This Saturday, as violent protests about Iran's presidential election continued in the streets of Tehran, Howard Kurtz had an important scoop.The CNN anchor was moderating a discussion about Twitter's relevance in an increasingly internet-dependent society. As he made arguments about whether or not Twitter was a sign of our culture's impending narcissistic Tweet-pocalypse, the Iranian government was shutting down cell phone service and e-mail providers around the country. Journalists were being silenced and police were opening fire on dormitories at the University of Tehran. And one of the only ways to send information in Iran? Twitter.
The networking site formerly known for its ability to give self-important internetters a place to tell the world about their new haircut (I use it religiously...) has proved this weekend that it can also serve as an organizing tool for causes of the utmost importance, and a news outlet when the mainstream media can't get their shit together.
CNN can think what they want about Twitter; the revolution is here, and it's 140 characters.
You can follow Feminist Campus on Twitter here.
Andrew Sullivan's live feed of tweets from Iranians at the center of the conflict can be found here.
Photo Credit: twitter.com
2 comments:
Thanks for this. I just added it as a source to an article I wrote for the National Film Board of Canada's site, Work For All. We are indeed in the middle of a revolution.
http://workforall.nfb.ca/social-media-iran-election
Thank you, and thank you for linking to Mousavi's twitter in your article. It's going to be vital reading in the next few days.
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