• Spring Awakening

  How an Egyptian Revolution Began on Facebook
• In the embryonic, ever evolving era of social media — when milestones come by the day, if not by the second — June 8, 2010, has secured a rightful place in history. That was the day Wael Ghonim, a 29-year-old Google marketing executive, was browsing Facebook in his home in Dubai and found a startling image: a photo­graph of a bloodied and disfigured face, its jaw broken, a young life taken away. That life, he soon learned, had belonged to Khaled Mohamed Said, a 28-year-old from Alexandria who had been beaten to death by the Egyptian police.

• At once angered and animated, the Egyptian-­born Ghonim went online and created a Facebook page. “Today they killed Khaled,” he wrote. “If I don’t act for his sake, tomorrow they will kill me.” It took a few moments for Ghonim to settle on a name for the page, one that would fit the character of an increasingly personalized and politically galvanizing Internet. He finally decided on “Kullena Khaled Said” — “We Are All Khaled Said.”

   “Khaled Said was a young man just like me, and what happened to him could have happened to me,” Ghonim writes in “Revolution 2.0,” his fast-paced and engrossing new memoir of political awakening. “All young Egyptians had long been oppressed, enjoying no rights in our own homeland.”

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• Internet role in Egypt's protests

              

• Certainly, the Egyptian government reacted quickly: blocking social media sites and mobile phone networks before pulling the plug on Egypt's access to the internet.

   

  This act of censorship was spectacularly unsuccessful.

• The events of 28 January are particularly important, because they contain crucial clues to understanding the broader relationship between the media - both "new" and "old" - and the mass movement for change which has developed in Egypt over the past few weeks.

   

  Firstly, the fact that an internet and mobile phone blockade failed shows clearly that this movement is not based on the web. In fact, the movement which erupted on 25 January has brought together many groups who have taken to the streets over the past 10 years.

   

       Protesters have been using a range of different media - including Twitter - for communication 

   

  They are varied socially and politically, ranging from workers to bloggers and democracy campaigners, to senior judges, to members of the Muslim Brotherhood and Coptic Christians.

   

  This is the first time they have all demonstrated together, and the first time they have been joined by millions of their fellow citizens. But it is important to understand that this movement builds on a legacy of protest by many different activist networks, most of which are not primarily organised online.

• Secondly, it is clear that the protesters use a range of different media to communicate with each other and to get their message across.

   

  I was in Tahrir Square on Sunday: everywhere you look there are mobile phones, hand-written placards, messages picked out in stones and plastic tea cups, graffiti, newspapers and leaflets, not to mention al-Jazeera's TV cameras which broadcast hours of live footage from the square everyday. When one channel of communication is blocked, people try another.

   

  Every mass movement needs spaces where political alternatives can be debated and organisation can take place.

   

  In the 1940s, the last time that Egypt saw mass protests on a similar scale, radical bookshops, underground newspapers and illegal trade union meetings played this role.

   

  For the current generation some of these spaces have been online.

   

  I asked Ahmed, a socialist activist in Tahrir Square, what role he thought the internet was playing in mobilising protest.

   

  "Online organising is very important because activists have been able to discuss and take decisions without having to organise a meeting which could be broken up by the police," he said.

   

• The Facebook group set up to protest at Khaled Said's death is "liked" by nearly 600,000 people and was a key organising centre for the current protests.

   

  Mobile phone use has grown exponentially in the past few years, reaching around 80% of the population according to recent figures.

   

  Now footage of protests and police repression filmed on mobile phone cameras is being broadcast back to millions of Egyptians by the satellite channels.

   

  Online organising does not automatically bring people onto the streets. In 2008, a Facebook group calling for a general strike attracted tens of thousands of members but only relatively small street protests took place in Cairo, largely on the university campuses.

   

• Ahmed believes that Egyptian activists have developed sophisticated ways of knowing when online protest will generate offline political action.

   

  "People learn quickly. They look at who is calling for a protest, and if it is someone they know and trust they are much more likely to take part."

   

  They also learn by example. The fall of Mr Ben Ali showed people across the Arab world, and not just political activists, that popular protests could bring down a dictator.

   

  It is that hope, and not the internet, which is driving this movement forward.

