The British Library has signed a landmark deal with Google, making one of the largest collections of books and pamphlets in the world available and searchable online for the first time. Internet users will be able to search for and access the huge volume of out-of-copyright works for free for the first time on the Internet.

While today, one percent of online content is in Arabic, five percent of the world's online population speaks Arabic, and the number of Internet users who speak Arabic increased by an astonishing 2,298 per cent from 2000 to 2009, remarked Karim Sabbagh at Booz & Company for The National.

One of the greatest lessons in social media is that everything begins with listening and such is true for any form of leadership. Governments and their administrations have much to learn. Not only are new media channels rich with insight, they are also interactive. There are people on the other side who have expectations of recognition, acknowledgement, and engagement.

In a story yesterday the New York Times stirred up a huge amount of excitement about the so-called "Internet in a suitcase." The idea is that a relatively small amount of equipment could be parachuted (either literally or figuratively) into a region where one force is suppressing the ability of the general public to communicate using the Net. This is our newest tool for global information sharing.

We have two types of freedoms related to the Internet; freedom to access Internet and freedom of expression on the Internet. World leading economies have thrived on information systems and making them accessible to all citizens, therefore increasing their participation in the economy. A connected society is going to be more prosperous and stable.

Two years ago, Iranian activists used social media sites as engines to organize massive anti-government demonstrations. But now, activists say, the limitless freedoms available online are proving to be a distraction from real-world dissent.

The people of the United States and the people of Ireland are working together to find more ways to improve maternal and child nutrition in the 1,000 day window between pregnancy and when a child turns 2 years old, when nutrition is most critical for saving lives and promoting cognitive and physical development.

With a predominantly English speaking subscriber base, it has been hard to view Facebook’s demographics as representative of the Arab consumer. At the same time, no homegrown social network has been successful in appealing to Arabic language Internet users in numbers and the region’s Arabic language social media environment has remained a fragmented one. This is now changing: fast.