I am not much for commenting on politics. They're sort of mushy and non-rigorous in a way that I have trouble parsing with my nerdy brain. But I have been asked to have some thoughts about Twitter and the protests that are going on in Iran.
I read Douglas Rushkoff's piece in The Daily Beast, which I think does a good job of summing up the Twitter-will-save-the-world-from-tyranny line, which we heard some of from Andrew Sullivan as well. Quoth Rushkoff: "The age of the totalitarian dictatorship is over."
I recognize that Twitter has done a lot to embolden and coordinate the opposition to Ahmadinejad, and engage the interest and emotions of the rest of the world. But there are some things I'm still not clear on:
-- Who is doing the tweeting that we see? The stuff in English, not the stuff in Farsi? And to what end? How many Iranians are actually tweeting, and how many are actually following? The scale of this thing is hard to gauge -- whether it's truly "mass" or not.
-- Anecdotally, from Time's people in Tehran, I'm told that a lot of the tweeting is done by "hyphenated" Iranians for Western benefit. The protesters tend to work by more private means. Which makes sense in a country that actually debated the death penalty for bloggers. If that's true, are we in the West just being self-congratulatory? We're helping! We made Twitter!
-- Why haven't the authorities blocked Twitter, if it's that powerful? I'm not getting any hard information that they've shut it down, or not completely. Network engineers tell me it's not at all unfeasible. There aren't that many pipelines in and out of Iran, and even with proxies it's theoretically possible to spot Twitter-traffic. It's hard not to wonder whether it's just too useful to the government, as a tool for keeping track of the opposition and for spreading disinformation. Otherwise why leave it up?
-- How powerful is Twitter, really? And those DDOS attacks on government websites? Does it mean anything at all, as long as Ahmadinejad has the military?
These are just stray rhetorical questions from the proud owner of a tight deadline and an article-in-progress.
[Update: awesome statistical analysis of the Iran election returns from Jordan Ellenberg. This is why politics needs more nerds.]
I'm glad to see that your nerdy brain was able to parse out some comments about mushy non-rigorous politics. I'm obliged (nay, compelled!) to ask why it can't bring itself around to parsing out some comments on BSG.
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Had to say that- you understand.
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What I'm curious about is why I haven't heard anything about Moldova recently. Wasn't that the original Twitter revolution? Whatever became of that one? Is every street rally going to be labelled the Twitter Revolution until one of the rallies actually succeeds in overthrowing a regime?
anon76
Jun. 16, 2009 19:42:pm
at 19:42:pm
The Cylons disagree and say the age of the totalitarian dictatorship has just begun and then their programs take Twitter down a dark alley and beat it senseless.
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The folks on Lost have no idea what Twitter is since it's still only 1977 or 2007 in their respective timelines.
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I'm having a hard time imagining that the protesting Iranians are using Twitter that much. Where I think it may be a valuable tool is related to something that James P. posted on Tuned In the other day where American Twitters supposedly shamed CNN into boosting their coverage. So maybe Twitter is the equivilent of The Daily Show. It doesn't accomplish much on it's own, but occassionaly it can be used to get the mass media it do it's job.
Kemper
Jun. 16, 2009 20:13:pm
at 20:13:pm
Tehran:1980
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It works on a couple levels...
Church
Jun. 16, 2009 20:52:pm
at 20:52:pm
If they're using their cell phone SMS to send to/receive from Twitter, then it's not so easy to block. They'd have to shut down all cell phone traffic (at least data). Though i suppose they could block whatever Twitter's sms addresses are... Maybe not.
dennitzio
Jun. 16, 2009 21:07:pm
at 21:07:pm
By the way, Lev, it must be either disconcerting or empowering that you have a whole community who gather on your blog to discuss stuff that has little to do with you or your posts...
dennitzio
Jun. 16, 2009 21:08:pm
at 21:08:pm
Hey, we were addressing Levs post. We just had to go through the upfronts first.
anon76
Jun. 16, 2009 23:45:pm
at 23:45:pm
Who are these people? We addressed this already in another issue. With twitter posts, as with much on the internet, initially there is no way to verify who the twitters really are. Could be a 62 yr old White woman in Duluth for all we know, or an actual Persian who is skewing the truth for his/her cause. It could be block, but not over night.
