OPINION: As a journalist I have attended thousands of presentations, speeches and debates, and rarely have I encountered a speaker as stultifyingly boring as Tony Smith.

According to Taranaki Daily News, Garry Sharpe-Young — who worked as a journalist for British, American and German rock magazines, wrote music reference books, biographies for OZZY OSBOURNE and BLACK SABBATH and set up the popular encyclopedic rock music web site Rockdetector (since renamed Musicmight) — died at his home on Friday (March 12) after suffering an aneurism.

Andrew Keen is no stranger to controversy. He has irritated bloggers by equating Web 2.0 with communism and enraged citizen journalists with his best selling book, Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet is Killing Our Culture. Naturally when I saw Keen's core conversation "Is Innovation Fair?" on the SXSW program, I knew it would incite lively discussion.

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SXSW and the term "read-write web" are perhaps the antithesis of what Keen has become known for. While we as a publication (and often as a community) celebrate the participatory culture of Web 2.0, Keen sees the rise of amateur publishers as the fetishism of change-based culture and the breakdown of centralized moral authority. In less diplomatic circles, he's accused of being an elitist. When an intimate 40 person setting of bloggers like Stealthmode Partners' Francine Hardaway and legendary futurist Bruce Sterling failed to erupt into an angry mob, I was surprised.

In addressing the question "Is Innovation Fair?" Keen maintains that there is no definitive answer. He says, "If you asked a peasant whether innovation was fair during the industrial revolution, he'd answer no. But history is written by innovators."

Keen explains that the voices that have legitimized change from the industrial revolution to the late 60's, have been those of the cultural elite. Professional poets, musicians, academics and writers have always had a place in creating the histories surrounding major paradigm shifts. Nevertheless, as the digital revolution rapidly destroys the barriers to creating historical narratives, a new elitism has emerged in the form of a-list bloggers, social media experts and web developers.

While digital utopians generally see technological innovations and social media as vehicles for democracy and positive solutions, Keen argues that the proponents of innovation tend to forget the victims of change.

"Innovation doesn't lead to justice and fairness. I'd argue there is a more dramatic inequality now then there ever was during the industrial revolution. We have fetishized change, but we are unfettered. If anything, the new media is less transparent and less accountable...I don't have a problem with Twitter or new media, my problem is that digital utopians have dressed up their ideology to sound like democracy...Google has become the master of seeming like an altruistic and public company and yet laughing all the way to the bank."

Keen argues that because established elites are being displaced by the digerati, the web ecosystem is suffering from a crisis in authority. He believes that a lack of thoughtful skepticism and the overwhelming emphasis on real-time sound bites rather than academic treatise is leading to the vast majority of netizens consuming only mulched versions of the truth.

Says Keen, "You can't get nuggets of truth in 30 seconds on Twitter...Skepticism requires deep thinking. We have an increasing nihilism when it comes to traditional authority and yet few of the new authorities are doing the reading or groundwork. ...When we simply assume that all traditional structures are wrong, we risk the populism of a Sarah Palin..."

As a blog with an audience of entrepreneurs, self-publishers and technologists, we know Keen won't hold you back from innovating. But he may make you question whether or not you have enough information to accurately assess your life decisions. Love him or loathe him, let us know your thoughts about Keen's assertions in the comments below.

Discuss

Not unless you think Crocs, an anorak and a cowboy shirt is a good look

I am angry. Fashion angry! There is a policy in my workplace that I feel is reverse discrimination. Although all staff are asked to dress smartly, only men are asked to wear a collar. I have smart jumpers and T-shirts that I feel would be suitable, but the company disagrees. The office womenfolk on the other hand can wear what they like, and I see everything from Topshop floral dresses to H&M vest tops to knock-off Chanel suits. Why can this fashion liberty not be extended to the less fair sex?

Name withheld by editorial decision

Now, before we deal with the anger – fashion anger – I think we have to deal with the interesting story behind this letter. For this is not just any letter, readers – it's not even just an M&S letter – it's a letter from a rival news- paper. That's right; such was this correspondent's sense of anger with his employer, or desire to self-sabotage, that he sent it from his work email address, with his name, address and job title affixed to the bottom.

Well, this column was astounded (and impressed – we don't have that job title thingy attached to our emails). And a little flummoxed: who would have expected our female rivals at this very downmarket rag to have the nous to wear Chanel-style suits, knock-off or not? H&M vests sound about right, Topshop floral dresses – sure, at a push. But the legacy of Coco? Living on in cough, cough? Golly. Even more unfathomable is the idea of a newspaper with a male dress code, but that might be because, in my office, a hint of polish on a brown shoe is seen not so much as pushing the boat out as requisitioning the whole fleet.

