"Take Me Away?..."
Words.
"...Yes, this revolution is being tweeted, blogged and Facebooked -- and not just in Tehran. Blogger Andrew Sullivan helped kick off the cyber hype with his June 13 post "The Revolution Will be Twittered?" in which he argued that the use of this platform means that "you cannot stop people any longer. You cannot control them any longer." And after the State Department asked Twitter to delay a scheduled maintenance last week so that this line of communication between Iran and the rest of the world could remain open, the company's co-founder Biz Stone offered a somewhat self-congratulatory aw-shucks post on his blog: "It's humbling to think that our two-year old company could be playing such a globally meaningful role that state officials find their way toward highlighting our significance."
...Yet for all their promise, there are sharp limits on what Twitter and other Web tools such as Facebook and blogs can do for citizens in authoritarian societies. The 140 characters allowed in a tweet are not the end of politics as we know it -- and at times can even play into the hands of hard-line regimes. No amount of Twittering will force Iran's leaders to change course, as supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei made clear Friday with his rebuke of the protesters, reportedly followed by the security forces' use of tear gas, batons, water cannons and gunfire to break up demonstrations yesterday. In Iran, as elsewhere, if true revolution is coming, it must happen offline..."
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