Iran Coverage as an Example of the Power of Social Media and the Internet

In reading the coverage of the current unrest in Iran, I had a flashback to when the Shah of Iran was overthrown. Yes, there was coverage, but by today's standards it was extremely limited. After all, there were a limited number of news outlets that any person had access to, and a limit on what any news outlet had access to. I have very little doubt that this helped the Ayatollah and his henchmen immensely, certainly to sell a story that I think current events tell us was not entirely consistent with reality.

Today, things a very, very different. I just did a Google search for news of Iran, and I must have gotten hits from a dozen or more news outlets, many of them from outside of the US. That certainly helps provide a broader perspective. But, if I had limited myself to Google and news outlets I would be missing out on an enormous amount of really relevant content. I tried a Google blog search - almost the lazy alternative, because it's so easy to do. But, it would have been worth it even if it hadn't been so easy, as it gave me a number of excellent hits.

But, why limit yourself to Google, or any particular search engine? I didn't. I use twitter, and there are a number of good tweets on the subject. The best ones are to links, mostly to items that didn't show up high, or at all, on the Google results. Some of the posts were fascinating, either bringing in facts that most people would never otherwise encounter, or providing perspectives that go past the conventional wisdom. I don't have time to do the extensive research I would like to, but I have no doubt that if I used other social media, I'd get similarly interesting results.

Iran's government process is still far too opaque, and I doubt that anyone is ever really going to know if the election was stolen or not. But, one thing is for sure. The rulers of Iran are NOT going to be able to pretend that everyone was satisfied with the results, nor that it handled any "stray" discontent peacefully. The internet in general, and social media in particular, mean that there is too much information out there, and it cannot just be buried.

That is powerful indeed.