Hisham Zaazou is looking to ramp up the tourism trade in the country after stories of Muslim groups calling for a ban on all the things people on holiday love began to circulate. Travelers have been wary of making their way to Egypt since the 2011 uprising that took down President Hosni Mubarak, fearing for their safety.

Still, Zaazou admits that not everyone is okay with allowing tourists to do as they please.

“We had talks with these Salafi groups and now they understand the importance of the tourism sector, but still you have some individuals that are not from the leadership saying these things”, Mr Zaazou said.

Tourism has always been a huge part of Egypt’s economy; in 2010, 14.7 million visitors made the trip, generating $12.5 billion in earnings. That dropped to 9.8 million the following year, making income earnings just 8.8 billion. Still, leaders are optimistic that some changes will encourage travelers to rethink their worries. Their goal is to hit 30 million tourists with revenues of $25 billion by 2022.

The EFF reports that Egypt’s Prosector General, Abdel Maguid Mahmoud, ordered an online porn ban on Wednesday. Mahmoud is using a three-year-old ruling from Egypt’s administrative court that said “freedom of expression and public rights should be restricted by maintaining the fundamentals of religion, morality and patriotism.”

The first thing to go under this ruling will be porn, but what’s to follow? The court ruling is too broad and can be used to block numerous forms of speech just because it goes against the ruling party’s views on religion or morality. It’s particularly worrisome in Egypt as the country is trying to transition away from the Mubarak regime to a more democratic government that claims to respect the rights of all citizens, regardless of their views.

The EFF says that Egypt could go one of two ways with the ban. The country go just go all out and ban every porn site that it finds. This would require a rather expensive and extensive filtering system that Egypt might not be able to afford at the moment.

The other option is that porn ban opponents take the ruling to the high courts. The courts might throw out the ruling, or they might uphold it. It’s hard to tell what will happen in Egypt at the moment due to numerous parties from many different walks of life all vying to have their voice heard.

Regardless of what happens, the EFF is right in that Egyptian citizens will most likely turn to VPNs and Tor for the time being. These services were used during the Arab Spring in Egypt to protect the identities of bloggers and social media users who were using the Internet to spread information to the outside world. Now these same services will be used to protect the identities of those who only want to use the Internet as they see fit.

UNC Charlotte alum and decade-long studier of satellite imagery Angela Micol first discovered the two distinct sites, which are located about 90 miles apart.

The first site features a four-sided “truncated pyramidal shape” that Micol says is about 140 feet wide. If you zoom out on it, you see that it’s actually part of a larger series of unidentified mounds that are all rather similar in structure. Micol says that they are similar to the alignment of the Giza Plateau pyramids.

The second site (seen at the lead) has a much bigger, triangular-shaped mound of about 600 feet. Surrounding that are more plateaus of 250 feet and 100 feet widths, respectively.

“The images speak for themselves. It’s very obvious what the sites may contain but field research is needed to verify they are, in fact, pyramids and evidence should be gathered to determine their origins. It is my hunch there is much more to these sites and with the use of Infrared imagery, we can see the extent of the proposed complexes in greater detail,” says Micol.

The structures, which come from Northern Egypt, have been verified as officially undiscovered by Egyptologist Nabil Selim. Selim has discovered pyramids of his own, Sinki at Abydos for example.

“My dream is to work with archaeologists to release sites that I have identified over the past ten years of research. This research is the frontier of discovery and it’s just beginning to advance views of our ancient past,” says Micol.

[Google Earth Anomalies via Discovery News]

The service launched for the two countries yesterday along the promise of Google Map Maker becoming available for another ten countries later this month. The updates submitted by users of Map Maker are typically included into the general Google Maps and Google Earth data within a matter of minutes after they’ve been approved, making the accuracy of these maps of utmost urgency. After all, you don’t wanna really steer anybody astray if they’re in unfamiliar environs. However, if you’re unsure of the exact shape of that lake or whether that restaurant is still located where you believe it is, users of Map Maker can collaborate with other online cartographers to verify the maps and make suggestions when necessary.

During yesterday’s conference, Google Maps Vice President Brian McClendon described the import of Google Map Maker for both users and developers, saying, “The ability to add your local knowledge enables users to add hiking trails, bike paths, and correct and improve local business listings.”

Google plans to launch Map Maker soon for the following countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Norway, and Switzerland.

Google recently invited talented map makers to participate in a competition where designers were asked to make 3D models of their towns, which would then be added to the Google Earth topography. While it was a clever way to encourage people to contribute to Google’s map data, the competition also yielded some impressive examples of what people are capable of making with Google Maps and Google Earth. So have fun, newly acquainted African countries.

