Ya it’s true! A designer here at the office was hearing weird noises, so we looked outside the window and thought they were birds or something, since the opposite building is a bit far. Then Hussein told us these are types of falcons called “kestrels”, apparently he likes birds :) You can read more about them on Wikipedia here

Anyway, sorry the photo of the four baby kestrels is not really clear, tried three different cameras. Click here for the bigger size. Oh and tough luck for the owners of the building :) They just cleaned it last month!

This is amazing, who would like to have a fiber optic cable connection in his house? Well I’d love to have a 20Mb connection at home and use it for HDTV, VoIP and browsing.

In 1999, when I was a student in Amman, I read an article in a Jordanian newspaper that there was a plan to build a fiber optic network all over Amman within 10 years, it made me laugh hard. Anyway, here it is! What will it be used for, how much would it cost etc. is the question, lets just wait and see.

This month at toot we have good news and bad news, lets start with the good news.
Wael, toot’s designer, just had his first baby girl, Joon. She is cute, don’t you think?
The bad news is that Jad, our geek at toot, had to go into surgery for his dislocated shoulder, the poor guy will have to stay at home tied for 5 weeks! (or maybe he’s lucky :p)

Mabrouk Wael and Salamat Jad.

The 60+ cm high Ammanite pavement you see in the picture is believed to date back to the time of the dinosaurs.
Lets start a list of advantages of such pavements, I will start with two:

- When a speeding car looses control and hits the pavement the innocent pedestrians will not be hurt at all.
- When there is a flooding due to heavy rain rest assured that you are safe on the pavement.

p.s that is if you can actually go on the pavement.

What do you have in mind guys?

We have just created a toot group on Frappr. So all Arab bloggers and toot lovers can add themselves on the map here
See you on Frappr.
www.frappr.com/toot

Blogging is mainly about freedom of expression, sharing of information, thoughts and ideas. This healthy phenomenon started to kick off in Arab countries, and since it requires use of internet and computers it is being driven, mainly, by the younger generation.

Since blogs are personal online journals, each blog tends to reflect its owner’s personality, from the layout design to content. Generally, older bloggers have no problems in revealing their identity, unlike teenage bloggers. In the Arab Gulf countries Arab bloggers –and mainly female bloggers- tend to conceal their identities, unlike bloggers from Jordan for example.

Why would someone blog and allow people to read her/his blog if she/he doesn’t want to be known? Wouldn’t it be better to use closed groups or forums? How can it be a personal blog with no identity? And how does this promote freedom of expression in our region?

But the most important question is why do these bloggers hide their identity? Is it because of the country/community they live in? Maybe it is because they are afraid of someone coming after them (“safe blogging” issue), or is it that they don’t want their families/friends to know about it?

I tried to follow these blogs for some time and did not find any justifications for concealing identity, some of these blogs are very good, but not knowing who wrote the post (or who commented) does not create any personal connections with that blogger.
All that I found was just a few bad words here and there and some nasty comments like “*crew you”. If the use of some bad words is the reason for hiding identity I think bloggers (and readers) should refrain from using them and at least show their first name or image.
This will also enhance the blogs’ quality.

Welcome to toot everyone!