DIGILIFE | Google Earth, a weapon of war?

It's been around for a while, but we've only recently been hearing some serious complaints regarding Google Earth.

Although it may seem somewhat ridiculous, but a number of nations have complained that Google Earth's satellite photos reveal the locations of secret military facilities which, typically, would not be available so easily to their 'enemies'.

It seems strange that something as simple as Google Earth is considered dangerous, especially when you consider that the satellite pictures on offer are old, single snapshots which only show a location at one point in time, several months ago (around 14 months ago, based on some of the Jordan pictures I've looked at).

And, you’d expect that a country's enemies could get access to better and more recent satellite shots, right?

Wrong. Because in today's day and age of small-scale terrorism with limited resources, the typical 'enemy-of-the-state' doesn't have sophisticated resources and capabilities! Owning to the Internet, such an enemy doesn't need to look too far.

If an army's position (or barracks) doesn't change for over a year, then a Google Earth picture could be a sufficient guide to assist an enemy in targeting that position with weapons. This logic holds true with regard to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) separating North and South Korea.

Although it's called a DMZ, there is in fact a substantial military presence on both sides adjacent to the DMZ lines.Apparently, the South Korean government has complained to Google saying that the satellite photos of the DMZ show the permanent positions of the US & South Korean forces. If the North Koreans did not have access to satellite pictures in the past, they now do!

Some voices are being raised around the world about this. Some military commentators have said that the Google Earth shots around the world have captured a number of military exercises, test flights of aircraft, and even re-deployments of troops. Surely, knowing the date of those shots, would somehow help an enemy in predicting a pattern or a schedule for such activities.

So, it's basically a case of Google Earth empowering the 'have-nots' in a conflict and, thereby, upsetting the existing balance.

It all makes you think about the boundaries we need to all agree on with regard to technology at your fingertips. Should everyone have easy access to everything at their desktop?

In a perfect world, yes. But, there will be those who argue that we live in a dangerous world were Internet technology is fast becoming a weapon of war.

What do you think?

zanasser@gmail.com

DIGILIFE | Arab men and women e-qual?

It's a known fact that, so far, male Arab users registered on the region's top sites outnumber females by, typically, three to one. Although some people may use this fact to claim that only one quarter of Internet users in the Arab world are female, that is not an accurate statement.

After all, women's interests as Internet users may lie elsewhere, other than the typical sites in the Arab World. Seeing as a comprehensive, methodological study, covering Arab countries, has not been conducted; it's really anybody's guess how many Arab women are online.

However, with young women and men today equally enjoying Internet access at home and at school, you can safely say that the 'new generation' of Arabs have gender parity.

The question becomes more complicated when we look at women of working, or married, age. Let's be honest about this. Married women in a typical Arab family, especially in the Gulf States, do not go to work. This means that their husbands may be using the Internet at the office, while they don't have access to the Internet at home. That can skew the numbers towards more male users of the Internet, in the age group of married men and women.

Also, the nature of Internet use differs as the interests of each gender differ. How that impacts the number of hours spent on the Internet and activity/inactivity of each gender remains to be seen.

First, let's establish the areas in which they probably use the Internet equally. Email and messaging seem to be areas in which both women and men are highly involved. In fact, and excuse this stereo-type, you'd expect women to be more involved than men in online chatting and discussions.

So, maybe, that's an area in which women supersede men.Onto Internet content- by which we mean the nature of the information which men or women would seek on the Internet- the decisive factor here would be what's available out there in Arabic. Are the popular Arabic sites offering primarily political/economic/sports news?

Please excuse me again for another stereo-typed conclusion, but such content would favor a higher percentage of males; particularly sports which is the strongest type of content in the Middle East. An Arab man will visit sports site daily, and sometimes several times a day to see the scores and read the news.

Economic and business sites present another example of a male-dominated audience, with the reason we mentioned before - the percentage of men who work is much higher than women- and you may add to that the percentage of men who make financial or investment decisions on behalf of the family is higher than women who do so.

Women-focused sites, on the other hand, are few but starting to emerge. They cover subjects like fashion, health, fitness, make-up, relationships and women-targeted products.

The number of visitors and page views of such sites is quite impressive, and this has drawn the attention of many of the male-focused portals that a huge potential lies in females!

Until we get a conclusive study, here’s a prediction for you. Half the Internet society is an untapped market, but not for long!

zanasser@gmail.com