Have you been following the role that Twitter is playing in the aftermath of the Iranian presidential election? I hope so. Today, Lev Grossman of TIME, files a story on the role Twitter is playing in mass communication (and the steps to which the government is trying to suppress it).
So what exactly makes Twitter the medium of the moment? It’s free, highly mobile, very personal and very quick. It’s also built to spread, and fast. Twitterers like to append notes called hashtags — #theylooklikethis — to their tweets, so that they can be grouped and searched for by topic; especially interesting or urgent tweets tend to get picked up and retransmitted by other Twitterers, a practice known as retweeting, or just RT. And Twitter is promiscuous by nature: tweets go out over two networks, the Internet and SMS, the network that cell phones use for text messages, and they can be received and read on practically anything with a screen and a network connection.
NYU professor and New Media guru Clay Shirkey participated in a TED interview on Twitter and Iran. The entire interview is worth a read, but pay close attention to this:
I’m always a little reticent to draw lessons from things still unfolding, but it seems pretty clear that … this is it. The big one. This is the first revolution that has been catapulted onto a global stage and transformed by social media. I’ve been thinking a lot about the Chicago demonstrations of 1968 where they chanted “the whole world is watching.” Really, that wasn’t true then. But this time it’s true … and people throughout the world are not only listening but responding. They’re engaging with individual participants, they’re passing on their messages to their friends, and they’re even providing detailed instructions to enable web proxies allowing Internet access that the authorities can’t immediately censor. That kind of participation is really extraordinary.
Twitter is playing such a huge role that the U.S. State Department contacted the social networking service and urged them to delay scheduled maintenance on the site. “We highlighted to them that this was an important form of communication,” said a State Department official of the conversation the department had with Twitter officials.
Thomas Friedman, in his column in The New York Times today, writes,
What is fascinating to me is the degree to which in Iran today — and in Lebanon — the more secular forces of moderation have used technologies like Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, blogging and text-messaging as their virtual mosque, as the place they can now gather, mobilize, plan, inform and energize their supporters, outside the grip of the state.
Naturally, I was concerned when none of this made into our local newscasts yesterday. However, today I did note this from Jessica Dean of KATV, via Twitter,
I really want to do a story on the effect Twitter is having in the #iranelection. Anyone involved? I need a local angle.
This is the largest social movement in the history of the world that has a substantial and vital online component. The ABC News headline from last night’s broadcast is illustritive of this point, “A Political Protest Wrapped in a Technological Revolution.” By magnitude alone it is affecting all of us, and particularly US foreign relations (There is an Arkansas connection in the State Department, if I recall). Like the Tiananman Square protests of 1989, everyone, even in Arkansas, should know about it.
Additionally, if you’re in Arkansas and you have access to a computer and an Internet connection you can engage and participate in what’s happening. As Ms. Dean notes, you can follow #iranelection for updates. You visit the growing presences on Facebook, including that of President Ahmadinejad and Ayatollah Khamenei. You can watch video on YouTube and share it with others. You can read Iran-based blogs. You can sign up for text messaging updates, although text messaging has been shut down in Iran. Many Arkansans (@markaelrod, for example) are doing this.
In our technological age the world is truly flat. As a result, international affairs can come to life on your laptop even if they’re happening a million miles away. Roadblocks to participation have been eviscerated. It’s time to go to school. Local news can play its part by informing. History, after all, has no geographic limitations.
UPDATE (via Twitter): Jessica Dean notes that the story will be one of three Choose Your News options beginning tonight at 6:00 p.m. You can vote here.
UPDATE II: It looks like the voters have spoken and the Iran and Twitter story will be the story of the day.
UPDATE III: Ms. Adverthinker and I will talk about Twitter and its impact on social and political movements tomorrow at SWIM. Please check it out here.