Favorite Links of the Past Week. Including, Of Course, Antonovs

by Michael Bear · 2009-05-30 12:15:00 UTC
Topics:

[Photo of an Antonov bomber over Darfur from Rob Crilly]

Without further ado:

- Mo'dernity, Mo'problems unveils the "Who the Hell Are you" Development Metric

- Two fascinating pieces on how the media covers humanitarian crises.  First, the Enough Project interviews Jeffrey Gettleman, the New York Times correspondent based in Nairobi, about how he decides which stories to prioritize. Second, Peter Casier at The Road to the Horizon writes about the "CNN effect" - how media coverage determines which emergencies receive sufficient funding, and which are forgotten

- Rob Crilly writes about what it's like to be hunted by Antonov bombers in Darfur

- Anne Richard from the International Rescue Committee writes in the Huffington Post about the deceptive calm in Kabul, and the impact of insecurity on how aid agencies operate in Afghanistan

- Sudan Watch writes about how "only 25 years ago Khartoum was full of bars, liquor stores and night clubs."  The mind boggles

- The Sachs-Easterly-Moyo walk off continues, with new (albeit more restrained) salvoes from Sachs and Easterly.  That said, Alanna Shaikh - writing at Blood and Milk - offers the best commentary, calling both Sachs and Easterly to account:

"And that’s why I’d like to slap both Bill Easterly and Jeff Sachs upside the head. There are human lives at stake here. There are people suffering and dying and risking their lives to help others. And nothing the big guys are saying right now is useful to me...

The high level debates about theory and the middle-aged guys mud-wrestling about African aid do nothing for me. You are very, very smart. You know more about aid than just about anybody. Please, give me something useful."

- Finally, a piece by Aaron Ernst at PBS about how aid workers are making use of twitter.  If you're interested in how twitter and other web-based tools are changing (or potentially changing) humanitarian relief, check out Aid Worker Daily, humanitarian.info and iRevolution

Michael Bear
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