Monday, June 15, 2009

Citizen participation is a powerful thing - Iran record turnout, defiant rallies

So, besides the record turnout for voting in the Iranian Presidential election, thousands are protesting what are widely considered to be fraudulent election results (normally the results are certified by the supreme leader--Currently Ayatollah Khomeini-- after three days, but this election was called a landslide for Ahmadinejad (the incumbent) after only three hours.)

Great crowdsourced coverage on Twitter #IranianElection
Great live blogging on The Huffington Post
Continuously updated images from PicFog

And Mashable's how-to guide so you can choose your own social media to track the Iranian Election and other current events in the future



Interestingly, CNN is getting repeatedly lambasted for its abysmal coverage of the rally. I wonder if it's because getting video out of Iran is so difficult, even under the best of conditions (only the state-run media have the equipment to send up a satellite beam), and according to reports the Internet has been variously blocked, tampered with, and shut off to prevent protesters from communicating and prevent journalists from getting the story out.

Favorite slogans: "WHERE'S MY VOTE?" And where indeed, when you read Juan Cole's analysis

Democracy. Wow. I attended a blogging conference in 2005 where someone gave me the book We Are Iran, which contained excerpts from Iranian bloggers intended as a counter-narrative to the image of Iran portrayed in the Western media; they definitely evidenced a desire for greater freedom and democracy -- had no idea this was coming so soon though. What an election.