Who still wears fur coats in 2005?
If you do, or know anyone who does, this is what you're supporting (the video is extremely harsh):

China's is the world's largest exporter of animal fur in the world. The country has no animal rights laws in place. Animal's are tortured, beaten and skinned alive. Why?

China, is though not alone. Canada is also at the forefront of the fur industry with it's annual carnage of seals.

You can stop this, not only by not buying fur yourself, but also by signing petitions addressed at your government to stop them from importing fur products.

A petition for the Italian Government to stop importing fur from China.
A petition to ban seal hunting in Canada.
Information on Petitions in other countries.
Report on the global fur industry(in German and Italian)

Here are some updates on winners, finalists and call for all key awards programmes that are going on around the world in these weeks!!

Finalists of the Stockholm Challenge Award 2003/2004 have been selected.
Projects show a clear emergence of information utility with an increasing mass-scale development of services and and problemsolving in the society through IT.
In this sixth edition of the Stockholm Challenge nearly 900 projects applied from 107 countries. The international jury has selected 103 finalists in the six categories:e-government, culture, health, education, e-business and environment.
Read about all finalists at www.challenge.stockholm.se

WINNERS OF THE CHALLENGE DIGITAL - CHILE 2003 ANNOUNCED The first Challenge competition in Chile celebrated their winners at a prize-giving ceremony in Santiago, Chile, in mid-December. The competition is launched by Fundación País Digital. Read more at http://www.challenge.stockholm.se/news_right.asp?IdNr=121

NEW DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS TO THE GLOBAL JUNIOR CHALLENGE The GLOBAL JUNIOR CHALLENGE, dedicated to all young people, from school children to teenagers and youth taking their first steps on the job market, has announced a new deadline for this year's competition - 30th June 2004. Read more at http://www.gjc.it

MOBILE TECHNOLOGY SAVES LIVES AND RESOURCES IN THE EMERGENCY WARD Innovative use of IT in health care and emergency situations save many lives every year, and many Swedish ICT Health projects show great progress. Read the column by Joakim Lind at http://www.challenge.stockholm.se/columnist_right.asp

THE DIGITAL VISION FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM AT STANFORD UNIVERSITY IS ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS FOR 2004-05 Digital Vision Fellows draw on the resources of Stanford University and Silicon Valley to create a sustainable technology project that serves a humanitarian purpose in the developing world. Successful candidates are professionals who wish to apply their skills to a humanitarian project, and program managers who are engaged in ICT projects in the developing world. Read more at http://www.challenge.stockholm.se/news_right.asp?IdNr=122

TECH MUSEUM AWARDING $250,000 IN CASH PRIZES - GLOBAL CALL FOR NOMINATIONS OF INNOVATORS USING TECHNOLOGY TO BENEFIT HUMANITY Nomination Deadline: April 5, 2004 The Tech Museum Awards is a unique and prestigious program that honours and awards innovators from around the world who use technology to benefit humanity in the categories of:
- Education
- Equality
- Economic Development
- Environment
- Health
Reward those making a difference and nominate today. Read more at http://techawards.thetech.org

Hi Everyone!
We've created (thanks Mike :-) a new page for WSIS that features news, pictures, participants and a blog around the Summit therefore allows all of those in Geneva and at home to have a window continously on the Summit and loads of tools for interaction!!!

Latest news from Geneva is that we've just finished the youth hub: it looks really cool! We'll send pictures as soon as Diogo finds his camera...