Anyway, after much gleeful gazing upon the hard kernel of power now lying in my hand, which could (possibly) allow me to bring down a rival paper and (more likely) get a correspondent into mortal trouble at work, my inner Sesame Street muppet reared its head and said: "Hey! Don't print his name. Be nice! And always share your toys!"

So anyway, thoughtfully anonymised correspondent, to your query. As much as it does not behove me to defend a rival paper's policy, I must confess that I agree with it. Give a man an inch in the fashion stakes and he will take a mile, some Crocs, an ugly, brightly coloured messenger bag, and probably an anorak, too. Men need strictly controlled perimeters in which to dress. Women don't. This is not (entirely) men's fault, but a result of men's high-street options being so dire that they are apt to go astray and rock up at work one day in a cowboy shirt because Topman told them it was a good idea.

So in this instance, oh rebellious journalist colleague, I must counsel you to break your career-long habit of questioning authority, gritting your teeth against the winds of established wisdom, and just kowtow to the man, dude. In this instance, he knows best.

Oh, you don't like your fashion choices being dictated by others for the sake of propriety? You feel that the other sex get an easier ride? Resent being the patronised sex? Anonymous correspondent, welcome to life as a woman. Who would have expected such a gender-bender experimentation and open-minded busting of cultural conventions from cough, cough, cough.

I have recently noticed that a large percentage of male cyclists have adopted baggy, just-below-the-knee shorts with black woollen leggings beneath. You must know people. Please, please pull strings.

Neil, by email

I do know people, Neil, but I don't know if any of these people have the necessary power to rectify the international blight that is bicycle-wear. I move in very humble circles.

Now, this is turning out to be a very conformist week for this column because, after defending a rival paper's fashion policy, I'm now going to defend this cycling look and, believe you me, I have about as much empathy with cyclists as I do with far inferior so-called rivals. Nonetheless, let's consider what the alternative would be to this, admittedly, upsetting doubled-up trouser look, Neil. On the one hand, just the shorts: it could get a little breezy for some parts of the anatomy, if you catch my drift. On the other, just the leggings: a bit too much "and here's the shape of what I have to offer", if you catch this second drift.

So really, it is a question of welcoming rare modesty from the cycling community, Neil, and this week, wearing a conformist cap (I'm thinking a bit of Maoist chic here), I welcome the conservatism.

· Post your questions to Hadley Freeman, Ask Hadley, The Guardian, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU. Email ask.hadley@guardian.co.uk

• Fashion
• Men's fashion
• Cycling

Hadley Freemanguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Imedi TV broadcaster provokes panic with report claiming Russian attack in progress

Switching on their TV sets at 8pm on Saturday, Georgians were greeted with incredible news – Russia had invaded. The pro-government Imedi TV station reported that Russian tanks were once more trundling into Georgia. Not only that, but the country's pro-western leader Mikheil Saakashvili had been murdered, the station said.

For the next half an hour there were scenes of absolute panic, as the mobile network collapsed, Georgians spilled on to the streets, and friends and relatives desperately tried to reach each other and seek out information. In fact, they needn't have bothered.

The report, it turned out, was a hoax. The Kremlin hadn't invaded and Saakashvili, it emerged, was very much alive. Not since Orson Welles persuaded Americans that the Martians had landed, during his hysteria-sparking War of the Worlds radio broadcast, had a whole nation been so duped.

Today furious opposition politicians denounced the TV stunt as dangerous and irresponsible. Angry residents in the capital, Tbilisi, gathered outside the offices of Imedi TV, hours after the report flashed erroneously around the world. Saakashvili, however, was unapologetic. He declared that the threat of Russian attack remained "very realistic".

Zaza Gachechiladze, editor-in-chief of the Georgian Messenger newspaper, said: "People were completely shocked. I was driving to my friend's party when I got a phone call telling me to turn on the TV.

"I rushed upstairs. There was Dmitry Medvedev saying that Russia was intervening in Georgia. I didn't notice this was old footage from August 2008. I immediately started looking for my children."

Gachechiladze said it took him 10 minutes to establish the story was, as he put it, "bullshit". He added: "It was a very cruel simulation. One lady whose son was in the army had a heart attack and died. Another pregnant lady lost her baby. Many children were taken to hospital suffering from stress. It was horrible what happened, actually. It is a criminal act that should be punished."

Over in Moscow, Russia's state news agency, Interfax, flashed news of the apparent invasion and Saakashvili's demise. British and American correspondents abandoned their dinner parties, phoned their editors in London, and began hunting for their flak jackets. It was left to David Cracknell, a seasoned former senior reporter on the Sunday Times now working for the Georgian government, to kill the story. He sent journalists a laconic SMS. It read simply: "Not true."

But for many Georgians the threat of a Russian invasion remains hauntingly real, given the five-day conflict of August 2008. Georgian tanks attempted to seize back the rebel province of South Ossetia, prompting a punitive pan-Georgian Russian invasion. Russian troops continue to occupy breakaway Abkhazia and South Ossetia – a short drive away from Tbilisi, down a scenic mountain valley lined with walnut trees and orchards.

