Personal Democracy Plus Our premium content network. LEARN MORE You are not logged in. LOG IN NOW >

Iran Roundup: Inside an Internet-Charged Resistance

BY Nancy Scola | Thursday, June 18 2009

iran

Yesterday we did a roundup of what's happening at the intersection of technology and politics in and around Iran, which is an admittedly one perspective on a complex picture. Today, we'll do another. One thing that seems to be becoming somewhat clear in this swirl of events is that, as far as new media goes, what is taking place in Iran is bigger than Twitter -- or Facebook, or Flickr, or YouTube, or blogs, or email, or any other one tool. To indulge in the "[Insert technology] + Revolution" construct, there's fair evidence that the last week in Iranian is perhaps best understood as an "Internet Revolution." There's a fluidity developed over decades of practice in how many of us engage online. We jump from site to service to app to tool. From the piecemeal reports we have, it might be fair to say that what's taking place with regards to Iran isn't entirely different. a look at what's happened in and around Iran of late:

A Facebook page centered on opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi is being used to share photos from the last week. A section called "Governmental Violence" has nearly two dozen photos of what appear to be acts of aggression by the police, including the one above of what appears to be a dorm room with a smashed computer monitor, and far more gruesome photos of Iranians bloodied, injured, or in the process of being beaten. (Worth noting as a purely process point is that, as these photos get passed around from "amateur" to "professional" and back again, copyright gets muddied -- an interesting wrinkle for established media as they navigate this brave new world.)

More broadly, video and photos continue to tell this story in powerful ways. The New York Times Brian Stelter and Brad Stone report on how videos of protests and their aftermath are being shared, including on YouTube, including this footage of protesters headed to Tehran's Azadi (Freedom) Square. As foreign journalists are leaving the country as their visas expire, the relaying of what's happening in Iran will be necessity fall to Iranians. Stelter and Stone capture a great quote from CNN's Christiane Amanpour, who left Iran for London on Tuesday: “The process of getting the word out is totally democratized.”

The BBC News is distributing third-party video of what appears to be "plain-clothes pro-government militia attacking a university dormitory in Iran." The Beeb notes that it can't confirm the authenticity of the footage, but offers its take on the validity based on other reports of what's been happening in the country.

The New York Times has what is, despite the subject, a lovely photo slide show of Wednesday's protests, showing many Iranians flashing what is known in the U.S. as the peace sign and wearing green ribbons -- the color that has come to represent a rejection of the contested election results and an opposition to the Iranian government.

The New York Times Nick Kristof, responding to the apparent Iranian government attempts to shut down Internet access and pathways to various Internet services, issues a call to "Tear Down This Cyberwall." And in that vein of combating Iranian government attempts to cut off Internet access, the San Francisco Chronicle's Matthew Stannard profiles Austin Heap, a California programmer managing proxy servers for Iranians to use to route around Internet restrictions. (Notably, though, sfgate.com doesn't actually link to Heap's work.) Somewhat relatedly, CNN.com profiles Ryan Kelly, the London developer whose Page Reboot software was given a new use in denial-of-service attacks against websites affiliated with the Iranian government websites. (Again, the article contains no link to the web tool that is the subject of the piece.) Worth noting is the mentions in both pieces of pushback on and critique of their efforts from what seems to be inside Iran.

CNET's Declan McCullagh reports that use of Tor, free software that creates complex ways of connecting to the Internet in an attempt to create anonymity, has doubled in Iran in the last several days.

We've all heard reports over the last several days about how Iranians are finding Internet access shut off or otherwise restricted. TechCrunch's MG Seigler reports that FriendFeed, a service for aggregating updates and content from a variety of social-media sources that happens to be rather popular in Iran, is being blocked in that country.

On to the meta-story on new media's role in Iran, the Washingtonpost.com hosts a chat with Foreign Policy blogger and Open Society Institute fellow Evgeny Morozov focused on how to understand the impact digital tools are and aren't having.

When it comes to Twitter, BusinessWeek's Joel Schectman makes an attempt to separate tweeting about Iran and using the service to organize and propel the flow of events within Iran. (Though, to amplify a point that Schectman alludes to, it's arguably clear that in real life, there's no real bright line between the two, as chatter about a political movement can do much to keep said movement going.) VentureBeat's Eric Eldon digs up what numbers are available and comes to the conclusion that despite the enormous attention being paid to Twitter, there's some evidence that "Iranians are mostly using Facebook."

