Amsterdam

I finally left Toronto after about a month and am now at a small hotel, called Freeland, in Amsterdam which unbelievably provides free access to the internet.

I really had a good time in Toronto this time, mostly because I spent the last two weeks in my favorite neighbourhood around Queen St. West, near my favorite cafes and restaurants. (Vienna Bakery is my most most favorite.)

The reason I'm in Europe again, obviously, is a conference. This time it's called Expression under Repression which is about freedom of speech on the net and is organized by the progressive Dutch NGO, Hivos.

I'm going to speak at a panel on Wednesday at 15:45 on internet censorship in Iran. Jeff Jeff Ooi from Malaysia and Taurai Maduna from Zimbawa will be on the same panel as well. (Full program in Dutch)

The whole event will also be streamed live on its official website, if you're interested.

I'd also suggest you to check out stop.censoring.us, a blog I've created and kept with the help of some volunteers to watch internet censorship in Iran. I wish I had time to raise some funds for it so we could do a better job in documenting and reporting on Net censorship in Iran.