Welcome to MEC TV

Posted By Marc Lynch Saturday, January 21, 2012 - 9:06 PM Share

Welcome to the Middle East Channel Editors Vlog, or possibly MECTV, or the MEC-VLOG or -- if I get my way -- Aardvark TV! We're working on it. Whatever the name, I'm thrilled to announce the pilot episode of what we hope will be a weekly video blog hosted by me on the Middle East Channel. Hey, it worked for Justin Bieber, right?

We recorded the pilot episode this week. It touches on Syria (jump to 1:01), Yemen (4:15), and the war debate (7:08); talks about some of my favorite articles on the Channel last week (9:45), including Aili Tripp's overview of the debate on electoral quotas for women and Michael Hanna's fascinating counterfactual on whether the Arab spring would have toppled Saddam; and profiles my book of the week (10:40). As we sort out the tech issues, we'll insert chapter breaks so you can link directly to segments. We had some fun with this one, and I hope you all do too!

Not all the episodes are going to be quite so, um....well you can provide your own descriptor once you've watched it. Each episode will be different, and most will bring in guests to join the conversation. Most weeks I plan to respond to selected questions which readers pose on Twitter, in the comment section, or over email. I'll talk about MEC articles, and when possible get the authors on camera -- or at least on Skype -- to answer questions about them. We'll feature conversations with scholars, authors, policy makers, and folks from the Middle East who come through Washington. We'll feature a book every week, some to recommend and others not so much. We'll have fun.

A big part of the reason for doing this is the opportunity to interact with readers, so do tweet questions or suggestions for the show at me (@abuaardvark) or drop me a line. We're hoping that this will be fun as well as informative. Thanks for watching, and be kind as we work out the bugs!