Social media’s role in 2011 Egyptian revolution

Egyptian revolution in 2011 was part of Arab Spring, a series of demonstrations, protests and revolutions. All of those revolts have one thing in common and it is the important role of social media. This essay is going to investigate the social media’s effect on Arab Spring, particularly on the revolution in Egypt. Social media have a great power, because thanks to them, people can share their thoughts in every single minute of their life. Even though there are other ways of communication, social media, such as blogs, Twitter or Facebook, had a great impact on Egyptian revolution in 2011 because people could organize their dissidence fast and could easily share their ideas of the free Egypt.
When Hosni Mubarak became a president in 1981, he became suppressing all his opponents. People were not happy, but they were not united in order to oppose Mubarak. Everyone trying to oppose Mubarak without the support of the people put his life and lives of his family into the risk. There was no simple nor easy way to connect with people who shared the same opinion about the government, because having such a discussion at any public place was dangerous at that time. Although it was possible to find people with the same political views, the idea of making any non-violent protest was unrealistic. To make such a protest many people need to join the demonstration, but without internet, people couldn’t share the information about the demonstration well. They could only talk about it, but in secret and only in small groups. In small group, the idea of making such a mass demonstration seems stupid. On the other hand, on the internet when you see how many people share your views it suddenly seems much easier to make such an event. Of course it was somehow possible to make a change, many people in many countries in history changed whole world. But social media made it much easier to share information about the regime and the revolution, and as people got more informed they started disliking the president the president more and more.
Social media are a way to communicate with each other, such as any other media like TV, newspaper or books. The difference between standard media and social media is the social aspect. Social media allow you to interact, not only passively receive. (Nations) The interaction was very important in order to manage to deprive Mubarak of power. Thanks to social media it was possible to accomplish that. Protests in Egypt began on 25 January 2011. After three days the Egyptian government attempted to eliminate the nation's internet access, in order to inhibit the protesters' ability to organize through social media. That shows how important social media really are. Egyptian government have seen such a big thread in social media that they shutdown whole Egypt’s internet connection, which is not easy and certainly is not cheap. (Richtel)
The protests started because people were unsatisfied with authoritarian regime and the suppression of human rights for a long time. On the other hand, there were two other reasons why did people go to the streets. First was the murder of Egyptian businessman Khaled Said. The connection between the social media and the revolution is even stronger because of the reason why was Mr. Said killed. He was beaten to death in the lobby of a residential building after two plainclothes police officers found out he had posted a video on his personal blog showing them with illegal drugs. (Preston) “Within five days of his death, an anonymous human rights activist created a Facebook page--We Are All Khaled Said --of cellphone photos from the morgue of his bloodied face, the video of the corrupt officers and other YouTube videos contrasting his corpse with pictures of his smiling face from happier days. By mid-June, 130,000 people joined the page.” (Prenston, par. 4) As we already know, Egyptian government blocked the internet connection for the whole country. That was a second and final reason for people to go to streets. Professor Mohammed el-Nawawy of the communications department at Queens University of Charlotte said: “The government has made a big mistake taking away the option at people's fingertips. They're taking their frustration to the streets.” And they indeed did. Ramez Mohamed, a 26-year-old computer science graduate said: “Frankly, I didn’t participate in Jan. 25 protests, but the Web sites’ blockade and communications blackout on Jan. 28 was one of the main reasons I, and many others, were pushed to the streets
According to CIA factbook, Egypt has around 80 million inhabitants. Around 20 million of them are internet users, which makes Egypt 21st country in the world according to the number of users within a country that access the Internet. Internet had the essential importance in the Egypt revolution. Most of the people who were caring about the politics were connected to the internet and when the government blocked Internet in Egypt, those people went to the streets, joining the people they only knew virtually, but who they never met before. Those who had not cared about the revolution before joined people who were protesting in streets already, because they found out that they are not living in a democracy as they might have thought.
Nearly two years after the revolution the international community still can’t tell if the revolution in 2011 will lead to European like democratic system. On the other hand, we can tell that the role of social media were very important. At first, it is helped to share information about the president Mubarak, information that would never get into the official printed media. After that, it united people who didn’t like what they saw on the internet and wanted to make some change. And at last, the simple fact that the government wanted to withhold access to the internet and social media to people, which leaded to many people going to the streets, because they taught previously that they lived in relative democracy, but they saw that they actually didn’t. Nobody knows what would happen if the government haven’t decided to block the internet. Maybe so many people wouldn’t go to the streets and would be satisfied just with saying their opinions on the internet. But when Mubarak decided to take something so important as social media, the place where people felt free, away from people, people decided to take things into their own hands. Social media changed the way people live in Egypt now. WORKS CITED

“Egypt”. The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency, 2012. Web. 20. Dec. 2012.
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Nations, Daniel. “What is Social Media?”. About.com Webtrends. About.com 27. Dec. 2012.
Richtel, Matt. “Egypt Halts most Internet and Cell Service, and Scale of Shutdown Suprises Experts.” New York Times: A.13. Jan 29 2011. ProQuest Newsstand. Web. 22. Dec. 2012.
Cohen, Noam. “Egyptians Were Unpluged, and Uncowed”. New York Times. Feb 20 2011. Web. 28. Dec. 2012.
Preston, Jennifer. "Social Media 'Catalysts' in Egypt Protests; Khaled Said Facebook Page Unified Citizens." National Post. Feb 07 2011. ProQuest Newsstand. Web. 27. Dec. 2012.
Gordon Crovitz, L. "Information Age: Egypt's Revolution by Social Media." Wall Street Journal: A.19. Feb 14 2011. ProQuest Newsstand. Web. 28 Dec. 2012.