Twitter power - or people power?
You'll have seen the suggestions, I suspect, that the remarkable scenes in Tehran and other major Iranian cities are a manifestation of a new phenomenon known as "Twitter power".
(Twitter, m'lud, is a method of communicating short messages via mobile phone or online, popular, apparently, among the urban young in Iran.)
I try to remain open-minded about new forms of communication (why else, after all, would I be blogging or on Facebook?), but I hope I am allowed by BBC impartiality rules to be mildly sceptical.
Where was Twitter when millions of people took to the streets of Manila in 1986, to put pressure on Ferdinand Marcos to quit?
Where was Twitter in central and eastern Europe 20 years ago to nudge Communist rule into the history books? Or in Tiananmen Square? Or more recently, in Kiev, or Tbilisi?
Of course, it's true that it is much easier now to spread a message than it was before the days of mobile phones or the internet. And I think the video footage taken on ordinary Iranians' mobile phones has genuinely added to our understanding of what is happening there.
But I am yet to be convinced that Twitter has done the same. Richard Sambrook, the BBC's director of global news, has written a useful piece about the pros and cons here -- and there's more useful background, plus links, on the BBC News website here.
Saeed Barzin of BBC Monitoring and Persian TV gave Ritula Shah his thoughts on tonight's programme. Click below to hear the interview.
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The problem is that, whether Twitter (etc) is a greater or lesser influence in Iran, it appears to be influencing the media coverage over here.
The coverage from the BBC also appears to exclude the more remote areas while it concentrates on the big cities (presumably this is due to restrictions placed on the BBC).
Is it possible that those with access to Twitter and similar media are from the younger and more liberal elements of Iranian society that would favour the opposition? Is it also not likely that these in urban areas will also predominantly be from this same group?
Adding these elements together points towards BBC output that may be skewed towards the opposition. Certainly on BBC News Channel last night it appeared to be virtually campaigning for the opposition. No doubt some of this coverage feeds back to Iran, especially those big cities.
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KennethM may be right that the BBC output maybe skewed towards the opposition, however, the Iranian government has no-one but itself to blame if the output is skewed.
What does KennethM expect if the Iranian Government refuses to allow foreign media outlets unrestricted access to report what is going on in Iran?.
I would imagine that pro-Government youth also have access to Twitter and other media, obviously apart from broadcasting Iranian government propaganda they have nothing to say?.
What is missing from KennethM post is his opinion on the shooting to death of 7+ demonstrators, the video footage of Iranian police and paramilitary groups beating peaceful demonstrators and why so many Iranians are prepared to protest against what they feel is a stolen election.
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REALPLAYER & 'WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER' PLAYBACK OPTIONS REMOVED FROM PIVOTAL INTERNATIONAL-NEWS-TOPIC BBC TV PROGRAMMES' SUCH AS NEWSNIGHT, PANORAMA & HARDtalk's WEB PAGES- WHY???
If persons outside-of-the-United Kingdom remain impeded from accessing the BBC's exemplary TV (video format) coverage of the current Iran issues & other important coming world events through the BBC's web sight- this can not benefit anyone: news event participants; politicians; civil servants; or especially- the UK's trade interests...
Until several weeks ago BBC video/TV-format programmes such as HARDtalk, Newsnight, Daily Politics, This Week, Working Lunch, Fast:track, Click, News at Six, News at Ten (& more) used to have links on their web pages that said 'view this programme on Realplayer or Windows Media Player'...
Gradually these links have been eliminated, leaving potential international viewers who wanted to view these programmes with only the option of clicking on the BBC iplayer link on these programmes' web pages...
The BBC iplayer has been set up to be non-working for video/TV programmes from locations outside the UK....
The result of the removal of the- for over half a decade available- option (for outside UK persons) of viewing BBC video/TV programmes using Real Player or Windows Media Player is a situation where UK citizens who are overseas; ex-pats; & others- are counter-productively impeded from doing this..
