Category: World Evolution

Figures from ICANN show that Africa has the most new IPv6-connections. IPv6 is the newest and necessary version of the Internet Protocol. 22 percent of the new connections in Africa have an IPv6-prefix.

During the International Day of Peace, War Child Netherlands organized a virtual Peace March on the online community Habbo. The goal of the march was to make the youth stop to think about war and to call on them to support the necessity of peace. The peace march was part of the Global Peace Gathering organized by War Child and Habbo in 32 countries. Beside the Peace March Habbos could sign a Peace Petition by War Child with which they could show their support.

During the march the visitors of Habbo, the so-called Habbos, made a communal trip through different virtual rooms. They were accompanied by several youths from Uganda, which visited the online world from a refuge camp.

Seatwave (Dutch), is taking over the Dutch site Skelper. Seatwave is, according to themselves, the biggest ticket service site in Europe where consumers can sell tickets for events.

After investing in infrastructure and oil, China is now investing money in the African agricultural sector. Agriculture is one of Africa's main sources of revenue, but it's also one of the most plagued sectors. It's plagued by, amongst others, climate change and a lack of means. Last week the Chinese governor Chen Yuan spoke with African ministers of finance and banks and told them that the China Development Bank has planned investments in African agriculture. These investments are aimed at decreasing the food shortage.

While western eyes are trained on China and India, China is looking chiefly at Africa: the next continent that will bloom up in a year or twenty. The Chinese quest for fossil fuels is leading more and more often to extremely active governmental support for projects in African countries that can offer oil. For example, China has been investing billions in oil-rich Angola for years and it's now investing in the electricity grid of the poor, West-African country of Nigeria. China has recently awarded Angola the support of 135 million dollars for rebuilding their electricity grid, water supplies and the infrastructure. In 2002 the civil war that had been raging in Angola for the past 27 years and had destroyed the infrastructure was finally ended. The Angolan media reported that the Chinese dollars will fund the modernization of the electricity grid in two cities in the Lunda Norte and Lunda-sul provinces, as well as the construction of a water purification plant, canals in Luanda and an improvement of the infrastructure in two other provinces. Furthermore the Chinese money will be used to build a center for the treatment and prevention of malaria in the hospital of Luanda.

China has stopped giving away plastic bags with the groceries. Retail chains will have to ask at least the cost for making the bags. This means about 3 billion bags a year less will be produced. It's the most radical ecological policy ever in China.

Dutch webshop company Eperium has divided its branches neatly across different timezones to be available 24 hours a day. With the opening of the establishment on Curaçao the e-Commerce specialist offers service around the clock. On top of that the exotic location works as a magnet on the rare ITers.

Through a context for East-African students, Google has developed new gadgets, small pieces of software with which users can share things (such as movies, games or information) on their weblog. It's expected that this will lead to locally applicable gadgets that help the community. The first prize is $600 and the 2nd to 6th prize winners get $350 each.

House specialist Immospy, known in the Netherlands as miljoenhuizen.nl, is now available in English, German, French, Spanish and Italian. By focusing on Europe (instead of individual countries) almost 4 million houses for sale are made available.

Soon European gambling sites will be allowed, and national gambling monopolies disappear. That is what the EU wants (em, Dutch). Thus the European market slowly evolves. Then, as a result of other developments, a world market follows, with a world government, world legislation, world police and one world currency. This will take at least another fifty years though.

Fitna, Dutch politician Geert Wilders’s film about the Koran, is announced in English, while the language spoken in the film is Dutch (fi). The Dutch politician apparently realizes that the whole world is looking at him, and this is how he anticipates that.

As the virtual world matures, and we connect to a worldwide network of 6.6 billion people, it shouldn’t surprise us that this will lead to conflicts. All cultures with their own convictions built up in thousands of years, and passed on from generation to generation, all of a sudden are confronted with each other. We will (have to) fight the confrontation over the years to come. The Danish cartoons were only the beginning. With more than 3 billion people connected through mobile phones at the moment (growing rapidly), this video from about the most leveled-out culture in the world, where everything seems ok, where you can say everything you like, might cause a huge shock wave. Finally (after a couple of decades) there will be peace like never before. We will then live in the era of Pamper Planet. 

Bulgaria has started rolling out the WiMax network, a wireless high speed internet network. In first instance only the ten biggest cities will get the network, but in 2009 there will be a ninety percent coverage. Bulgaria will then be one of the first countries to have this technology available almost everywhere. Cisco states there is a lot of interest in WiMax in upcoming countries, from Africa to the Middle East, but also in parts of China. This is especially true for areas that don’t have existing communication infrastructure like copper. For Bulgaria this is the quickest and cheapest way to roll out broadband internet (em, Dutch). 

China has the plan to minimalize the trade in, and physical and psychological violence against, women and children between 2008 and 2012. The Ministry of Public Security (MPS) leads the operation in which local regions will also start their own organizations (cg). Very slowly elements like human rights, environment and education are getting more important for the whole Chinese population. It will lead to more wealth, and to the disappearance of bad jobs from China. To still keep up the production, for low prices, the country will dramatically automize and robotize, and outsource another part of the work to Africa. This way the Chinese population, 1.3 billion inhabitants, can develop itself as the strongest nation in the world.

European commissioner Viviane Reding (Information & Media) has plans for a European music market, although national copyright laws are in her way. Licenses for copyright, which have to be taken care of separately in every country now, could cover several countries, or even the whole European Union (dc, Dutch). In the past local copyright was introduced, like countries borders were a couple of years before that. The world however isn’t divided in countries: we have done that ourselves at some point. To protect us from evil from outside. As this threat is fading, borders slowly fade too (the process of denationalizing), and we have to start thinking of copyright on a worldwide level. Let’s start with Europe. This will prove to be hard enough…

The European Commission wants a new European telecoms authority which should stimulate the competition throughout Europe, by removing hindrances (em, Dutch). The European market slowly develops its basis. First in the financial market, partly due to the introduction of the Euro, now also in the telecoms market. In a next step, the physical infrastructure and its usage will be standardized. Then suppliers can easily cross the borders, grow, and work more efficient. In the end this will lead to better products for the consumers, a wider range of products, and lower prices. The most important barrier to be taken though, is the ‘fear for Europe’. That is why this process is very slow (but sure).