Iranians can use twitter now!

As of Monday, Iranians can now access Twitter and Facebook for the first time since 2009 when their government blocked social networking sites.

As we know most famously from the Arab Spring, social media can be used to raise awareness and to organize protests in times of uncertainty, to try to uprise against repression and to rally for hope in times of conflict.

Before any of that happened, this specific use of social media use was seen in Iran. In 2009 there was a presidential election won by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that many believed to have been fraudulently won. People began protesting, and these were described as the biggest since the revolution in 1979, with hundred of thousands (if not millions) of people protesting.

It was named the Green movement. The Iranian government soon became aware that sites such as Facebook and Twitter were being used to organize their protests against the regime, and they shut access down.

Since then, people in Iran who wanted to access the sites had to use complicated software such as virtual private networks in order to bypass the firewalls put in place by the government.

However…

Three months ago, Iran held elections which saw Hassan Rouhani take the office of president on August the 3rd. Rouhani is seen as being much more moderate than his predecessor, and the government under his leadership has said that it will be liberalizing the internet and improving online access for all Iranians.

This seems to be the beginning.

So far not all parts of Iran have access, and not all social media sites are unblocked, but in our humble opinion, this is an excellent start.

Images courtesy of Mashable & Engadget