Why was this decision made?
Why haven't there been any announcements by the BBC on its web pages about the removal of Realplayer and Windows Media Player options for outside-of-the-UK persons to view BBC video/TV programmes??
If cost is a factor, perhaps using the MSNBC Internet model as a straw horse for the BBC's formulating of policies & practices re accessibility of its video/TV programmes by outside-of-the-UK persons could be useful...
MSNBC puts SHORT revenue-generating commercials SHOWN ONLY AT THE BEGINNING of its video/TV programmes (and news-clips) that are accessible through the Internet...
It stands to reason that the more accessible to persons based outside-of-the-UK that the BBC's world leading radio, TV and text-based products are, the better for the UK & its foreign-policy/trade relationships abroad...
What productive sense can there be for the United Kingdom in significantly reducing the availability of core-products of the UK's defacto "international goodwill ambassador"- the BBC- at any time, let alone during today's international-strife (Iraq/Afghanistan/radicalized Islam) & economic turmoil ridden world??
(And during extensive world media-delivery change, which may see many of the BBC's competitors going out of business)??
Roderick V. Louis,
Vancouver, B.C., Canada,
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I wonder, Robin, which events in Tbilisi you mean? The Rose revolution or this year's protests against the Revolutionary President Saakashvili? I believe it is the former. Then there was no need for Tweeter because the Western media was more than happy to do Tweeter's work and show the world that the USA and EU protage Saakashivili is winning. Now when he is protested against, there is need for Tweeter indeed, as the media has been strangely keeping silent on the subject. Double standards for reporting? No, to have double standards you need to have some standards in the first place.
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A BBC NEWS EDITOR's ILLOGICAL, TRADE-FOOLISH 'RESPONSE' TO # 3, ABOVE:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2009/06/changes_to_international_pages_1.html
"... On a problem raised by "mikedbrit" of not being able to access video that was available before, via the audio/video section on the UK version of the site: unfortunately, we are unable to use the licence fee to fund distribution of full programmes in high-quality video to international users (we do of course offer many news clips across all sections, as well as live coverage during special events), or to sustain the existing narrowband offering that some of you may have been accessing. This means that the narrowband access- in particular to the One, Six and Ten O'Clock news bulletins- is being withdrawn..."
If the UK walls its best news, social & human-interest media-products off from Internet-accessibility by the outside world- will this be good for the UK's future foreign policy and trade interests??
Roderick V. Louis
Vancouver, BC, Canada,
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Re Twitter;
"I hope I am allowed by BBC impartiality rules to be mildly sceptical."
It is Saturday evening June 20 and we have seen images from Teheran and other cities in Iran like Shiraz today thanks to twitter that show us what is going on there like nothing we've ever seen under such circumstances before. Are you convinced yet?
"Where was Twitter when millions of people took to the streets of Manila in 1986, to put pressure on Ferdinand Marcos to quit?
Where was Twitter in central and eastern Europe 20 years ago to nudge Communist rule into the history books? Or in Tiananmen Square? Or more recently, in Kiev, or Tbilisi?"
Can't say about Kiev or Tblisi but in the other cases, the technology to make Twitter possible didn't exist yet. The free flow of information and the versitility of modern communications networks that makes it so difficult or impossible for governments to suppress the truth about what's going on in their country to the outside world and visa versa is a real threat to dictatorship. Twitter and other services like Facebook and Youtube are making a major contribution. This may seem like a threat to conventional journalists but there is no substitute for it today.
What I want to know is where is the self nrighteous indignation at seeing ordinary civlians being beaten and shot by government thugs for exercising their right of peaceful protest and assembly we saw from the world when a relative handful of terrorists captured on a battlefield were sent to GITMO and some waterboarded to learn what other terrorist plots they knew of? Where is the call for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the government militia, and the supreme leader to face charges of crimes against humanity in the Hague? Sounds like a double standard to me.
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