Update on Shiva Nazar Ahari's Case

In this previous post, I alerted you to the probable execution of Shiva Nazar Ahari. So far, over 3.000 people from 60 countries signed the petition for her release.

This is not yet enough. Please continue to spread the word via Reporters Without Borders or on Facebook. The petition will be handed over in Berlin on 2 September already - there is absolutely no time to waste!

Jana Mänz of Janasworld

 
Jana Mänz, editor of Janasworld, is one of the few women who have made it onto the German blog charts - an assortment of weblogs ranked by the number of incoming links. 

Follow the jump below to find out more about Jana's most successful project and what she likes best about her blog. Or read on to get some straightforward blogging advice...

Facebook Anno 2004

For more info and other screenshots, visit Guest of a Guest.

Leslie Hall - Body Rolls

On The Covers

Crushable reports on a Japanese magazine cover featuring a manga-ly  Britney Spears (doesn't she look like @CourtneyLoveUK here?) and Blica compiled a couple of older shots of uber-pretty Christy Turlington practicing yoga.

Blogging Women Need to Network Better

Today Politik.de, a political community blog, published another article on blogging women entitled Frauen bloggen anders? [Do Women Blog Differently?] It sums up recent contributions on the topic and wonders whether distinguishing between "male" and "female" blogs makes sense at all.

In her reply Frauen bloggen anders. Anders als wer? [Women blog differently. Differently from whom?], Antje Schrupp demanded more constructive, theme-focused dialogue between women on the web.

Girls Can Blog in Iran... NOT!

Shiva Nazar Ahari is a 26 year old Iranian blogger and human rights activist, who has been wrongly detained for "war against God and the state", also known as Moharebeh.

In the Islamic Republic of Iran, Moharebeh is a capital crime. This means Shiva Nazar Ahari faces the death penalty.

In order to save her life, Reporters Without Borders have set up an online petition. Please join Elke and I in signing it in time for Shiva Nazar Ahari's trial on 4 September 2010.

The 100 Most Powerful Black Women on Twitter

Looking for someone new to follow? Look no further! Black Web 2.0 compiled a list of the 100 most powerful black women on Twitter.

Stephanie Schubert of Frei Schnauze

For a while, when I was still in school, I wanted to become an interior designer. Nah, I thought, it will be way too difficult to find myself a job. Luckily, Steffi was braver than I was, received her diploma and started frei Schnauze. 

Follow the jump below to find out how a blog can help you in achieving professional goals, why Steffi's seemingly appeals to everybody, and why you should never, ever mention a certain company in your posts.

Plant a Tree With a Blog Post

KaufDA and the environment organisation I Plant a Tree started an initiative entitled "Mein Blog ist CO2-neutral" ["My blog is carbon neutral"]: 
For every blog that embeds their button, they will plant a tree.* The service is free and the idea is to neutralize 50 years worth of your blog's CO2 emissions.

All you need to do to participate is write a brief blog post, add a button of your choice to it, and write an email about your post to CO2-neutral[at]kaufda[dot]de.

* One tree per domain.

GCB in Missy Magazine #03/10

And yet another GCB-related post:

Thank you Helga Hansen and  
Missy Magazine for a brief
interview and feature in the
mag's August issue!

For German Readers: More Blogging Tips by Lu

Zusätzlich zu den Tipps, die Lu in ihrem GCB Portrait gegeben hat, finden Neulinge jetzt auch auf Lus eigenem Blog ein paar wertvolle Hinweise.

Sarah Doesn't Speak For Us! - Initiative by Emily's List

For German Readers: A Study on Conflict Management

Im Rahmen ihrer Dissertation untersucht Johanna Kirchhoff von der Uni Marburg Entschuldigungen nach zwischenmenschlichen Konflikten. Bisher fehlen Ihr noch Teilnehmer für Ihre Studie. Wenn Ihr 15 Minuten übrig habt, klickt hier, um Johanna in ihrer Forschungsarbeit zu unterstützen.

Healthy Packed Lunches

The Unclutterer, a blog I really like, wrote an article entitled Simplifying Packed Lunches that received some very interesting comments. I was especially happy to see that Makiko Itoh's blog Just Bento was the first web address recommended for healthy lunch recipes. Read Makiko's GCB portrait for more information or check out her upcoming Just Bento Cookbook.

Anastasia of The Palpable Obscure

Who would have thought that a blog called The Palpable Obscure that was inspired by darkness, as its creator Anasasia put it, would concern itself mostly with fashion and style? 

Follow the jump below to find out why blogging is like looking in a mirror sometimes, why she finds Twitter "bizarre", and which only other blog Anastasia has been reading.

McKinsey Women's Day 2010

McKinsey's annual networking event for female students, doctoral candidates and young professionals will be taking place Nov 5 - 6 in Frankfurt/ Main, Germany. They are accepting applications until 19 September 2010.
More info at McKinsey & Company.