   

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• “If you want to free a society, just give them Internet access.” These were the words of 30-year-old Egyptian activist Wael Ghonim in a CNN interview on February 9, 2011, just two days before long-time dictator Hosni Mubarak was forced to step down under pressure from a popular, youthful, and peaceful revolution. This revolution was characterized by the instrumental use of social media, especially Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and text messaging by protesters, to bring about political change and democratic transformation. This article focuses on how these new types of media acted as effective tools for promoting civic engagement, through supporting the capabilities of the democratic activists by allowing forums for free speech and political networking opportunities; providing a virtual space for assembly; and supporting the capability of the protestors to plan, organize, and execute peaceful protests.

• Additionally, it explores how these new media avenues enabled an effective form of citizen journalism, through providing forums for ordinary citizens to document the protests; to spread the word about ongoing activities; to provide evidence of governmental brutality; and to disseminate their own words and images to each other, and, most importantly, to the outside world through both regional and transnational media.

   

   

• Wael Ghonim on the social media spark that lit Egypt's revolutionary fire

   

  Revolution 2.0

• Wael Ghonim is the unassuming and accidental facilitator who helped give voice to oppressed, angry, demoralized youth on Facebook. The success of the revolution speaks to unimaginable reach of social media in uniting citizens like nothing else before in history.

   

  “…Thanks to modern technology, participatory democracy is becoming a reality,” he writes in the book, a memoir he rushed to get into print before the first anniversary of the revolution in 2012.

• “Today they killed Khaled. If I don’t act for his sake, tomorrow they will kill me.”

   

  That was the first Facebook posting that Ghonim published on a newly created page dedicated to the memory of Khaled Said.  Said was a young student in Alexandria, seated in an internet café when two police officers attacked him, took him outside and beat him to death. Some reports said he was downloading images of police brutality himself when he was caught, others say he infuriated the officers when he refused to acquiesce to their request that everyone leave the café so they could have it to themselves.  Regardless of what truly transpired (the government claimed he was a drug dealer), the photograph of his bloodied, swollen and disfigured face served as a lightning rod for Ghonim who galvanized thousands to stand up against a regime that had routinely tortured and terrorized its populace.
• As a tech-savvy graduate, with an MBA to boot, Ghonim knew that Said’s gruesome image -- especially when aligned next to the photo of his clean-cut and handsome face from before the attack represented all that was wrong with their government.  But Egyptians were still afraid of the regime and Ghonim knew he would have to engage people with the underlying injustice without directly criticizing or insulting the government which up until then would still alienate most of mainstream society.  The population had been fed on a steady diet of propaganda for decades and was not accustomed to seeing and hearing about events that were relegated to furtive conversations. 

• “The media’s suppression of the physical world made the virtual world a critical alternative for promoting the cause,” he writes.

   

  He started the Facebook page ”Kullena Khaled Said” -- “We are all Khaled Said” which slowly grew into the avalanche of social engagement that would see the page go from 49 views to over close to half a million in a matter of months, culminating into the mobilization of hundreds of thousands of people just over a year later, on Jan. 25, 2011 marking the start of the revolution.

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• The Power of Social Media: Egyptian Revolution
• Social media is no longer limited to status updates and posting photos from a friend’s birthday party. Social media has become one of the most powerful factors in grassroots socio-political mobilization across the globe. The January 25 revolution in Egypt gained a major foothold with the application of social media tools like Facebook and Twitter. Since the existence of media, individuals have used it to demand more governmental transparency and mobilize allies. It also proved to be the most importance
• After a revolution had taken place in Tunisia many Egyptians began protesting against the unemployment and poverty that had settled in Egypt. #Jan25 was trending worldwide as the beginning of the revolution started on January 25th. The protests were a result of the country’s 30-year rule by former President Hosini Mubarak. Facebook and Twitter were the lifeline of the revolution and through these networks the world saw a first hand view of the revolution through pictures, tweets, and Facebook groups.
• Arguably one of the most driving forces behind the revolution was the “We are all Khaled Said” group. The Egyptian government shut off access to the Internet and text messages on the second day of the mass protest. Their aim was to shut down the revolution; they felt that by doing this it would ultimately eliminate the strength of the revolution. However, the government’s effort to disable ‘insurgent’ communication in Egypt was unsuccessful. Many transnational human rights activists, translators and bloggers used Facebook, Twitter, chatrooms and other social media platforms to relay messages from protestors, journalists and human rights activists to further the grassroots social mobilization while allowing the world to witness step in step exactly what was going on inside of Egypt.

  • Two photos used in my presentation are found on this website.

