A Technological Revolution

Matt Loewenstein Revolution 2.0 Due: May 21, 2012 In the year of 2004, the largest and most influential social networking platform was released to mankind. By allowing users across the globe to share their beliefs regarding social, political, and economic drama, a new technological era entered society (Bellis). Facebook did not only annex another piece of technology for society to use, but it socially constructed our society. It opened a new form of communication and social structure that our planet would later rely on for self entertainment as well as bringing people together across the globe. In the memoir, Revolution 2.0, Wael Ghonim uses the technological evolution engrained into society in order to promote the 2011 Egyptian Revolution leading to the resignation of the former president, Hosni Mubarak. In June of 2010 while the corruption throughout Egypt continued to spread, Ghonim noticed an image posted on his Facebook wall. The picture was a very gruesome, vivid image of a male name Khaled Mohamed Said who had been beaten to death by two police officers in Alexandria, Egypt. Ghonim decided to take action after been horrifically distraught from understanding what his homeland had become. The rise of the Facebook page, "Kullena Khaled Said" meaning "We Are All Khaled Said" was motivated by Ghonim's empirical state of mind to reform Egypt into a nation free of corruption. Ghonim posted on his page, "Egyptians, my justice is in your hands" (Ghonim 60). In this statement, Ghonim purposely used first person to act as if he were Khaled Said. Ghonim's degree in marketing and job at Google most definitely helped him effectively steer people toward his page. In addition to Ghonim's use of Facebook, his use of YouTube helps him broaden his technological horizons. By posting links to YouTube torture videos, Ghonim is able to substantiate to society that Egypt is becoming corrupt. Ghonim uses Facebook in order to organize events where people could stand up for their rights. In order to successfully plan an event and make sure the results are outstanding, Ghonim uses his Facebook page to promote the event and send out invitations. Therefore, he creates an event called "The Silent Stand" where everyone lines up along the Alexandria corniche dressed in black and performs no act of violence. Ghonim states, "This is the strongest message we can send to our government. It says that we reject their practices and at the same time we are peaceful" (Ghonim 71). Ghonim most definitely does not support violence because he wants to stay as far away from replicating what the state police were doing. While Ghonim's events were in progress, people used another massive technological platform created in 2006 called Twitter to release their whereabouts. For example, "one activist on Twitter said that more than a hundred people lined up along the corniche in the Cleopatra district in Alexandria" (Ghonim 77). Immediately, Ghonim saw the twitter feed and made sure to direct people towards the Cleopatra district. Technology truly served as a guide for the Egyptians and without it, the success rate of these events would have dropped dramatically. These technological platforms were also used for safety measures. Many lives were saved when Egyptian protestors would post on the "Kullena Khaled Said" wall or even send out a twitter feed stating that the NDP were attacking a certain area because people would know to stay away. There were multiple Silent Stands because one event was not enough to overthrow the country of Egypt. When government interference occurred, the hundreds of thousands of protestors always came up with a backup plan. Also, Ghonim would make sure to consistently post on his page in order to build his followers' confidence and make sure they do not quit. Ghonim