Iran Social Media Facing Serious Obstacles

Citizen journalists faced serious obstacles in Iran today. News outlets are reporting that during the lead-up to the 31st anniversary of the Iranian revolution, the Internet was slowed and many social networking sites -- especially ones that chronicled last June's election protests -- were blocked.

As of now, the citizen media service Demotix is reporting, via Twitter:

From Tehran now: Google up, FBook & Twitter down. Proxies working but very very slow.

Last June's disputed election in Iran was chronicled assiduously by social networking systems, such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. The Internet played a large role in the reportage -- much of it produced by Iranians on the ground -- that reached the rest of the world.

Before today's protest, the government went to great lengths to hobble the Internet's ability to engender communication. The New York Times reports:

Thursday, the Iranian authorities on Wednesday drastically slowed Internet service in Iran and shut down text messaging services, and an official said that Gmail, the Google e-mail service, would be blocked.

This comes in the wake of last week's announcement that Iran's government was going to introduce its own national email service to compete with Western alternatives. According to the Guardian, 95% of Iran uses Google, Yahoo or Hotmail accounts. According to multiple sources, Google traffic has dropped off quickly since the announcement.

Nevertheless, hundreds of videos of the protests in Iran have been posted on YouTube. Organized opposition to Ahmadinejad, however, seems to have occurred on a small scale.

The Guardian talked to students who commented on the opposition's lack of organization:

Morteza, 23, a student, said: "It's not fair. The government has all the facilities to organise their own rallies but we've not been given permission to hold one protest since the election. They bus in basiji militia from other cities to Tehran and give them free food and transportation.

The BBC summed it up perhaps the best:

The government is not used to such protests and is infuriated by this, he adds, although opposition support appears not to be enough to overthrow the government...

US state department spokesman Philip Crowley said it appeared Iran had "attempted a near total information blockade" to deal with anti-government protesters.

Comments

[jabidi]

10:10 PM on 02/13/2010

Important read for parsi, weareeverywhere and other trolls:

The failure of the "Green Movement" of Iran

http://www.iranaffairs.com/

[PrairieView]

11:29 AM on 02/12/2010

The US government has figured out that it is counter productive to deny access to the Internet. Instead they spy on every American by reading and saving every email sent and track every web page visited and every post made by every American. Iran's government is pretty backwards compared to the good old USA.

[parsi]

11:24 AM on 02/12/2010

This is a crosspost by Arash

The Islamic Republic’s attempted publicity stunt at UCL last night was a miserable failure. The following video really says it all as dozens of freedom activists poured into the lecture theatre, causing Yvonne Ridley (PRESS TV Anchor and IRI's propagandist) the Ahmadinejad supporter to run off with her bodyguard after 10 minutes, and the meeting was abandoned!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcSdr6A1JDo&feature=player_embedded

My thanks in particular to Mr Potkin Azarmehr and Mr Elcid Asaei who publicised the sinister nature of this event in their blogs. Also to be thanked are the many people who emailed and rang UCL to complain against this disgusting propaganda. And last but certainly not least, a huge thank you to the free thinking students that poured into the lecture theatre and ensured that the Islamic Republic could not hijak 22 Bahman for its own ends.

Shame on UCL for allowing these Islamic Republic mercenaries a platform from which to indoctrinate British students and well done to those who ensured the eventual victory of this campaign!

more than 30 years of fascism and now not only Iranians but people all over the world are awakening to the true nature of the Islamic Republic and raising their voices and banners against it. The end of the fascist Islamic Republic will be the first stake in the dark heart of Islamism.

http://www.hurryupharry.org/2010/02/12/people-power-on-22-bahman/#comments

[evagorman]

11:47 AM on 02/12/2010

Thanks for sharing this. I joined the London "Where is my vote" group for several months when I lived there. I miss their enthusiasm and level of activity and I'm not surprised they are still going strong.

Leaving them was the hardest part of leaving London!

The video appeared to have no sound, though (or is it my computer?)

[parsi]

11:59 AM on 02/12/2010

Yes, the Brits are much more involved in politics both foreign and domestic.

[parsi]

10:43 AM on 02/12/2010

Focusing on abuses
We must not ignore human rights in Iran

by Trita Parsi
11-Feb-2010

Old habits are difficult to break. After years of almost singularly focusing on the nuclear issue, the west has been slow to react to the rapidly deteriorating human rights situation in Iran. While United Nations Security Council members are preparing new sanctions over the nuclear issue, the UN has yet to address Iran’s human rights abuses since the fraudulent elections last summer.

Now more than ever, the narrow nuclear focus must be set aside and renewed attention given to the state of human rights in Iran. It is literally a matter of life and death.

On January 28, Mohammad-Reza Ali-Zamani and Arash Rahmanipour were executed for the capital crime of moharebeh, or “taking up arms against God”. Though the Iranian authorities claimed that the two were involved in anti-government protests following the election dispute, Rahmanipour’s lawyer points out he was arrested a month before the elections.