Relations with Russia have scarcely improved since Vladimir Putin, Russia's prime minister, notoriously told Nicolas Sarkozy during the Russo-Georgian conflict that he planned to hang Saakashvili "by the balls". Few observers, however, expect Russia to launch another attack since it achieved most of its geopolitical goals last time.

They included thwarting Georgia's attempts to join Nato, humiliating Saakashvili and – by proxy – his backers in the US, and avenging the west's decision to recognise Kosovo, a move Moscow bitterly resents. (Russia got its own back by recognising South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent. So far, though, only Venezuela, Nicaragua and the tiny Pacific guano island of Nauru have followed Moscow's lead.)

Nearly two years on, Georgia's unhappy war with its mighty neighbour continues to divide Georgians and polarise society. Saakashvili insists his South Ossetian offensive was a desperate response to a long-planned and already under way Russian assault. Georgia's opposition accuses Saakashvili of criminal recklessness. It says that since coming to power in the 2003 Rose revolution Saakashvili has turned from liberal reformer to nationalist autocrat.

It is no coincidence that Imedi TV's extraordinary broadcast came days after Georgia's opposition leader, Nino Burdzhanadze, held talks in Moscow with Putin, and called for the restoration of ties. Announcing that Russia had bombed Georgian airports and seaports, the 30-minute bulletin said that Burdzhanadze had taken power. The broadcast appears to be an ill-conceived dig at Georgia's opposition, before important elections for a mayor of Tbilisi in late May.

Georgia's interior ministry conceded that the broadcast had caused "great panic". Cinemas in Tbilisi emptied as parents called their children home. However, Georgy Arveladze, the head of Georgia Media Production Holding which owns Imedi, said the aim of the broadcast had been to show the "real threat" of how events might unfold. The station said it had indicated the broadcast was a scenario – but the distinction appears to have been lost on most viewers.

Russia and its state-controlled media have long portrayed Saakashvili as a dangerous tie-chewing maniac. Today gleeful Kremlin politicians seized on the TV channel's stunt to ram home their view that Georgia's leader was indeed deranged. Russia's envoy to Nato, Dmitry Rogozin, dubbed it "criminal", and said the western military alliance should have nothing to do with Georgia's erratic president.

Imedi TV used to be Georgian's main independent TV station. Saakashvili, however, took the channel off the air after falling out with its owner, the oligarch and opposition presidential candidate Badri Patarkatsishvili. After Patarkatsishvili's death in exile in England in 2008, Sakaashvili handed the station over to a government supporter. It now regularly screens pro-government opinion.

• Georgia
• Russia
• Broadcasting deception
• The news on TV
• TV news

Luke Hardingguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Can Matt Damon's half-fiction set the benchmark for a popular history of the Iraq war?

Now is the moment for the Iraqi war film. Less than a week after the low-budget The Hurt Locker won Oscars for best picture and best director, Paul Greengrass's big-budget Green Zone has hit the screens. Following a series of Iraq war flops, the latest efforts show how the fictional Iraq has the potential to overshadow the reality.

Indeed, last week BBC News at Ten featured an interview with Matt Damon about his portrayal of Warrant Officer Miller, a soldier looking for WMDs in Iraq, while not reporting on a multiple bombing in Baghdad that killed more than 30 people.

It can be argued that such adrenaline-fuelled dramatisations of the conflict distance people from any ability to understand actual events. And yet, effective filmmaking can unearth the guilt at the heart of the Iraq war in a way other mediums struggle to reach.

The film will be instantly criticised as Bourne in Baghdad. Yet that is not necessarily a bad thing as Miller, like Bourne, is an establishment figure whose moral compass won't tolerate the attempt by senior US administration figures to cover up the absence of WMDs, as he says: "I came here to find weapons and save lives".

While it takes a near-death experience and amnesia for Bourne to join the good guys, Miller is driven by the tragedy of realising the he has been betrayed by sections of his own government. The film is a warning against putting too much trust in government decision-making. Director Greengrass spoke of his drive to make the film by explaining that "I genuinely believed Blair".

Yet the casting of a Hollywood A-lister as its hero is a reminder, if ever you needed it, that "the American soldier" can walk away from this war with his reputation intact, something that cannot be said to be true of the politicians and media. Indeed, despite the fictional conspiracy concept at its core, the film keeps regular connections with reality in the characters of WMD-duped US journalist Lawrie Dayne (representing the New York Times's Judith Miller) and the exiled Chalabi-type figure returning triumphantly to govern over a divided nation.

The film's premise strikes at the heart of the Iraq adventure; that the neocons in the US administration used a combination of cherry-picked intelligence and cooperative exile groups to topple Saddam's regime.