Also on the Twitter front, Mashable's Ben Parr runs the numbers on the popularity of the #iranelection hashtag that tweeters coalesced around with amazing speed and unanimity. In one record-setting hour yesterday, finds Parr, tweets marked with the #iranelection hashtag numbered more than 221,000.

The Twitter Search results for in and around Tehran are swamped now by non-Iranian-related content. Many tweeters have changed their location to "Tehran" to show solidarity with Iranians and in an attempt to provide some measure of online cover to those active in the protests there. For better or worse, those actions do appear to have erased the usefulness of Twitter location-based search in this context.

And in a show of solidarity with protesters and resisters, some on Twitter are using a new service based at HelpIranElection.com to add a green overlay to their Twitter icons. Its existence is somewhat owed to the openness of the Twitter service, as the quickly cobbled-together app makes us of the freely-available Twitter API.

News Briefs

RSS Feed today >

Honda Campaign Rolls Out Endorsements From Asian American Stars

Rep. Mike Honda (D-Calif.) rolled out several additional endorsements from Asian American leaders and celebrities Tuesday, with one of them vouching for his high-tech bona fides. GO

Here Are The People President Obama Hopes Will Repair American Elections

The Presidential Commission on Election Administration established by President Obama after problematic 2012 elections now has a web presence at SupporttheVoter.gov. Obama established the commission by executive order on March 28 "to identify best practices in election administration and to make recommendations to improve the voting experience." GO

After Oklahoma Disaster, Neighbors Look Online for Ways To Help

In echoes of the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy in the Northeast, social media sites and small business websites in and around tornado-wracked Moore, Okla., are full of offers of help, questions about missing pets and loved ones, and evidence that neighbors are willing to reach out to help one another in a disaster. On a single Facebook group, there's a Mexican restaurant in Oklahoma City promising free meals to first responders or people hit by the tornado; a mother a few hours' drive from Moore offering to open her door for children who might need a place to stay; a resident sharing a picture of a found dog and contact information for the owner to get in touch. GO

Change.org Lands $15 Million From Omidyar

Change.org capped an extraordinary few years of growth Tuesday with the announcement that it has landed a $15 million investment led by the Omidyar Network. GO

What German Politicians Think of Google Glass

The German government led by Chancellor Angela Merkel has not had the easiest relationship with Google. The company launched a public campaign against a law backed by her coalition that would require search engines to pay to show news articles in search results, with mixed results. What's more, Google has long had to navigate the privacy waters in Germany and throughout the European Union. But that has not stopped her federal minister for economics and technology, Philipp Rösler, from giving Google Glass an enthusiastic test run as he leads a delegation of German technology companies and politicians on a trip to Silicon Valley this week as part of German Valley Week. GO

Crowdsourcing Waste Management Solutions in Montenegro

For once we aren't talking about the worldwide scarcity of toilets, just good old-fashioned household waste. Montenegro has a garbage problem so bad even the tourists are complaining about it. A new mobile app sponsored by the Agency for Environmental Protection, NGO Ozon and United Nations Development Programme in Montenegro will hopefully get citizens involved in reporting illegal garbage dumps. GO

monday >

Her Majesty's Government Wants to Monetize Open Data

A new paper from the chair of the U.K. government's Open Strategy Board outlines the best practices for the government's open data policies. The government-commissioned Shakespeare Review – after author Stephan Shakespeare – looks into ways to monetize open data, and recommends an all-encompassing National Data Strategy.

GO

Will Silicon Valley "Disrupt" Politics With a Candidate for Congress?

