Democracy 1.0 meets Web 2.0

In June 2009 the Islamic Republic of Iran faced a legitimacy crisis the like of which it has not experienced since its creation in 1979.

In the June of 2009, the election of the president of Iran, Mahmound Ahmadinejad, caused a major unrest amongst major cities in Iran and around the world starting June 13, 2009. The protests are against the alleged victory of Iranian President Mahmound Ahmadinejad and in support of opposition candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi.

The protests have been given several titles by their proponents including Green Revolution, Green Wave or Sea of Green, reflection Mousavi’s campaign colour, and also Persian Awakening.

The events have also been nicknamed the “Twitter Revolution” because of the protesters’ reliance on Twitter and other social-networking Internet sites to communicate with each other.

Social networking sites such as Twitter have been a major focal point of the protests against the Islamic regime. As in the aftermath of the disputed presidential elections in June 2009, anti-government protesters have been posting hundreds of accounts, photos and videos of the latest clashes on the micro-blogging network.

With foreign media facing tough restrictions by the Iranian authorities and state-controlled media which is mistrusted by most of the country’s population, posts on Twitter, although difficult to verify, provide a vivid insight into the chaotic situation on the streets of Iran. For example “mamad202” condemned the coverage of the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) as “propaganda” in a series of tweets.

The situation in Iran was a perfect setup for spotlighting the strengths of Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, particularly when the professional media are hobbled. As protests and violence erupted following the June 13 declaration of victory for President Mahmound Ahmadinejad, the Iranian government mounted a full-force effort to block images and news offices being raided and equipment confiscated, journalists arrested and beaten, broadcast signals jammed and Internet access blocked. On June 16, the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance banned foreign journalists from leaving their offices to cover the story. Four days later, foreign journalists were ordered not to report on the demonstrations at all without permission from Iranian authorities.

That left private individuals, risking arrest and serious physical harm, to provide the world with images and updates. According to the Project for Excellence in Journalism’s New Media Index, the top two news-related videos on YouTube from June 13 through 19 were amateur footage of protests in Tehran. The most iconic and wrenching image of the entire ordeal was a shaky video clip of the death of a young woman, Neda Agha-Soltan, who was reportedly shot by security forces during one of the protests. There’s no doubt citizen journalism played a critical role in the world’s understanding of events that transpired there.

The following video clip is of Neda Agha-Soltan. It is an example of the videos from the Iran protests that have been uploaded to Youtube.

This video starts with photos, and then shows a recording of Neda Agha-Soltan – (begins at 50 seconds in)

Warning: This video is very graphic – it contains coverage of a real victim who has been shot

Citizen journalism has played a key role in the coverage of the revolts. The traditional media, which is banned from reporting from Tehran, have had to feed off the bloggers rather than do their own reporting or shift through thousands of often apocryphal posts from unknown writers.

Twitter provided news from Iran that was fast and effective, with most of it coming from within Tehran. This went on to be re-tweeted all around the world. With the bans on foreign reporters, journalists on the outside had to rely on Twitter and other sites to provide them with content. Twitter made it possible for the Iran election protests to become documented global news.

This short clip on Youtube explains the reliance that foreign Journalists have had to place on social networking technologies such as Twitter.

The use of citizen media provokes the question of authenticity of social networking media.  By its very design Twitter’s credibility is uncertain. It’s simply impossible to pack much context into its 140 characters. Therefore Twitter and similar technologies face a problem. On one side these technologies can provide a voice that would otherwise not be heard, but at the same time can we trust that voice?

The June 16 edition of “The Daily Show” exemplifies this dilemma. The show opened by criticising professional news organisations – in particular CNN – that were turning to Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites in lieu of verifiable information about what was taking place in Tehran. Host Jon Stewart especially enjoyed the anchors’ disclaimers that “we’re relaxing our usual vetting process a bit” and “we cannot verify readily some of this material that we’re going to show you.”

So what does this mean for Twitter as a journalistic tool?

There are both positive and negatives to this question. One of the great advantages of Twitter as a journalism tool s its immediacy and concise content. Learning from foreign blogs is a long and tedious process. During a time of crisis who has time to read and translate blog posts when people are dying on the streets and the readership is demanding up-to-date news? So its quite logical that Twitter has emerged as a key source of news and updates from Tehran.

After all you can view photos, videos and/or text updates from the Iranian streets that resurface on blogs just a few hours later.

However the ability to verify content, or the lack of, is a major problem for Twitter and other social networking sites used as media content in professional practice.

References

Batty, D 2009, “Iran: Twitter becomes focal point of protests”, Guardian Unlimited, Guardian Newspapers Limited, pp.1-2

Morozov, E 2009, “Iran: Downside to the “Twitter Revolution””, Dissent pp.14-14

Paiser, B, “Amateur Content’s Start Turn: The MSM’s ample use of unverified citizen material from Iran raises serious questions.”, The online Frontier, American Journalism Review pp. 42

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