In the U.S. Alaa Ahmed Seif Al Islam would be a celebrated public intellectual, and would probably be a highly paid consultant. He’s an award-winning journalist-blogger, open source developer, and a human rights activist. On May 7, 2006, Alaa was beaten and jailed for participating in a protest to support a free, independent judiciary in Egypt.

The blogosphere has been abuzz with the hope that the combined efforts of online activists might be able to free Alaa. Journalactivist Jon Garfunkel has done some excellent in-depth analysis of the various strategies attempted by online activists, including his own foray into purchasing Google AdWords. Garfunkel makes an important observation: while online activists may get swept up in the crowd cause of the moment, their attention span is notoriously short. They don’t follow up on whether their effort actually worked. Alaa is still in jail.