Blogs

Yesterday, on MetaFilter, readers figured out that Hoder.com was about to expire at the end of this month and they wanted to make sure that it stayed in Hossein Derakhshan’s name. Some had suggested that they wouldn’t allow the domain to be renewed until he did it himself — and he obviously can’t as he’s in prison. However, later in the day, the domain’s whois records showed that someone had renewed it for a year, but it was unclear how…

Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of the arrest of Hossein “Hoder” Derakhshan. I’ve been covering this issue on my blog and also for three media outlets: PRI’s The World, in a piece that aired on Wednesday, TVO’s Search Engine (in an episode airing tomorrow), and for PBS’ MediaShift in a piece that will be airing later this week. The CBC also came out with a piece late Thursday night that I’ve just now seen. I have also been in regular…

Just 10 days before the one-year anniversary of the arrest of Hossein Derakhshan, his father, Hassan Derakhshan, has written a letter to Ayatollah Larijani, the head of the Department of the Judiciary. The letter was published on the website of Salaam, a reformist newspaper today, October 21, 2009 (29th of Mehr, 1388). The letter was translated from the original Persian by an Iranian living in California who wished to remain anonymous and edited for clarity by yours truly. To the…

Earlier this month, Egyptian blogger Abdel Rahman Faras was arrested in Cairo by Egyptian authorities. I checked in with Antony Loewenstein, author of The Blogging Revolution to check in to see what he could tell me about this. Our 12 minute conversation is here.

Reporters Without Borders: Reporters Without Borders said today it was deeply shocked at the death in a Tehran prison of blogger Omidreza Mirsayafi and called for the immediate opening of an investigation into the circumstances of the tragedy. His lawyer, Mohamed Ali Dadkhah, was informed of the blogger’s death by a doctor, Hesem Firozi, who is himself imprisoned. The young blogger had been depressed and no longer able to cope with prison conditions. The doctor said, “The death of this…

Sanam Dolatshahi, an Iranian blogger now living in Florida, says that the arrest of Hossein Derakhshan has been confirmed by his family in Tehran. The arrest has also been confirmed by a friend of the family’s, as quoted in today’sThe Globe & Mail. To be clear, I myself, have not spoken with anyone in Hoder’s family yet. Sanam writes: My friend Nazli finally got the OK from Hossein Derakhshan’s sister, Azadeh Derakhshan, to publicly announce that Hossein Derakhshan, one of…

Iranian-Canadian blogger Hossein “Hoder” Derakhshan may or may not have been arrested recently in Tehran. One Iranian site, Jahan News, is reporting that he has been — citing “reliable sources” — and up until now, that’s all we have. And yet, UPI, the Jerusalem Post, Ha’aretz, The Guardian and others are all treating this as fact, using one possibly dubious Iranian newspaper as the sole source. It’s even made the Iranian equivalent of Digg, Balatarin (“Highest”). For the record, NPR…

Dear Friends, I’ve been informed that my radio piece on the new bill in the Iranian Parliament that would make “corrupt weblogs” punishable by death, will be airing today. It will be available on any of these stations (and their Internet streams): New York – 3 pm Eastern – WNYC – 820 AM – www.wnyc.org Washington, DC – 8 pm Eastern – WAMU – 88.5 FM – www.wamu.org Los Angeles – 12 pm Pacific – KPCC – 89.3 FM –…

Hossein asked me to blog about his libel case. I don’t have much to say about it, other than what Ethan Zuckerman has already said: I’m not in a position to argue the veracity of many of the criticisms of Derakhshan by Iranian bloggers – I don’t read Persian, and I don’t have all the facts. And I will happily admit that Derakhshan can be abrasive and difficult, and that I disagree with much of what he’s currently been writing…