Twitter: Revolutions Continue?

The concept of “Twitter revolution” appeared in the spring and summer of 2009, first in the texts of news agencies about public unrest in Moldova, then in Iran. And now it can be said that the Twitter revolutions continue, and who wins - free Internet or governments interested in censoring it or even turning it off, time will tell. In the meantime, twitter is making history.

How it all began, or Twitter world

In April 2009, the Moldovan authorities, trying to deprive the voices of the opposition, first tried to disable Internet access in the country as a whole, and then - to influence point-by-point the network media located in Moldova. Moldavian Odnoklassniki turned out to be blocked. Then opposition-minded Moldovans began to more actively use sms messages and twitter, the hosting of which was far from Moldova.

A little later, in June 2009, during the elections in Iran, with the help of Twitter and YouTube (which the authorities almost immediately blocked), the opposition attracted world attention to events in the country. Although there were not so many microblog users in Iran, it was after the tweets from Iran, replicated by the world media, that the Nobel Peace Prize was proposed to be awarded to Twitter.

True, from the very beginning, European and American journalists who came up with the name “twitter revolution” slightly exaggerated the role of social networks in general and twitter in particular, in social explosions. Because not such a large percentage of the population, especially in Arab countries, actively use social networks. In Iran, for example, there were only about a hundred opposition activists with Twitter accounts. Twitter played a role more like an “informational boomerang”, serving as a source of content for the Western media.
')
In addition, opposition activists themselves suffered greatly from the activity in social networks, about which, thanks to their accounts, the authorities learned a lot.

But it is impossible to belittle the role of social networks in anti-government actions.

Orange wave

The next “twitter revolution” took place in 2010 in Tunisia, whose official media “did not notice” the self-immolation of the vegetable merchant, and the world learned about it from YouTube. Of course, government censorship immediately blocked YouTube, Vimeo and a number of news sites, both local and European, and imposed restrictions on access to popular social networks.

In Egypt, during the riots, the authorities acted even more radically: from January 27 to February 2, 2010, the Internet was almost completely blocked on the territory of the country, until February 6, SMS messages did not work well. It was the SMS connection that united the opponents of the regime. The wave of "Arab spring" rolled around the world.

The situation developed differently in different countries, but one thing turned out to be common: the role of Internet communication in conditions of total censorship in official media has greatly increased. According to the Dubai School of Management, in the Arab countries, the number of Facebook users increased by 78% in 2010. In general, in the Arab world, Facebook was more likely than Twitter revolutions. Partly because Facebook has an interface in Arabic.

Official structures have learned to respond more flexibly; now, instead of turning off social networks completely, they are switching the discussion to other topics - perhaps also sharp, but not so dangerous. But social networks do not give up. Now to find out about what is happening in Ukraine, the most reliable way is from tweets or YouTube videos from event participants. Such reports are rarely impartial, but they certainly reflect the situation better than official media.

Information war

Meanwhile, disabling social networks is still popular in the world. Turkish President Abdullah Gul said at the end of March 2014 that he was against blocking social networks, but the relevant court decisions were made, and Twitter was blocked, and then YouTube was blocked. The Turks immediately began sending tweets via the sms service and using special software to bypass the locks. Of course, Turkish users immediately began to share ways to circumvent the ban and thanked the companies and products that helped in this .



In Kazakhstan, article 41-1 “Procedure for suspending networks and (or) communications” was adopted not long ago, as an addition to the law “On the Press”, which allows suspending social networks without a trial. The ban can affect WhatsApp (for mass mailing of bankruptcy messages to several banks), twitter, facebook, skype ... In principle, even calls for the Internet and mobile communications can be blocked for extremism, terrorism and unauthorized rallies.

Opponents of locks also do not give up. There are more and more ways to circumvent Internet censorship , and share information without restriction. Most likely, with the help of social networks in the world many more events will occur, including “color” revolutions.