<nettime> Reply to Vijay Prashad's thoughts on Facebook/Twitter in Iran

[Naeem Mohaiemen <naeem.mohaiemen@gmail.com>]

I posted this on Vijay's wall on FB, but since that's a semi-closed
system, posting it here in hopes of generating some debate-- on either
side of the coin.

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Vijay Prashad wrote this op-ed "Made for Revolution: Iran and Us"

http://www.counterpunch.org/prashad07012009.html

I agree with most of the op-ed, except this sentence-->
"Our Facebook updates and Twitter squeals do not contribute to their debate."

My response to this specific sentence, which I also sent to Vijay-->

I disagree that Iranian twitterers, inside Iran and in the diaspora,
don't have an impact on the crisis. To suggest otherwise would be to
denigrate the achievement of twitterers like PersianKiwi, who sent
updates for two weeks, until being allegedly arrested by security
forces.

Yes, there's tremendous amount of chaff on Twitter, but there's also
precious data.

I stand by my original op-ed from June 17

"The Revolution Will Bypass Your Filters"
http://unheardvoice.net/blog/2009/06/17/iran-filters/

This crisis has been different precisely because of the critical mass
interlinking of social media. News, photos and video has leaked out in
such large volume precisely because of the existence of Twitter,
Twitpic, Youtube, Twazzup, Facebook, etc.


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