However, this is not a film solely about WMDs; it expands into investigating what triggered the descent into civil war and insurgency that followed the invasion. It traces the marginalisation of the Sunni military elites from the building of the new Iraq by the process of de-Ba'athification and the disbanding of the security forces, announced proudly at a Green Zone press conference as "former regime elements" (FRE) watch on. Mark Urban's recent book, Task Force Black, revealed the role and independence of Special Forces operating against FREs – another aspect of the conflict that Green Zone manages to cram in.

Critics have already attacked Green Zone; Peter Bradshaw wrote that it lacked a "passionate flame", while Joe Queenan dismissed the film as a "cartoon" with a political context. This brushes over the writing that informed it. The film is "inspired" by the prize-winning book, Imperial Life in the Emerald City by Rajiv Chandrasekaran, but Greengrass was clear that the narrative surrounding the internal tussles within the US administration was a nod to the books by Bob Woodward and Ron Suskind. The strength of Chandresekaran's book was the ability to look in depth at life in the Green Zone bubble where "bars were stocked with cold beer" and a disco was filled with women in hot pants. Although Green Zone alludes to the surreal nature of the American occupation, the hectic pace of the movie prevents it slowing down to truly investigate.

Instead, what makes Green Zone effective as a mass vehicle for highlighting the insanity surrounding elements of the drive to war is that it can stand alone as a typically enjoyable Bourne film, complete with Greengrass's classic urban chase scenes and shaky hand-camera work. Powerful entertainment packs a bigger punch than the bureaucratic mundane process of the Chilcot inquiry.

Hollywood's portrayal of Iraq can be contrasted to a media whose credibility was severely tarnished by its inability to hold power to account on the road to war, and politicians whose lame attempts at inquiries into the conflict have still to draw true accountability into the mistakes made.

Ultimately what gives the film its credibility is that it avoids any simplistic idea that Iraq could have simply been "got right". Indeed Miller's vision of exposing the WMD conspiracy and the CIA's plan to keep the Iraq army is undermined by the film's wildcard – a nationalist Shia war veteran who turns the plot on its head before delivering the killer line to the Americans when he tells them: "It's not up to you to determine what happens in this country."

• Iraq
• Paul Greengrass
• Middle East

James Denselowguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

The latest Pew Internet & American Life Project report, “Understanding the Participatory News Consumer,”  examines how Americans are increasingly using their social networks and social networking technology to filter, assess, and react to news.

News consumption is a socially-engaging and socially-driven activity, especially online. The public is clearly part of the news process now. Participation comes more through sharing than through contributing news themselves. Getting news is often an important social act. Some 72% of American news consumers say they follow the news because they enjoy talking with others about what is happening in the world and 69% say keeping up with the news is a social or civic obligation. And 50% of American news consumers say they rely to some degree on people around them to tell them the news they need to know. Online, the social experience is widespread: ! 75% of online news consumers say they get news forwarded through email or posts on social networking sites and 52% say they share links to news with others via those means. ! 51% of social networking site (e.g. Facebook) users who are also online news consumers say that on a typical day they get news items from people they follow. Another 23% of this cohort follow news organizations or individual journalists on Pew Internet & American Life Project Understanding the Participatory News Consumer | 6 ! 75% of online news consumers say they get news forwarded through email or posts on social networking sites and 52% say they share links to news with others via those means. ! 51% of social networking site (e.g. Facebook) users who are also online news consumers say that on a typical day they get news items from people they follow. Another 23% of this cohort follow news organizations or individual journalists on social networking sites. Some 37% of internet users have contributed to the creation of news, commentary about it, or dissemination of news via social media. They have done at least one of the following: commenting on a news story (25%); posting a link on a social networking site (17%); tagging content (11%), creating their own original news material or opinion piece (9%), or Tweeting about news (3%).

The report says:

“News consumption is a socially-engaging and socially-driven activity, especially online. The public is clearly part of the news process now. Participation comes more through sharing than through contributing news themselves.

“Getting news is often an important social act. Some 72% of American news consumers say they follow the news because they enjoy talking with others about what is happening in the world and 69% say keeping up with the news is a social or civic obligation. And 50% of American news consumers say they rely to some degree on people around them to tell them the news they need to know. Online, the social experience is widespread:

• 75% of online news consumers say they get news forwarded through email or posts on social networking sites and 52% say they share links to news with others via those means.
• 51% of social networking site (e.g. Facebook) users who are also online news consumers say that on a typical day they get news items from people they follow.
• Another 23% of this cohort follow news organizations or individual journalists on on social networking sites and 52% say they share links to news with others via those means.
• 51% of social networking site (e.g. Facebook) users who are also online news consumers say that on a typical day they get news items from people they follow.
• Another 23% of this cohort follow news organizations or individual journalists on social networking sites.

