This week once again offered a demonstration of true revolutionaries at work in Tunisia, where they forced Zine El Abidine Ben Ali from power, and Egypt, where demands for Mubarak to step down continue. Unfortunately, neither Twitter nor Facebook updates accomplished more than amplifying a hopeful echo around the world.
Blogging, micro-blogging and other social media are coming of age, but have they influenced these political protests? Is it true that Russians and President Medvedev found out about the carnage at Domodedovo Airport in Moscow through Twitter, as reported in the Financial Times?
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- Moscow bombings - the Financial Times loves social media BUT
This tweet was noted by the Financial Times as representing a situation in which Twitter is the best way to spread news among Russians.
The article also states that @Iplantov tweeted, "Medvedev, found out from Twitter what was going out at Demodedovo and prepared an electronic message."
Besides the fact that we were unable to find that tweet, did President Dmitry Medvedev really get such bad news through Twitter? Unless Ms Weaver checked with his office, why would she pass on such information? Most importantly, if it is true, we should all be seriously worried: can Mr Medvedev really take the time out of his day to scan his Twitter feed?
I would have thought his intel services informed him of the event within minutes of the bomb's detonation. He certainly was not checking his feed while giving a speech at this week's Wolrd Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos.
Did I miss something? Inquiring minds want to know, so please leave a comment!
This latest episode brings to mind
- a) The age of trivial minds that forget to double-check their news source(s) before touting what they consider news that is fit to print, and
b) The inflation of Twitter's importance as an information source in case of a political crisis or terrorist attack. The past is repeating itself one again - think Iran.
By the way, can you trust the information you get via social networks (see why Twitter was unimportant during the Iran election)?
Just as building trust as a blogger journalist, newspaper and/or brand takes lots of time, that trust is also fragile and can easily be destroyed by failure to check facts or confirm a source:
- Egypt and Tunisia: Twitter and al-Jazeera
As previously mentioned, Twitter's role in the Iranian protests was as fleeting as a retweet itself. When Iranian authorities clamped down on the 60 or so tweeters in Iran, the number dropped to six.
The Egyptian government decided not to risk even that and just cut off internet traffic (see below).
Another interesting thing we discovered during this week's Middle East turmoil was al-Jazeera's obviously careful consideration of Qatar's own diplomatic agenda before lashing out. Coverage of Tuesday's 'day of rage' was relatively moderate, compared with coverage of the revolt in Tunisia. And while the station reported little about the Egyptian crackdown against protesters and Mubarak's struggle stay in power, the station was busy campaigning against the Palestinian Authority.
- Bottom line - takeaways
The Internet once again showed its prowess at spreading news and images that may help the world feel connected, but in the larger scheme of things it was probably quite unimportant to those directly affected this week.
By Friday, pressure from citizen journalists, bloggers and social media pundits forced al-Jazeera to return to its old form while reporting about Egypt's streets. This clearly illustrates three things:
- 1. Protests happen with or without Twitter: the telecoms blackout may have stopped mobile communications, but it failed to stop the release of years of pent-up anger in Egypt's streets.
2. al-Jazeera DOES have an agenda - activists beware: we have to take al-Jazeera's reporting with a grain of salt, since the station submits to Qatari rulers' political interests, AND
3. Social media rarely matters during a civil uprising: social networks are not all pervasive and political change remains difficult to accomplish, with or without Twitter.
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Are you with me on these trends? Will Twitter and Facebook help change things for the better? What do you think? Please leave a comment; the floor is yours!