In the digital 21st century, Jürgen Habermas’ public sphere and Marshall McLuhan’s global village have gone electronic, hence citizen journalism and the blogosphere. In 2006, TIME magazine named ‘YOU’ person of the year, calling the Web “a tool for bringing together the small contributions of millions of people and making them matter.” The ‘YOU’ person of 2011 – at least for this year’s World Economic Forum event – is Canadian video blogger and citizen journalist Shawn Ahmed.
This 27 year-old’s YouTube application video, which was chosen as winner of the Davos Debates out of some 100 applications. Ahmed “calls himself a free-agent, a bridge-maker who with a laptop and an internet connection has managed to link hundreds of thousands of people to help, in a concrete way, solve problems such as poverty, clean water and education in Asia and Africa.”
All you need to know about Ahmed and his project can be found via his blog “The Uncultured Project,” YouTube Channel UnculturedProject and verified Twitter page @uncultured.
Ahmed’s project gives voice to the voiceless in Bangladesh, exemplifying how one can change the world with a powerful cause and a video camera, all thanks to the medium of Internet.