Sean Parker, of Napster fame and now executive general partner at venture capital firm Founders Fund, has invested in political startups before. But last week, he went a step further — co-hosting a fundraising event for a candidate for Congress. Parker and SV Angel co-founder Ron Conway organized a crowd of Internet industry luminaries to support Ro Khanna, a former assistant deputy secretary in Barack Obama's Commerce Department. Khanna is preparing a challenge to Rep. Mike Honda (D-Calif.), whose newly redrawn congressional district encompasses Silicon Valley. GO

Burma's Upcoming Telecom Revolution Will Probably Not Bring Internet Freedom

Burma (Myanmar) is on the threshold of an Internet revolution, but Human Rights Watch has warned companies to proceed with caution or risk trampling Burmese citizens' rights. GO

friday >

Chilean Anti-Corruption Resource: A Crowdsourced Database of Social and Political Connections

In countries where a small minority of social circles have a majority of the political and economic power, personal relationships can affect major decision-making, a serious concern of anti-corruption activists. A new web platform stores personal profiles of key players in Chilean business and politics, complete with biographies and personal and professional connections through family, education, social circles, employers and coworkers, to make tracking social relationships and conflict-of-interest easier. Called Poderopedia (from the Spanish word for power), the project sounds kind of like LinkedIn, but the creation and management of profiles is being crowdsourced out to journalists, activists and concerned citizens.

GO

Middle Eastern Telecom Accused of Working With Saudi Arabia to Spy on Citizens

Mobily, an arm of the state-owned Middle Eastern telecom giant Etihad Etisalat, has been accused of working with Saudi Arabia to develop software that would allow the government to bypass protections for social media users. The exposé comes from Moxie Marlinspike (neé Matthew Rosenfield), an expert in a certain type of malicious Internet attack called MITM (man-in-the-middle), whereby attackers intercept and secretly alter private messages exchanged via email and other social media platforms. GO

Saudi Religious Leader Warns Twitter Users of Consequences in the Afterlife

In late March, Saudi Arabia's top religious cleric said Twitter was for clowns and corrupters. Earlier this week, he said anyone using social media, in particular Twitter, “has lost this world and the afterlife.” His comments might be laughable, if they did not come at a time when the Saudi government is looking into monitoring or blocking social media sites and eliminating user anonymity.

GO

thursday >

What The Other Silicon Valley Immigration Group Is Doing This Month

A bipartisan coalition of political advocacy, business and tech groups are moving ahead to launch a social media blitz next week designed to persuade members of the Senate to vote in favor of immigration reform legislation supported in Silicon Valley. "We're going to create a virtual digital storm," said Jeremy Robbins in a Wednesday ... GO

The New Yorker Hopes "Strongbox" Is a Wiretap-Proof Sieve for Leaks

The New Yorker yesterday became the first outlet to implement DeadDrop, a new system for sources to submit information to journalists online in a more secure and anonymous way than, for example, email. GO

Female Organizer of Pakistan's First Hackathon Stresses Collaboration Over Competition

After Pakistan banned Valentine's Day this year, Sabeen Mahmud started an online protest in which people uploaded photos to mock the government ban. In the weeks following she received death threats and menacing phone calls, and early on she had to stay home from work. That did nothing, however, to keep her from further organizing. Last month, the café she started in Karachi hosted Pakistan's first ever hackathon, which tackled problems including sanitation, crime, disaster management, and education. She even invited a government representative to observe the initial conversations, tackling sensitive areas like government inefficiency and elections.

GO

wednesday >

White House Innovation Fellows Project Spins Off Into A Business

Clay Johnson and Adam Becker joined the Presidential Innovation Fellows program to help the White House fix the way government does business. Now they're turning that mission into a business themselves. GO

Fighting Fires With Data, New York City Launches New Safety Inspection System

Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced today that New York City has implemented city-wide a new risk based inspection system focused on fire safety that is driven by analytics from multiple city agencies. GO

Chinese Netizens Use Digital Initiative to Gain Media Attention for Unsolved Poisoning Case

Last month a medical science student at a Shanghai university died from poisoning, allegedly murdered by his roommate. The specifics of the crime echoed a case from the mid-1990s, in which a 19-year-old student was poisoned with thallium. That case has once again been thrown into the media spotlight, but after 18 years the media has changed and the spotlight means a trending hashtag on Sina Weibo or an online petition to the U.S. President.

GO

PDF France 2013: “Au Code, Citoyens!”

This year PDF France will take place in Paris on June 13, with the theme "Au Code, Citoyens!" ("To Code, Citizens!") The speakers' lineup includes some of the continent's leaders in the digital revolution. GO

More