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The real question is does any of it really matter. Most of the general public are not familiar with this, that the President doesn't have that much power. The Clerics are the rulers, specifically the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei. The President cant make any international, military action without the approval of the Supreme Leader. If the votes were rigged those in power continue to manipulate behind the scenes, which all Iranians are aware of, and rule and make decisions despite who actually wins. I always said that Ahmadinejad did anything that actually jeopardized what the Ayatollah wants, just oust the man and bring in a new President that can caters to the wests wants while subverting them at the same time.
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What ever happens militarly or actual action its with the consent of the Ayatollahs.
lostepic
Jun. 17, 2009 05:25:am
at 05:25:am
@lostepic: I don't think that conventional wisdom is still considered accurate. I've been reading (in Time, no less, along with NYT) that the Ayatollah is not as powerful as before, and there's a power struggle going on between the old mullahs and the Republican Guard. Khamenei has allied himself with Ahmadinejad and that has cost him, especially after his flipflop on the election results. Apparently he was some kind of compromise choice for Ayatollah among the religious elite and has never been a very strong or decisive leader. Throw in Mousavi, who was an early PM and his appeal to the same demographic who put the mullahs in charge in the first place, and you have a very unstable political system. I don't know what kind of support he has among the high-level clerics, but he wouldn't have gotten even this far if he didn't. They may see the writing on the wall - the youth demographic is far the largest in Iran - and want to prevent a revolution or destabilizing crackdown.
dennitzio
Jun. 17, 2009 12:04:pm
at 12:04:pm
Journalists like to make these grandiose allegorical pieces about things so after the fact they can say they were on the forefront of calling it. Most the time they end up looking pompous and just plain wrong. As far as I've heard, Twitter hasn't actually gotten rid of any leader; it's a little early to call the end of totalitarian dictatorships because of Twitter, Burma is still doing well, North Korea has a successor named. I believe in twitter its pronounced "#TwitterFail".
yogi
Jun. 17, 2009 12:29:pm
at 12:29:pm
@dennitzio: True and I agree. It's not so much Khamenei, who was once president himself, but the position he currently holds as Supreme Leader, which is appointed by an unelected board of mullahs. Currently he very well may be at odds with one of the founding clerics of the Islamic Republic, Khomeini, who was part of Khamenei's criticisms during his presidential election back in the 80's. He doesn't stand as close to the hardliners in the cleric's expert board, hence, the supposed compromise with Ahmadinejad being Khamenei's poster president.
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A promising note, is that the general population of Iran, most notably Tehran, are very untraditional and pro-west in the sense they show disillusionment and dissatisfaction with the Islamic Republic. Perhaps this brooha will be the catalyst for political/social change that the politically convoluted Iran needs.
lostepic
Jun. 17, 2009 12:38:pm
at 12:38:pm
My limited understanding of these things is that while we traditionally represent Iran as a religious dictatorship, it actually isn't one. It's a sort of co-dependent republic that gets its authority from the religious fundamentalists, but then the religious fundamentalists need the government to shelter them from ugly harsh stupid reality. That may not be ideal, but it's not a dictatorship, strictly speaking, and in some ways it's a kind of theological equivalent of the old Soviet Union's structure. Assuming I'm right about any of this, the fundamentalist side of the equation wanted to tighten it's grasp - of course - and of course even a lot of staunch muslims aren't gonna' sit still for that.
My hunch, then, is that the twitstorm was mainly to make sure every part of the country knew what was going on, and the international english outflow has been mainly specifically to force the issue even more. My Iranian buddies from LA refer to the city as "Terrhangeles," there's been a huge Iranian population there forever.
republibotthreepointoh
Jun. 17, 2009 13:25:pm
at 13:25:pm
@9 Yogi
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It's a bit early to call 'fail.' The revolution may yet be tweeted.
Church
Jun. 17, 2009 21:06:pm
at 21:06:pm