Last year, following the revolt that toppled then-President Hosni Mubarak, a rule was enacted for presidential elections wherein candidates must not possess citizenship for any other country other than Egypt, but their parents must not be citizens for any other countries, as well. An Egyptian electoral commission has disclosed that Abu Ismail’s mother had “used an American passport for travel to and from” Egypt. According to the documents, Abu Ismail’s mother became a naturalized citizen in October 2006.

Abu Ismail has denied the allegations and declared the claims to be a conspiracy against him to invalidate his presidential campaign. Meanwhile, legions of his supporters have flooded President Obama’s Facebook page with comments ranging from warnings against the United States for participating in the conspiracy to pleas earnest urging the U.S. government to confirm that Abu Ismail’s mother did not in fact possess U.S. citizenship. Several comments simply have an as ASCII-type graphic that simply display’s Abu Ismail’s first name:

The comments are being left in posts that are largely irrelevant to the Egyptian elections, such as one post containing a video of singer Janelle Monáe expressing her support for President Obama. Many of the comments were left in Arabic, but several were also in English.

The people of Egypt tells you you Obama ::: —- live with dignity ….. …………. dirty despite your plans and we took the decision that we will break the dependency constraints we will not give you … . and we will hang your customer Hosni Baaaaaaaaaaaaarak …….. ………… Egypt’s youth are free to live .. freedom … social justice, human dignity ……. .. …… glory to God, glory to the martyrs and the victory of Egypt, God willing ………. We are firm despite the haters hate

Obama is a liar, and the Egyptian military is also a liar, and the Egyptian people we do not want only the dignity and freedom of our country or world and Egypt believe Hazem Abu Ismail and Nkzpkm of you because we are accustomed to lie … I will live with dignity and glory of the martyrs

becareful obama if you prove that hazem’s mother is an american so hazem also is an american too …. and you will not be president no more … because we will support hazem to be president of usa

Obama Beware wrath of the Egyptian people of Israel not far from us but did not leave us the freedom to choose our president, do not blame only yourself and the U.S. embassy is also not far from Tahrir Square’s youth Egypt will not accept humiliation and shame and dominance of the American administration by Vibta for our candidate Hazem Abu Ismail and stop fraud nationality of his mother أوباما إحذر غضب الشعب المصرى إسرائيل ليست بعيده عنا وإن لم تترك لنا حرية إختيار رئيسنا فلا تلوم إلا نفسك والسفارة الامريكيه أيضا ليست بعيده عن ميدان التحرير فشباب مصر لن يقبل بالذل والهوان ولا بهيمنة الاداره الامريكيه عليها فأبعدوا عن مرشحنا حازم ابو اسماعيل وتوقفوا عن تزوير جنسية والدته

We will fight our battle to the end and WE TRUST IN GOD we will win.{YES WE CAN !!} with the aid of ALLAH we will live with DIGNITY .Hazem Abu Ismail is not just a person,but he is an idea lives in us. If you want to remove Hazem ,you have to kill all of us!!.

As you can see, the comments are considerably more grave than the “sarcasm bombing” embraced by American protestors against anti-choice politicians.

[Via BBC.]

The question is, will the Egyptian government know it when it sees it? An Egyptian court has ruled to ban internet pornography in the country. The ruling was confirmed by the Egyptian Ministry of Telecommunications and reported by Egypt Today.

The news brings rising concerns about how the Egyptian government will enforce the new law, and who will decide where the line is drawn when it comes to porn.

The issue has been brought up in America thanks to Republican Presidential hopeful, Rick Santorum, who has blamed pornography on everything from divorce to homosexuality. His announcement that he wishes to ban pornography in the United States has caused an uproar over civil liberties and even prompted a campaign on Twitter, #SaveThePorn.

In Egypt or America, where does one draw the line. Will suggestive images or video be next? What kind of punishment can you legitimately impose on people who continue to watch porn? Prison? Will the person be branded as a sex offender? What’s Next? What other civil liberties will a government be bold enough to restrict? A porn ban is certainly a slippery slope.

A ruling was made in Egyptian Court back in 2009, but never enforced. But this is the first time the ruling has been upheld by the Ministry of Telecommunications and Egyptian Parliament. This one has a better chance of sticking.

The Egypt Independent is reporting that the government is taking the first steps to ban all online pornography. The ban is being instigated by Minister of Telecommunications and Information Technology Mohamed Salem. The first step is to create a National Telecommunications Regulation Authority that will discuss how they can control porn sites.

Salem must have a good reason for wanting to ban access to porn sites, right? He says that the issue of porn is becoming “persistent and worrying to families.” I think that porn has always been “persistent and worrying” to anybody who has children. That’s why families install filters or keep a close watch on their child’s Internet usage. That’s apparently not good enough for the People’s Assembly Transportation and Telecommunications Committee as they asked the government in February to ban access to all porn sites within the nation.