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• The Face of Egypt's Social Networking Revolution
• "He has sort of been tweeting every day, almost every hour," said CNET.com's Declan McCullagh. "He has been saying this is what I'm doing this is how we are going to bring democracy freedom to Egypt. He has developed quite a massive following, he has become a figure head of this revolt. I guess we can now call it a revolution."
• It generally acknowledged that Ghonim's Facebook page first sparked the protests. Titled "We Are all Khaled Said" -- it memorialized an Egyptian businessman who had been beaten to death by police after threatening to expose corruption.

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• Social Media Plays Pivotal Role in Egypt's Revolution

   

• The pictures out of Egypt last week stunned the world. For 18 days, thousands of young, educated and frustrated Egyptians called for their president's resignation.

   

  Before they descended on Tahrir Square, they rallied on Facebook.

   

  "These weren't necessarily people with political goals," said Shel Holtz of Holtz Communication and Technology. "They just wanted to see change."

   

• "One of the girls who started the whole movement put up a video on YouTube," said Egyptian-American UNLV student Sarah Trabia. "That was watched by over 500,000 people, and she spent the entire three minutes just talking about how they need to get out there and speak to the people who need help."

   

  More than a third of the Arab world uses social media. An anti-Hosni Mubarak Facebook page, started by a Google engineer, incited rage among Egypt's youth which led to the protests.

   

  Trabia used social media to stay in touch with her relatives in Alexandria. "I attended the March of Millions virtual march. I did everything I could to post statuses about it, and post links, and just get the word out within Las Vegas' community, and connecting with my cousins as much as I could, even though the Internet was down for a good portion of the riots," she said.

   

  Trabia hopes the energized protesters will stay connected to ensure democracy prevails.

   

• "I'd like to see the citizens stay in contact with them, stay knowing what's going on, keeping up with any updates with the writing of the Constitution, about elections, and keep going, understanding what's going on in your government so it doesn't happen again," she said.

   

  The Egyptian government shut down the Internet last week to stop the rallying on Facebook and Twitter. With ongoing protests in other Middle Eastern nations, social media experts think those countries' governments may try to do the same.

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• How Social Media Is Keeping the Egyptian Revolution Alive

• CAIRO -- The revolution in Egypt is unfinished business. While new online tools are used to strengthen civil society, activists are still struggling with the digital divide when it comes to mobilizing masses against the army and the remains of the old administration.

    

  On a Saturday evening in Cairo, a digital campaign against military trials for civilians is on. Activists are posting comments on the Facebook site of the Egyptian Armed Forces, whose Supreme Council -- the SCAF -- holds power in Egypt. SCAF took over after President Hosni Mubarak was ousted in the revolution in February.

• Human rights groups claim that 10,000 civilian Egyptians have faced military trials since the uprisings began -- which is more than during the Mubarak regime.

    

  The campaign was announced on a Facebook page and about 8,000 participants have joined. After bombarding the SCAF's site with comments for 15 minutes, the crowd moved on to criticizing the ministries' sites.

    

  After a while, an official closed the comments sections on the Facebook sites. Activists continued the discussion, however, on Twitter with the hashtag #nomiltrials.

    

  "Twitter and Facebook are the ways we keep the momentum going. We protect and defend people. We campaign there," said Salma el Daly, an Egyptian videoblogger.

• She, like the other Egyptian activists, is not happy with the proceedings after the spring uprising. The old regime is still in power, and the army has its foot on the neck of the country. Not so much has changed since Mubarak left, and many view the revolution as an unfinished chapter.

    

  "But we will make the change happen. It is only a matter of time," she said.

    

  As the military has closed Tahrir Square from demonstrations, smaller protests are happening elsewhere in Cairo. Facebook pages, such as We are all Khaleed Said, with more than 1.6 million followers, are used for spreading the message about protests and campaigns.

    

  "The Khaleed Said page is a machine now. Almost everything that is posted there goes viral instantly," said Adel Iskandar, a media scholar from Georgetown University who specializes in the Middle East.

    

  But just like during the uprising, online activism is merely one way of protesting. It is more crucial to get boots on the ground, and activists on the streets.

    

  The April 6 Movement, one of the central organizations behind the revolution, arranges protests in several parts of Cairo. Five minutes from Tahrir Square, young Egyptian activists gather for TweetNadwas, a series of online and offline meetings, to discuss the next steps in campaigning.

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• Exactly What Role Did Social Media Play in the Egyptian Revolution?
• The January 25th revolution in Egypt was an incredible achievement by its people and a truly inspiring example of the power of peaceful protest. Yet the work towards an effective transition to democratic government within Egypt has just begun. Meanwhile a debate continues to rage in the blogosphere as to the exact role played by social media.

