Iran's Twitter Revolution? Maybe Not Yet

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Twitter in Moldova?

Zuckerman analyzed protests in Moldova this past April, which were also labeled a "Twitter Revolution," and found the vast majority of tweets, or Twitter postings, during the protests were coming from outside the country, either Moldovan expats or just people sympathetic to the movement.

"Of the 700 people who were twittering on the Moldovan protests, less than 200 were in Moldova at the time," Zuckerman said. "Social media are helpful in exposing what's happening to the outside world, but it's a mistake to think that these protests [in Iran] are because of social media. It's more conventional things like word-of-mouth and phone calls that really bring massive numbers of people into the streets."

A study by Mike Edwards, a social network researcher at Parsons The New School for Design, examined 79,000 tweets related to the Iran protests, and found that one-third are repostings of other tweets. The general ratio of reposts to posts is 1-to-20, and even in other fast-breaking global news events, when reposting might be more common, such as the swine flu outbreak, Edwards says he has seen the number go only as high as 1 in 5. This could indicate the amount of information deployed by protestors in Iran is small compared to the amount recirculated by outsiders, although Edwards cautions there are other possible explanations.

"There is this romantic notion that the people tweeting are the ones in the streets, but that is not what is happening," Edwards says. "The hubs are generally not people on the ground, and many are not in the country."

Exaggerating the News?

One analyst cautioned that while Twitter or Facebook may keep the outside world's attention trained on Iranian protests, there was also a danger such tools could exaggerate the movement's momentum. "You can get the notion that Ahmadinejad is very unpopular and that Mousavi has this groundswell of support, but we don't have data that shows that," says Reva Bhalla, director of analysis for Austin (Tex.)-based Stratfor, a strategic intelligence and forecasting company. "Ahmadinejad has real support, but his supporters don't have smartphones. There is a real risk of amplifying [one side]." Ahmadinejad is thought to have a greater base of support in rural areas, while Mousavi is popular with urbanites.

Still, regardless of how much a mover social media may be in the protests, Iran watchers agree that the tools do represent a step forward. "Governments like Iran, Syria, and Egypt are really struggling with how to continue limiting information," Bhalla said. "No matter how hard these governments try to block communication, now there is always going to be a hole. This really is a case study in how technology can affect closed societies."

Mousavi introduced the use of social-networking tools to his campaign last month, Iran experts say, because he didn't have the access to state-run television and newspapers Ahmadinejad enjoys. "They needed an alternative means to campaign and get their message across," said Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council. But Parsi, like others, acknowledges that Facebook and Twitter were important mainly for letting people outside the country follow events, and text messages and phone calls were the primary mover of people in Iran's protests. "The people I know mainly tell me they hear about these protests from friends or by SMS," Parsi says.

Schectman is a reporter at BusinessWeek.

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