for profit is a crime, including advices and suggestions on how to deal with it. This post had been viewed over 101,000 times at the time of deletion.

Continue reading Protecting the User Generated Content

A while ago on Reuters and Slash dot I read that Chinese President Hu Jintao has launched a campaign to rid the country’s sprawling Internet of “unhealthy” content and make it a springboard for Communist Party doctrine.

That isn’t really anything new. The truth is, the distributed and democratic nature of the Internet has always been a threat to those who are trying to super impose conformity or a unified set of ideas over the diverse humanity. I personally think attempts to censor and lock down content would fail in the long run, yet they could do quite a bit of damage in short run.

Photography by Abbey Wuthrich © All rights reserved

Many social networking and online communities such as YouTube and Flickr aren’t exempt. For example, we all know that there is an ongoing race among companies such as Google or Yahoo to grow market-share in China. They have already filtered their search engine content to comply with the censorship regulations imposed by the communist party. The same applies to YouTube and Flickr which are owned by Google and Yahoo. In general the fact that a lot of user generated images and videos are centralized in these two online communities, would leave them at the mercy of corporate greed and dictator governments.

Continue reading To better protect the Democratic Internet

My mother is walking 60K to raise funds for Breast Cancer research. The money she raises will benefit the BC Cancer Foundation, a leader in this critical cause.

Most of us know someone close to us who has been affected with some sort of Cancer, I lost a girlfriend to cancer myself few years ago. My mother has also lost a close friend to cancer just recently.

We can join forces and make a difference and as they say “Let’s make Cancer history”.

Your can make your donations directly to the CIBC bank when you visit my mother’s personal page on the BC cancer foundation website. Thank you kindly for making a difference.

[tags]mehrzad mehr, peach interior design, end breast cancer, find a cure, make donations[/tags]