• Some 37% of internet users have contributed to the creation of news, commentary about it, or dissemination of news via social media. They have done at least one of the following: commenting on a news story (25%); posting a link on a social networking site (17%); tagging content (11%), creating their own original news material or opinion piece (9%), or Tweeting about news (3%).

I kind of hesitate to review this, but I will anyway. I'll explain below the jump!

MPD-Psycho is written by Eiji Otsuka, drawn by Sho-U Tajima, translated by Kumar Sivasubramanian, and lettered by Steve Dutro. Dark Horse publishes the English version, and nine volumes have come out. There's part of the problem. The most recent volume came out last May, a tenth volume has not been solicited, and there doesn't seem to be any news about it coming out. It seems that there aren't many more volumes to go before the series is completed, so it seems strange that Dark Horse hasn't continued publishing it. It makes it difficult to recommend the series, because I have no idea if it's going to finish, and it ends on a bit of a cliffhanger.

MPD-Psycho is a fairly wacky comic that begins with a multiple personality disorder sufferer (hence the title) and then goes sideways into far weirder areas. In some ways, that's fine, but in other ways, the accretion of governmental conspiracy takes the focus away from the main character, and whereas series that I will highlight later in this mini-feature of manga reviews handle that better, Otsuka isn't quite as good at it. The main character, we think, is a police detective named Yosuke Kobayashi, who in the first few pages is being sentenced to a jail term for "professional negligence resulting in death." As he stands to be sentenced, he tells the court that he is, indeed, Kazuhiko Amamiya, not Kobayashi. Then we go back in time and see him as Kobayashi, who's working a murder case. The killer delivers a large cooler to him one day, inside which is his girlfriend, dismembered but still alive. Then we go back to the present, where he's in prison. He's no longer Kobayashi in prison, he's Amamiya. So far, so good. A woman, Machi Isono, visits him to get profiles of various cases she's working on. She gives the profiles to his old partner, Sasayama, who's somewhat incompetent . She's also bothered by a freelance journalist, Toguchi, who gives her a videotape showing the "birth" of Amamiya and the crime for which he was imprisoned - he tracks down the killer and shoots him. In that moment, we realize that there are three personalities in his head - Kobayashi, Amamiya, and the one who pulled the trigger, Shinji Nishizono. Still all clear?

Machi offers Amamiya a job when he gets out of jail at her private criminal research lab. This is where the series takes its first real twist. A murderer Machi has been profiling (with Amamiya's help) turns out to be a female cannibal, and when the cops pick her up, she commits suicide using a razor she had hidden in her mouth. Toguchi is there to film it, and he gets close enough to look under her left eyelid and see a bar code there. The bar code becomes part of the central mystery of the book: What is it, what does it mean, and how are all the people who have one (and there are many) linked? Otsuka keeps piling weird stuff on weird stuff, but he does manage to keep things on track. This is a government conspiracy book, so things are never what they seem, but when you read all the volumes at once, you see the grand scheme much more plainly (at least, as much as Otsuka has shown us so far). One of the ridiculous things about conspiracy books is that everyone is in on it, and MPD-Psycho, unfortunately, doesn't escape that cliché, as people keep showing up who are plotting something behind the scenes. The mystery is fine - the entire enterprise has something to do with a 1960s folk singer who also happened to be a terrorist - but like all conspiracy stories, every so often the reader has to roll his or her eyes when the coincidences (that aren't, of course, actually coincidences) pile up. But if you can deal with that, you can enjoy this.

Otsuka and Tajima make sure that this world is dangerous - it's a violent manga, to be sure, but that's not surprising. What's interesting about MPD-Psycho is that no one is safe, not even children (who are, throughout the book, often the perpetrators of horrible violence). Amamiya himself isn't even safe! It keeps the tension high in the book and adds to the sense of not knowing who's who. Even seemingly innocuous characters might turn out to have a bar code on their eyeballs and become crazed killers. You're never quite comfortable reading MPD-Psycho, which is somewhat refreshing. With my last selection, Gantz, you expect everyone to die. With later selections, there are certain characters you're reasonably sure are safe. With this book, you never really know. It's fun!

Otsuka manages to keep the book from being all grim and angry by including Sasayama, who's a nice comic figure. Sasayama uses Machi Isono early in the series to get profiling information from the imprisoned Amamiya because he's not very good at his job, and then he allies with her and Amamiya to solve cases, but he's still not very good at it. He's a goofy character, but this book needs something like that, someone to point out the absurdity of what's happening before the reader does. Yes, in Sasayama's world, people are actually dying horribly and people are turning others into killers, but it's still a little ridiculous, and Sasayama is Otsuka's way of winking at the audience. It's good to deflate the insanity a bit, and it keeps the book from taking itself way too seriously.

