Twitter in Iran

Image via Wikipedia

In the news today is the story of how Twitter maintenance was postponed on account of the activities in Iran. We may be witnessing one of the first time social networking technology contributes to enabling a revolution.

In the past governments could control a populous by controlling the news media. So the Iranian government did the classic response, and jammed the radio and TV, restricted foreign reporters to their hotels... But they didn't account for social networking technology.

Social networking technology has become pervasive form of instant information. It reaches from individual to individual, with no single controlled outlet points. Blogs, Twitter, and other forms of information dissemination is near instantaneous and very personal.

News stories through classic electronic dissemination is becoming history, in more ways than one. It is in comparison disseminating a description of what happened, and not what is happening. It this regards it is worth noting that the wiki definition for news media does not include such near real time sources for information as Twitter and YouTube postings from cell phones and Face Book entries.

The recommendation for ailing news outlets would be to incorporate this technology and individuals as sources. The Washington Post has an excellent editorial on all "Iran's Twitter Revolution", but hasn't yet seemed to recognize the significance to the Post as a business.