The Next Web reports that a similar law was almost passed in Tunisia. That one didn’t make it through because critics found that it would allow the government to block any Web site that was deemed immoral or offensive. The Egyptian courts might throw out the law or they might pass it. Either way, the Egyptian people will probably see it as an affront on their freedoms and protest again.

From Santorum’s speech on porn to these new attempts to ban it just go to show you how far people will go to protect families and children. Yes, porn should be kept out of the hands of children, but governments shouldn’t punish an adult’s individual freedom in the name of protecting children. There are ways to protect children from offensive content than just an outright ban. This also puts the responsibility to protect children on the parent’s heads and I know that’s so hard these days. The government shouldn’t be your children’s parents as that leads down the road to them becoming big brothers.

The open exchange of information can have a positive global impact. This is both a practical and ethical belief. On a practical level, we simply cannot review all one hundred million-plus Tweets created and subsequently delivered every day. From an ethical perspective, almost every country in the world agrees that freedom of expression is a human right. Many countries also agree that freedom of expression carries with it responsibilities and has limits.

Our position on freedom of expression carries with it a mandate to protect our users’ right to speak freely and preserve their ability to contest having their private information revealed.

It was well-placed statement given that many news sources speculated on how Twitter’s service facilitated the Egyptian (and subsequent) protests; opportunistic, even, as Twitter wrapped itself in the banner of Free Speech and cried, “Sally forth, citizens of the world. Get your freedom on!”

Twitter stated earlier this week that they were branching into services for other languages such as Arabic, Farsi, and Hebrew. On a date that is so significant for so many in the Middle East, it was hard not to conceptualize the timing of the announcement as a self-acknowledging wink at Twitter’s role, however major or minor, in the organization of protesters over the past year.

In a post on their official blog today, Twitter acknowledged that as they continue to move into culturally different regions of the world, some of what they can permit to be said through their service will be challenged by conflicting mores and tenets of freedom of expression. Given that, Twitter said today:

Until now, the only way we could take account of those countries’ limits was to remove content globally. Starting today, we give ourselves the ability to reactively withhold content from users in a specific country — while keeping it available in the rest of the world. We have also built in a way to communicate transparently to users when content is withheld, and why.

We haven’t yet used this ability, but if and when we are required to withhold a Tweet in a specific country, we will attempt to let the user know, and we will clearly mark when the content has been withheld.

So, if I’m understanding this correctly: someone in Egypt tweets something that violates a cultural or political restriction on free speech, so Twitter receives a request to remove it. Twitter now has self-applied the power to selectively remove the Tweet from view within Egypt, yet the rest of the world will still be able to read the tweet?

I really hope that’s what Twitter means by this news. Please let this be what this means, Twitter.

So what do you think about Twitter’s new elective powers for selectively censoring tweets where they violate freedom of expression laws but still make them available outside of that country? Anybody have any thoughts on what kind of implications people could see as a result of this new policy? Comment below with your thoughts.

On Feb 15th, CBS released a statement saying that Logan had been assaulted 4 days earlier while covering the celebrations of the regime change in Cairo. The hub of those celebrations was Tahrir Square, and it was filled with thousands of Egyptians that day. The CBS statement said:

In the crush of the mob, she was separated from her crew. She was surrounded and suffered a brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating before being saved by a group of women and an estimated 20 Egyptian soldiers.

In her first TV interview since the event, Logan details the terrifying account of having her clothes ripped off my hundreds of men, and being beaten and “raped with their hands” repeatedly for 25 minutes. Logan confirms that a group of Egyptian women surrounded her and warded off the attackers long enough for Egyptian soldiers to finally come to her aid.

Check out the video below:

According to a new Reuters article, Sechin said, "Look what they have done in Egypt, those highly-placed managers of Google, what manipulations of the energy of the people took place there."

Assuming that quote’s completely accurate (and translation issues or some other small misunderstanding could come into play), Sechin’s drawn some interesting conclusions.  First, consider the words "they" and "managers," implying that Ghonim wasn’t acting alone.

Then there’s the term "manipulations" to consider, since it has some pretty unpleasant connotations.

This might cause more than a few problems for Google.  The Russian government isn’t known for tolerating rabble-rousers, and Google’s already had trouble competing with local search company Yandex.  Negative PR or a formal penalty of some sort wouldn’t help.

Sechin has a bit of evidence on his side, too.  The official Google Twitter account has at least twice tweeted in support of Ghonim, and Eric Schmidt’s also indicated a certain level of approval.