Nina Kinert - Beast

GCB on taz.de

Katrin Strohmaier wrote an article on blogs edited by women (entitled Wie im echten Leben or Like in Real Life) that quotes me as saying that women often lack technical knowledge. I would like to clarify that this sentence was part of an original statement I made that touched upon a wider context:

As women don't usually receive much technical education, many of them are self taught. And while the expertise acquired in private study may be vast in some cases, most female bloggers aren't trained information scientists and have never disassembled a hard drive. Luckily, for blogging your opinion, you don't need to be able to take apart computers (or I wouldn't do it). Nevertheless, I do believe that encouraging girls and teenage women to use Internet technologies self-confidently is key to a louder female voice on the web. 

In any case: Thanks, Katrin, for featuring me in your article! (Picture Source)

Anna Niestroj of BLINKBLINK

Graphic designer Anna Niestroj runs two corresponding blogs: The beautiful BLINKBLINK - something like an aesthetic pin board - and Zukunft Arbeit, where she discusses her profession's future. 

Follow the jump below if you're interested in why she runs two instead of one blog, why navigating social platforms well is key to finding readers, and to hear about her only - yet bitter - negative experience with blogging. And while you're at it, watch out for GCB's new, 14th interview question!

New Project

It's called Things I Gave Away This Year, and I started it only yesterday. It's layout isn't permanently set yet, and a friend was kind enough to help out with today's post. If you like it, please do participate - the more of you will mail in pictures, the better the collection will become! 

*UPDATE on The Issue of "Netzneutralität"

Helga summed up the discussion very well for our beloved Mädchenmannschaft.

Blogger Portraits of a Different Kind

Already in 2008, artist Danny Roberts started drawing bloggers he admired on his blog Igor + André. Click the following link for Danny's Blogger Portrait Series that is mostly comprised of female fashion bloggers like Jessie and Julia of Les Mads above.

For German Readers: The Issue of "Netzneutralität"

As many of you might have heard by now, the word of the week is "Netzneutralität"*. It has been widely debated in German media, politics and the blogosphere and means something like free availability of data to all. There is a petition on Pro Netzneutralität that you may sign if you believe that data transmission should remain neutral and equitable, no matter what content the data provides, which country it comes from, or whether it was sent by a rich or poor sender.

The German weekly SPIEGEL wrote an article on the topic, as has DIE ZEIT.

*Official definiton by the German Bundestag: „Der Begriff Netzneutralität bezeichnet die neutrale Übermittlung von Daten im Internet, das bedeutet eine gleichberechtigte Übertragung aller Datenpakete unabhängig davon, woher diese stammen, welchen Inhalt sie haben oder welche Anwendungen die Pakete generiert haben.“

Flattr now open to all :)

Just a quick hint - if you're interested in sharing the love, start flattring right away!

Simone Finkenwirth of Die Klappentexterin

Today's guest on GIRLS CAN BLOG is Simone Finkenwirth, also known as  Klappentexterin. Albeit her litblog's rather young age, Simone has managed to sneak into the RSS feed readers of plenty of book lovers.

Follow the jump below to find out why passing through in silence ain't her thing, which section of her own blog she likes best, and why to Simone, one smile is worth more than ten visits of grumpy readers.

(Picture taken from postsecret.)

The Serpentine Ladies Swam Loch Ness in Aid of Afghan Mother and Child Rescue

Congratulations on swimming 23 miles at 5ºC! 

Click here to support their cause and the AMCR, have a look at more photos of the swim on flickr, or recap it on Twitter. There's also a portrait of the American-Australian-British team on the official Swim Loch Ness Homepage.

Ariane Fürer Landolt of Suleika

With a first entry to her archive on 1 October 2004, Ariane has been blogging longer than myself* - and she's been doing so from a world trip on a boat called Suleika! 

Follow the jump below to find out how blogging from a sail boat works and what technical difficulties might arise on the open sea, or just to take a look at the cutest seal ever. 

*I took it up in Malaysia in the spring of 2005.

Blogger Gewinnspiel von Appsilon

Appsilon, ein Online-Magazin für iPhone, iPad und Co, verlost noch bis zum 15. August 2010 ein neues iPhone G4 ohne Vertrag. Um an dem Gewinnspiel teilzunehmen, "einfach" in einem Statement erklären, warum ausgerechnet man selbst das hippe Teil verdient. Zum Beispiel:

Ich sollte das neue iPhone gewinnen, weil es mir erstens dabei helfen würde, die GIRLS CAN BLOG-Leser_innen auch von unterwegs zu unterhalten, weil GIRLS CAN BLOG zweitens ein Blog ist, der auf einem Mac konzipiert wurde und zu dem daher so ein Telefon irre gut passen würde, weil iPhones drittens großartig sind (das behaupten zumindest alle, die schon eins haben), und weil viertens noch immer ein paar weniger Frauen als Männer eines besitzen und es im Zuge der neuen Gleichstellungsabsichten in der Wirtschaft - GIRLS CAN BLOG berichtete hier - doch eigentlich schön wäre, wenn man die Nutzer-nach-Geschlecht-Statistik von Februar 2010 auf 50%-50% bringen könnte... Schließlich soll unser Erfolg nicht daran scheitern, dass wir unsere guten Ideen nicht von unterwegs unter die Leute bringen können, oder?

SIA - Soon We'll Be Found (Live)

Do Women Have to be Naked to Get Into the Met. Museum?

1989:

And again, even worse, in 2005:

Source