• With sobriety and complexity in mind, I want to take a closer look at the specific role that social media played in terms of scaling awareness and support among anti-government protesters that ultimately resulted in the resignation of President Mubarak.

   

  The role of social media is critical because it helps to spread cognitive dissonance by connecting thought leaders and activists to ordinary citizens rapidly expanding the network of people who become willing to take action. Brian Solis describes this process as creating the necessary "density" of connections, writing "If unity is the effect, density is the cause."Similarly, Stowe Boyd writes:
• "Ideas spread more rapidly in densely connected social networks. So tools that increase the density of social connection are instrumental to the changes that spread. […] And, more importantly, increased density of information flow (the number of times that people hear things) and of the emotional density (as individuals experience others' perceptions about events, or 'social contextualization') leads to an increased likelihood of radicalization: when people decide to join the revolution instead of watching it."
• As many commentators have noted, one of the early catalysts for the January 25th revolution in Egypt was a Facebook page created in honor of Khaled Said, a young man who had been brutally beaten and killed by the police. This page became a focal point around which 470,000 "fans" organized their dissidence while aYouTube video about his murder was viewed by more than 500,000 people fueling further public outrage.

• Inspired by the protests against and the eventual overthrow of Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali on 14 January 2011, the Khaled Said Facebook page then became a focal point for the dissemination of popular protest throughout Egypt. As such, the limited penetration of social media within the country was overcome by the fact that it first scaled vertically through key Facebook sites such as those of Khaled Said, 15-year old Asmaa Mahfouz and later, Google executive Wael Ghonim.

    

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• When social media 'hinders' revolution

• Behind all of these happenings is a theory: That new-ish communications technologies -- from Facebook and Twitter to BlackBerry Messenger -- help people mobilize and revolt against governments. Tech insiders tend to see the Internet and social media as democratizing forces -- digital tools that can be used to topple dictators and spark change.

  Perhaps Wael Ghonim, the Google employee who helped organize Egypt's revolution 2.0 over Facebook, put words to this theory best:

  "If you want to liberate a society, just give them the Internet."

• "Social media can act against grass roots mobilization," he writes. "They discourage face-to-face communication and mass presence in the streets. Similar to more traditional and highly visible media, they create greater awareness of risks involved in protests, which in turn can discourage people from taking part in demonstrations."

  He uses mathematical models to map out why this was the case in Egypt.

  To put this in a pop-culture context, think about Facebook photos of your friends. To some degree, seeing what they're up to all the time could stop you from actually meeting up with them in person to communicate.

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• • One of the photos used in my presentation is from this source.
• Why Social Media is (Really) Revolutionary: Looking Back At Egypt
• Unrest is flaring in Egypt again this week, as new President Mohamed Morsi moves to expand his authority and assert more control over the country. Protesters concerned over the power grab again staged sit-ins in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, and—not surprisingly—social media channels are once more serving as critical organizational tools.  
• As this scene plays out again in Cairo, I’m reminded of the small but significant role social media played during the 2011 Egyptian Revolution, when the country finally threw off the yoke of decades of dictatorial government.
  
• I became involved in social media in part because I believe it’s a truly revolutionary form of communication that can change society. Events like these make me realize what a powerful and disruptive force we’ve unleashed.
• When hundreds of thousands of Egyptians flooded Tahrir Square in early 2011, it wasn’t the first time discontent had simmered in the region. But it was the first time an entirely new kind of uprising was about to boil over and ripple throughout the Middle East. During this period, I was able to see firsthand how technology—primarily social media—would play a role in shaping the events that were to follow.
• The mass demonstrations that precipitated Hosni Mubarak’s fall from power were organized on Facebook groups. Demonstrators got the word out on Twitter, encouraging followers to hit the streets at predetermined times and locations. Eventually the government caught on, blocking access to Facebook and Twitter on Jan. 24, 2011, just as the crucial Day of Anger protest was building. But the censors forgot about HootSuite.  
• Our tech team began noticing a huge spike in sign-ups from Egypt that same day, as Egyptian users tapped HootSuite to circumvent the government ban on accessing Facebook and Twitter directly. We saw people using our dashboard to organize protests, share curfew info, reach outside media and monitor the status of family and friends.
  
• One woman, whom I never met and know only from one tweet sent through HootSuite was named Sonia Verma. Reporting from right in the heart of Tahrir Square—where protests had suddenly turned bloody—she tweeted: “They are ripping up banners to use as bandages #Egypt.” In fewer than 140 characters, she said volumes—and her message potentially reached and moved millions. That’s the power of social media.  

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