As difficult as it is for me to discuss American artists, it's even more difficult to discuss manga artists. One of the reasons I resisted manga for so long is because whenever I saw the art, it featured the same style of art - the big eyes, goofy expressions of extreme emotions, and too many speed lines to deal with. Obviously, I've learned better, but it's still hard for me to really express what's going on artistically in these manga. Tajima is a fine artist, but he doesn't have, to me, a wildly distinctive style. There's a lot of photo-referencing in this book for the long shots of Tokyo or Manila, and the violence is nice and gory, but he also slides into the extreme expressions that I associate with manga art at odd times, when they don't seem to match the words or even the situations of the book. I enjoy the art quite a bit, but I'm not very good at explaining what's good and bad about it. Sorry.

The biggest disappointment about MPD-Psycho is that Otsuka ignores the multiple personality stuff, for the most part. I don't mean that Amamiya doesn't show his other personalities, just that it doesn't seem to have much impact on the story except to allow him to do horrible things. The real focus of the story is personalities and how they can be manipulated, which fits into the set-up at the beginning, but Machi Isono and Sasayama don't seem terribly perturbed that Kobayashi suddenly starts manifesting all these personalities, some a lot more evil than the Kobayashi one. We get a perfunctory connection between the personalities, but they don't do much more investigation into what's really going on with their comrade. The main plot distracts them, of course, but it seems weird that the fact that Amamiya suddenly turns into the crazed Nishizono, for instance, doesn't faze them in the least. It's not a book that delves into the psychological too much, nor does it pretend to be, but it's somewhat weird, given the major theme of the series.

As I wrote, MPD-Psycho seems to be stuck in limbo with regard to the rest of the series, and that's a shame. It's a wildly entertaining roller coaster ride of a story, and the ninth volume ends with some interesting cliffhangers, so I'd like to see where it all ends up. We shall see if Dark Horse sees fit to bring out the rest of it. That would be nice.

Next: Something that will probably end up being higher on the list, but it's a bit too soon to tell!

It's SXSW weekend so you may be pretty burnt out on conferences - or just sick and tired of hearing about them - but if you're in New York City this week, don't miss what's sure to be a profound and fascinating A Historic Conversation in NYC: Ai Weiwei, Jack Dorsey & Richard MacManus

On March 15, at the prestigious Paley Center in New York City, a conversation will take place between Chinese digital activist and artist Ai Weiwei, Twitter co-founder and chairman Jack Dorsey, and ReadWriteWeb's Richard MacManus, ReadWriteWeb founder and editor in chief. The moderator will be Orville Schell, the director of the Center on U.S.-China Relations at the Asia Society in New York.
The topic of the event is the emergence of digital activism for fostering positive social change. The onsite event is invitation only, but it will be live streamed exclusively on ReadWriteWeb on Monday, March 15, at 6:30 PM EST (-5 GMT), from the Paley Center for Media, New York City.

15 – 16 March 2010: London, England

2nd Annual Social Networking World Forum — London

The 2nd Annual Social Networking World Forum takes place at the Olympia Conference Centre in London. The two-day event features four dedicated conference streams:

• Social Networking World Forum
• Enterprise social media
• Social TV World Forum
• Mobile Social Networking Forum

The event features key speakers from global brands, organizations, social networking publishers and developers, pioneering social media leaders, top agencies, content producers, and more.

• Full workshop program within exhibition area
• Evening networking reception
• Pre-show online meeting planner for delegates
• Free pass for exhibition only

22 – 26 March 2010: New York City

Search Engine Strategies New York Conference & Expo

Go beyond search at Search Engine Strategies New York. Learn the newest trends, strategic action plans, and technology that industry leaders are employing today. Our experts will trace the natural evolution of search exploring topics such as: digital asset optimization, mobile application development, transition from search to discovery and more.Book your pass today. Enter RWW15 to save 15% off the registration. Sessions include:

• Digital Asset Optimization
• Deep Dive Into Analytics
• Augmented Reality: It's a Brave New World
• Bringing SEO In-House: The Pros and Cons
• Advanced B2B Search Marketing
• Duplicate Content & Multiple Site Issues

23 March 2010: San Francisco, California

S.F. Beta 4.0

After a long winter's hiatus, S.F. Beta is back, for its forth year straight! Join hundreds of founders, investors, developers, and technologists for a lively evening of demos, drinks, conversation, and new connections. Early bird tickets are available, and they're going fast. Register now for discounted admission. As always, we feature startup demos all night. This time around, the theme is Search & Discovery. If you're building the next Google (or the next Google acquisition), we want you here! Email cperry@sfbeta.com for more info.

26 March 2010: San Francisco, California

Freemium Summit

The first Freemium Summit is a one day event focused on exploring what it takes to succeed under the freemium business model. Across all segments of the media landscape, entrepreneurs and executives are pioneering models that combine a free offering with a premium, paid offering. This hybrid business model is one of the most exciting areas of business model innovation impacting the world of media and the Freemium Summit will explore the most important topics on the minds of leading practitioners.

