Fareed Zakaria wrote about the Saudi Trap in Newsweek.

(via Zaydoun)

When telecommunications companies offered mobile phones for the first time in Saudi Arabia, it was difficult for Saudis to remember the numbers that Nokia give to their phones. Therefore, the Saudis distributors decided to give every model of Nokia phones a nickname. For instance, Nokia 8210 called “The little bird, while Nokia 7210 called “The Kingdom.”

Couple of years after that, Nokia and their rivals started to produce the camera phones. The Saudi authorities banned all that kind of phones. That decision was so stupid because you can see these mobiles wherever you go in the state. It is available everywhere and all you have to do is to ask for it, and the salesperson will bring it immediately as it is usually hidden under the table.

That was just to give you a general idea about the whole thing, as what I want to talk about related to this somehow.

The Saudis called Nokia 6600 “The Banda,” but the fundamentalists decided to give it some different names. The Monster, The Evil, or The Criminal. Why? Because some people took photos to some unveiled women and then distributed them using Bluetooht. It is just crazy! If some people are abusing a certain technology, you take action against those people, but you don’t ban the technology.

This is not the way to deal with that kind of stuff here. It is useless anyway. Satellite receivers were banned in the beginning, and now even the homeless people got them. Wait a little bit, and every mobile phone in the market will include an embedded camera. What are they gonna do? Advise the people to keep their old phones forever?!

Everyone knows how to maintain his privacy. Nobody needs to the government to protect him from what others consider as The Evil. People who take photos of others without their permission are “immature and irresponsible” said Dr. Fawzia Ashmakh to Asharq Al-Awsat. And I may add that they are sick people in need of psychological therapy.

However, the Forces of Dark cannot understand that it is about people not technology. They started a special campaign using a website to warn people of “The Banda” or what they would like to call “The Evil.”

“Finally, there is no such thing that cannot be abused. If we banned all the new innovations we will live the way people lived in the Middle Ages,” Dr. Ashmakh added. But it seems that there are some people wants us to live that way, at least that what AlHamedy thinks.

The Angry Arab is releasing his book tomorrow: The Battle for Saudi Arabia. I am absolutely convinced that it won’t see the light of day in any of the Gulf countries so we can’t critique it. But hope to pick up a copy and make it my holiday reading!

(via Mahmood’s Den)

Blogger could be to words what Napster was to music – except this time, it’ll really work.

– Andrew Sullivan

OK, there are no movies theaters in Saudi Arabia, but that dose not necessary means that there are no Saudi movies.

If you can read Arabic, read this interview with Hayfaa Al-Mansour, the first Saudi female director. However, if you cannot read Arabic, you can read this piece about her, or you may want to visit her own website.

Some Saudis where shocked to watch a Saudi woman reading the news on the Saudi TV earlier this year and some Islamisits asked to stop it. How will they feel about this?

I wanted to send this message to a friend, but then decided not to do. You think I did the right thing?