Seeking to discourage Iran’s Green Movement...more

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/023fb718-167a-11df-bf44-00144feab49a,Authorised=false.html?_i_location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ft.com%2Fcms%2Fs%2F0%2F023fb718-167a-11df-bf44-00144feab49a.html&_i_referer=http%3A%2F%2Firanian.com%2Fmain%2F2010%2Ffeb%2Ffocusing-abuses

[PrairieView]

11:32 AM on 02/12/2010

The US's puppet Islamic Republic of Iraq decides which candidates can be on the ballot. Why would Iranians look to the US for freedom and democracy?

[parsi]

12:02 PM on 02/12/2010

Iranians are not looking to US for freedom and democracy. This is only in your head...

If anything Iranians think that the US installed the mullahs in 1979 to keep Iran backward...

With all due respect, You are not really well-informed on Iran...

[parsi]

10:37 AM on 02/12/2010

Mehdi Saharkhiz
Son of imprisoned journalist Issa Saharkhiz

Interviewied by ABC's Diane Sawyer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfz5FOncYmQ&feature=player_embedded

[Rucio]

10:36 AM on 02/12/2010

How did the Ayatollah Khomeini manage -- from Paris -- a revolution against a military dictatorship before twitter, facebook, and cellphones?

[parsi]

11:09 AM on 02/12/2010

You really don't know the answer??

He had the BBC. His nickname was Ayatollah BBC.

http://www.netnative.com/news/06/mar/1090.html

[parsi]

10:34 AM on 02/12/2010

Where are IRI supporters?
Sparse crowds at Azadi Sq. during Ahmadinejad speech on 22 Bahman
Google image shows sparse crowd at Azadi Square
by Ali Lakani on Fri Feb 12, 2010 03:43 AM PST


Liars caught red-handed! Image shows Azadi Square 10 minutes before Ahmadinejad's speech at 10:47 A.M. and this crowd is nowhere near the lies IRI media dished out about 5 million pro-government demonstrators. How embarrassing!


http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2010/02/view-into-tehran.html

[parsi]

10:31 AM on 02/12/2010

Today during Iran's Victory of the Revolution Day, when words like "revolution", "independence" and "freedom" are on everyone's lips, fears of torture, repression and death still remain.

The shock is still very much palpable over the two horrific hangings that took place in Iran just weeks ago. The two hanged men became the "fall guys" for the post-Presidential election violence that consumed the streets of Iran last summer. This happened despite the fact that the accused men were nowhere near the widespread demonstrations – they were already in prison!

Now fear mounts again that 9 more men will hang based on similarly outrageous charges. Help focus Iran's attention on its real problem. Urge Iran to stop the executions!

On Monday, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei vowed to deliver a "punch in the mouth" to those who might exercise their right to peaceful dissent today during Iran’s national holiday. But a "punch" is a far cry from the two executions recently carried out for the same reasons.
Don’t let Iran execute any more people for expressing their dissenting views!

http://takeaction.amnestyusa.org/siteapps/advocacy/index.aspx?c=jhKPIXPCIoE&b=2590179&template=x.ascx&action=13726&ICID=E1002A01&tr=y&auid=5929644

[jalaroc]

10:26 AM on 02/12/2010

obstacles besides the veils?

[NYC123]

10:16 AM on 02/12/2010

We (America) must stop picking on the Persian people and their theocratic system of government as evil. They have many reasons not to trust Western countries. If Western countries did to us what we did to Iran - we would not trust the West either!
We have enough ills of our own - "the thorns in our eyes are many - lets first address their removal and then, and only then, can America see with clarity the issues of others -- and others will see that we fair brokers to trust!"
Until then we have nothing to offer the Persian people except more death and a country more divided!

[Gaylord P Farqua]

08:57 AM on 02/12/2010

The abundance of communication sources is really giving the Supreme Ruler a headache. He cannot understand why these people won't just shut up and do as God tells him to tell them. Maybe it is because the Iranian people are well educated and civilized and had no idea that pitching out the Shah would result in this madness. Totalitarianism when it is mixed with theology creates a brew that even Hitler would have had trouble managing even though that prick did not have to worry about tweets. It is not likely anything will really change in Iran until the world community clamps down even further with sanctions. And that will not happen as long as China and Russia do their profit/loss statements to determine whether forcing Iran to play nice is worth the potential cost to their economies. Now there is an irony. If there is a hell and in there a special place for the really nasty folks from history, Mao is saying to Stalin:" You gotta be sh**ting me. All people we murdered in the name of Communism and it comes to this. We were right though. Wall Street is a source of evil."

[woodpecker4]

07:35 AM on 02/12/2010

The US should stop threatening Iran. Iran has not threaten the US, and is no threat to the US, despite the fact that the US has never stopped threatening Iran.

[rougebaisers]

06:34 AM on 02/12/2010

Internet life will find a way. Germany should offer them a way to counter the technology they sold them to block it all. Ahminijob and his thugs are finished. They will never survive the storm coming their way from their own people.

[flamflurm]

06:32 AM on 02/12/2010

Shocka. It's not fair, Morteza?

[MichaelMcKLA]

03:18 AM on 02/12/2010

Now the religious right knows what to do next time they manage to get into power in the USA. Enjoy your freedom while you have it.

[truthfinderddw]

06:42 AM on 02/12/2010

Absolutely, when you mix Church and State, you get their Morale interpretation of Law. Some very sound inconguencies between the Right Wing in this Country and How they view Right Wings in other Governments!