Confirmed Speakers: Toni Schneider, Automattic (WordPress); Matt Brezina, Xobni; Aaron Levie, Box.net; Phil Libin, Evernote; Tom Conrad, Pandora; Drew Houston, Dropbox; Ranjith Kumaran, YouSendIt; Ben Chestnut, Mailchimp; Lance Walley, Chargify; Isaac Hall, Recurly; and Lincoln Murphy, Sixteen Ventures.

March 29, 2010: Portland, Oregon

Social Fresh Portland

The social media conference for marketers, Social Fresh is not about concept, but focused purely on case studies from the front lines. Learn what social media can really do for business bottom lines. Over the course of the day, you'll hear from 35 speakers from companies like Intel, Ford, Comcast, Nike and many more, as well as keynote Peter Shankman. Register now and use coupon code RWW15 for 15% off.

4 April 2010: Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburg, Pennsylvania

ConnectNow

TEDx CMU is an independently organized TEDx event that will be held on April 4th, 2010 at Carnegie Mellon University and will feature a full day of talks by prominent speakers as well as recorded videos from past TEDTalks. Confirmed speakers include Jonathan Fields (author, blogger and entrepreneur), Stacey Monk (founder of Epic Change, a startup nonprofit), Chase Jarvis (photographer, director and social artist) and Nathan Martin (CEO of Deeplocal, an innovation studio in Pittsburgh).

The theme of the event is "Fearless", and we are inviting speakers from cross-disciplinary backgrounds to talk about their experiences, and tell us a little about what inspires them to be fearless in the pursuit of goals. We hope to spark discussions and foster connections between participants, encouraging aspiring individuals to follow their dreams and make a difference. The event is free to attend, and the application deadline is March 21, 2010.

For more information about the event, visit tedxcmu.com or email info@tedxcmu.com. You can also find TEDx CMU on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

7 – 9 April 2010: Sydney, Australia

ConnectNow

ConnectNow brings together international specialists and thought leaders in social media, emerging technologies and their intersection with business. Learn how the realtime web, location based services, augmented reality, ubiquitous computing and personalised services are changing marketing and communications. Understand the importance of trust in relationship marketing and what is "social currency". For more info email info@connectnow.net.au.

13 – 15 April 2010: Dallas, Texas

PubCon South

PubCon, the premier search and social media conference, features the industry's biggest names and key players shaping the future of the Web. PubCon South will include cutting-edge panel sessions exploring tracks dedicated to search, social media and affiliate marketing, an intensive professional search and social media training program, and some of the world's top keynote speakers. PubCon South at Dallas will also hold a one-day, two-track slate of intensive educational training programs led by some of the industry's most respected search professionals. The event takes place at the Richardson Conference and Civic Center. Register here.

16 April 2010: Mountain View, California

Under the Radar: Cloud

Under the Radar: Cloud is must-attend event for dealmakers and heads of IT from large enterprises, SMBs, service providers, carriers and media companies who are responsible for helping their companies leverage new technology and innovation in the fast-evolving IT ecosystem. Join us for the 15th Under the Radar conference, featuring a hand-picked selection of the world's most innovative cloud startups among 350 top tech, media, telcom and finance executives. For ticket and more information, visit http://undertheradarblog.com.

16 – 17 April 2010: Royal Oak, Michigan

FutureMidwest

FutureMidwest is the region's largest technology and knowledge conference. Founded by Adrian Pittman, Jordan Wolfe and Zach Lipson, FutureMidwest is the fusion of two successful conferences held in Michigan in 2009 - the Module Midwest Digital Conference and TechNow.

Both conferences highlighted how technology and digital tools have dramatically changed the way we do business and the effect this transition has had on companies. FutureMidwest kicks things up a notch with presentations, group breakout sessions, relationship-building opportunities and influencers who are taking action to redefine business in the digital age. Register here.

April 19, 2010: St. Louis Missouri

Social Fresh St. Louis

The social media conference for marketers, Social Fresh is not about concept, but focused purely on case studies from the front lines. Learn what social media can really do for business bottom lines. Over the course of the day you'll hear from 35 speakers from companies like Ford, Best Buy, Scottrade, Hardees, CMT and many more. Register now and use coupon code RWW15 for 15% off.

19 – 21 April 2010: San Francisco, California

DrupalCon

DrupalCon is the premier conference focused on Drupal, the award-winning open source content management framework that is galvanizing social publishing and web development today. For a registration fee of $195, attendees get three full days of sessions led by the best and brightest Drupal experts.

Drupal has been downloaded over 2 million times since its inception, and project growth has doubled annually for several years. Drupal is used to deliver a wide variety of application types including blogs, wikis, community networks, digital media portals, and web content publishing and management.

