For those of us who mocked at the “triviality” of social networking sites – the recent unrest in Iran should be an eye opener. When President Ahmadinejad returned to power with a massive win, thousands of Iranians on the grounds cried foul. These supporters of former Prime Minister Mousavi claimed that the elections were heavily rigged and were out on the streets. Had it been a few years earlier, this would have been just another political problem in just another country. But today it is no less than a world event: followed, understood and participated by people around the globe.
Thanks to social media.
It is almost uncanny to think that a political struggle is being fought on social media circles as much as it is being fought on 
the streets of Tehran. The fieriest battlefield is of course Twitter. To give you an idea how much Iran dominates micro blogging, here are some facts. Every 1 min, almost 10 new feeds on Iran are posted on Twitter; and ever since the election results, “iran” and “iranelectons” has constantly been on the top 10 trended discussions, world over!
the streets of Tehran. The fieriest battlefield is of course Twitter. To give you an idea how much Iran dominates micro blogging, here are some facts. Every 1 min, almost 10 new feeds on Iran are posted on Twitter; and ever since the election results, “iran” and “iranelectons” has constantly been on the top 10 trended discussions, world over! What Google did to the internet, and Facebook did to the social networking, Twitter is most definitely doing to both! It has redefined what social networking can achieve, and has become the single most important face of the internet today. Never before has a two year company made so much visible impact to business, media and politics. Untill a few years back blogs were for meant for geeks, celebs and bored individuals! With the advent of micro-blogging, the internet has opened itself to (almost) everyone. Students, professionals, media personnel, marketers, anyone who has the time to type 140 characters has the means to reach out to the world. And the world literally follows.
From the marketing perspective Twitter is a buzz heaven. For any word of mouth campaign to be successful it needs three tools: credibility, reach and speed. Credibility has always been a social media thing. Twitter stands out because of its reach and more so because of it extraordinary speed. The Iran affair has shown the world that the scope of social networking goes far beyond party pictures and funny animal videos: it holds the power to bring about real change. And for people who aren’t really interested in change and justice, this episode also showed what newer levels of success an organic 'word of mouth' campaign can achieve.
Last heard: Twitter Overtakes Google as Leading Search Engine for “Iran+Election”
Cheers !
It would be wrong to say that Twitter is the sole reason why the Iranian crisis is followed the world over. It was definitely the result of collaboration and information sharing over the Internet. Twitter just happens to be most visible of the lot. Though Youtube vidoes of Neda's needless death did play their part.
ReplyDeleteGood to see you here....
But Twitter is indeed a serious platform now for sharing ideas and information. Unlike not so long ago when Ashton Kutcher challenged CNN to a popularity contest on Twitter and won. He also went on to interpret that his win proved that his tweets were more influential than CNN's broadcast
Excellent!
ReplyDeleteWell, to some extent I agree that Twitter was not the sole reason why people across the globe were following Iran's crisis, but it was THE most important tool to get the words out to the whole world. And the reason was simple: Twitter happened to be the easiest way of spreading the news. To understand this, one needs to know the background of IT in Iran.
In a normal day, with relatively low internet connections for home users, people could hardly watch videos on Youtube and the website has been filtered for over a year in Iran! And even worse during the post-eletion unrest, the bandwidth for home users reduced to one tenths of what it was before and in some districts it was totally cut off! So with unbelievably low speed internet connections and the filtering system in place, it was just impossible for Iranian people to see what's really happening in the country.
Today, many people all over the world have watched the video of Neda, the girl who shot dead, and even Us persident, congress members and senators are talking about her, but it might be surprsing for people if they know there ain't many people who have actually seen that video inside Iran!! They have only heard about it...
The same applies to Facebook. The site is filtered and it's not an easy task to log into your acconnt through a proxy considering the terrible internet connection. With a heavy clamp-down on all sort of media and communication tools ranging from shutting down mobile phones and Text messaging services to filtering of websites and even emails and messengers and also by kicking out correspondents of International news agencies and arresting the Iranian reformist journalists and also with a state-controlled media [which is really busy these days pretending as nothing is happening in the country and broacasting top films to refrain people from going to the streets and join protests!] and last but not least by creating noise on foreign satellite TV channels and also swapping into houses confiscating satellite dishes(!) how could have one possibly informed the whole world of what's been happening in Iran and how could have the nation stood united for demonstrations??
Twitter just made it so easy for Iranian to send out the news to the world and also keep updated for those who were in Iran of the time and location of demonstrations. So simple and so easy: you just type in a few sentences at no time and Abracadabra - the whole world knows about it and hundreds of thousands of people are rallying in the streets!
So I have no doubt if it was not because of Twitter, Irsn's crisis would have not become the top news for several consecutive days on the internet and also in newspapers and magazines and even more importantly people inside Iran would have not been able to spread the word and ccrate these massive protests...
Yes - Twitter was like nothing else. It [unexpectedly] changed the way things were done. I've always had faith in Social networking servises, but I did not have a solid example to prove that they are not just meant to be used for posting some pictures and videos [or perhaps stalking some friends' activities!!]. That they could play a very important role in today's life ONLY IF one knows how to deploy them... And for those who had closed their eyes ignoring importance of these services(like the Iranian government) and also those who were mocking users(or according to them "LOSERS"!) of these services, Iran's case had a clear message - it's high time that they opened their eyes and saw where the world is heading. And for marketers, there is a great potential here at stake. So, if you miss out on this big opportunity, be sure others just won't let it go and they'll milk it as much as they can....
Hi Sujoy, Good to see u!
ReplyDeleteAmin, thanks for the excellent insight. Right from the horse’s mouth!
And it is totally right, Twitter is not the ‘sole reason’, it is a cumulative social media impact. Nonetheless it was unique to see a political movement use micro blogging so effectively and so spontaneously. To add to what Amin mentions, Youtube videos and Facebook messages have limitations. Youtube is uni-directional and facebook notes have limited and unqualified audiences. Twitter helped transcend these limitations seamlessly.
We are most definitely entering a new era.
And about the CNN and Ashton Kutcher remark that Sujoy made: it also indicates of things to come. Commercial news might just be a thing of the past. As and when more and more people from every corner of the world start tweeting their stories by the hour, it will become a better and much faster source of information than any 3rd party news agency. We already see news channels officially using Tweets as sources for their information. In fact, almost all the celebrity condolences running all day on television yesterday for MJ (rip) … were expectedly picked up from Twitter.
Politics or Media, the impact is there for all of us to see. This is democratization of the real kind. Fascinating times lies ahead.
Cheers.