26 April 2010: San Francisco, California

Future of Money and Technology Summit

The Future of Money & Technology Summit will bring together the best and brightest thinkers around money, including visionaries, entrepreneurial business people, developers, press, investors, authors, solution/service providers, and organizations who work where cash and commerce collide. We meet to discuss the evolving ecosystem around money in a proactive, conducive to dealmaking environment. Featured speakers include Jolie O'Dell from ReadWriteWeb, as well as representatives from Wells Fargo Bank, Kiva, SharesPost, Jambool, Founders Fund, Outright.com, SoftTech VC, and many more.

Use discount code "rww" to get 10% off registration.

7 May 2010: Mountain View, California

ReadWriteWeb Mobile Summit 2010

The ReadWriteWeb Mobile Summit 2010 will be an exploration of the latest Mobile development trends - both the technology and the emerging business applications. Get ready to explore, think and create the future of Mobile with the brightest in the industry, your peers! As in our last Summit, The Real-Time Web, the ReadWriteWeb Mobile Summit is an unconference.

An unconference is a participant driven conference where the agenda is created on the day, in real-time and discussions are lead by conference participants. Read about the history of unconferences.

We will have two main tracks at this Summit - Development and Business - so the Summit will be of interest to managers, marketers, developers, innovators, entrepreneurs and thought leaders alike. Here's a sample of some of the topics we'll explore in both of these tracks.

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• Geo-location services - what can you do using location as a platform?
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• Commerce & Marketing - as more and more consumers use smartphones, how can businesses utilize this channel?
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• Content, Publishing & Recommendations - the technologies and best practices.
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• Mobile Social Networking - how to tap into communities on mobile devices.
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• Internet of Things - the emerging opportunities from sensor and RFID data.
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• Augmented Reality - the technology and business applications of AR.
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• Native App vs. Browser Based - Including iPhone, Android, RIM, Palm, Windows Mobile and Symbian.
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Click here to register now, or to become a sponsor, or to help shape the conference.

11 May 2010: San Francisco, California

FinovateSpring

FinovateSpring 2010 will again showcase the most cutting-edge financial and banking technology innovations to Silicon Valley and the world. With Finovate's signature mix of short, fast-paced onstage demos (no slides are allowed) from handpicked companies and intimate networking time with their executives, this conference packs a ton of unique value into a single day.

Come see the cutting edge of banking and financial technology and network with hundreds of the leading financial executives, venture capitalists, press, industry analysts, bloggers and fintech entrepreneurs. Early bird registration rates are available.

May 17 2010: San Francisco, California

SF MusicTech Summit

The SF MusicTech Summit will bring together 700-plus visionaries in the music/technology space - the best and brightest entrepreneurs, developers, investors, service providers, journalists, musicians and organizations who work with them at the convergence of culture and commerce. We meet to discuss the evolving music, business and technology ecosystem in a proactive, conducive-to-dealmaking environment. Enter the discount code "rww" to get 10% off.

25 – 27 May 2010: Denver, Colorado

Glue

Glue is the only conference devoted solely to exploring the problem-sets facing architects, developers and IT professionals in a "post-cloud" world. Glue focuses on the APIs and protocols (Twitter, Facebook, Websockets, PubSubHubBub, XMPP), formats and standards (RDF/Linked Data, JSON, Microformats, HTML5), platforms and providers (Amazon, Rackspace, Google App Engine, Salesforce.com, Eucalyptus), Identity Protocols (OAuth/WRAP, SAML, OpenID, SPML) emerging NoSQL data models (Cassandra, CouchDB, MongoDB, Riak, HBase), and other mechanisms that are building the post-cloud world.

ReadWriteCloud will be blogging live from Gluecon and CloudCamp, and ReadWriteWeb's Alex Williams will be moderating the "Managing Complexity in the Cloud" session. Please join us May 25-27 in Denver, Colorado. ReadWriteWeb readers can receive 10% off of registration by using the code "RWW12".

15 – 16 June 2010: New York City

Corporate Social Media Summit

The Corporate Social Media Summit is a two day conference focused exclusively on how big businesses can take advantage of social media to enhance their marketing/comms strategy. Featuring:

• Practical and relevant insights from peers who have already used social media successfully
• 20-plus corporate speakers (including PepsiCo, Whole Foods, Dell, McDonald's, General Motors, Citi, Johnson & Johnson),
• Best practice, benchmarks and practical next steps you can use to take advantage of social media in your business
• A tightly-focused agenda with 14 in-depth, practical workshops giving you knowledge on only the most critical business issues surrounding corporate use of social media

Save $400 if you quote RWW400 when booking. Book here.

29 – 30 June 2010: London

Cloud Computing World Forum

The 2nd annual Cloud Computing World Forum is the perfect event to learn and discuss the development, integration, adoption and(...)