THE 2011 EGYPT REVOLUTION AND THE SOCIAL MEDIA

The January 25th revolution in Egypt was an incredible achievement by its people and a truly
inspiring example of the power of peaceful protest. Yet the work towards an effective transition
to democratic government within Egypt has just begun. Meanwhile a debate continues to rage in
the blogosphere as to the exact role played by social media.
While commentators such as Brian Solis and myself have argued against the off-hand dismissal
of social media by Malcolm Gladwell, Evgeny Morozov and Will Heaven, Jeff Jarvis and Jay
Rosenmade the sobering point that its silly to argue the issue in absolutist terms.
Rosen argues Factors are not causes, and insists that social media was neither fully
responsible for the revolution in Egypt nor irrelevant, and that social transformation is far more
complex involving a high degree of mystery.
With sobriety and complexity in mind, I want to take a closer look at the specific role that social
media played in terms of scaling awareness and support among anti-government protesters that
ultimately resulted in the resignation of President Mubarak.
In his book, Revolution 2.0, Ghonim (2012) suggests that the eruption of the 2011 Egypt
revolution goes back to June 10th, 2010 when he anonymously created a Facebook page, We
Are All Khaled Said. He made his emotional comment Today they killed Khaled. If I dont act
for his sake, tomorrow they will kill me along with a horrifying picture of Khaled Said (Ghonim
2012, p. 60). The purpose of the Facebook page was to publicize the brutality of the Egypt
government and its police officers who murdered 28 year-old blogger Khaled Said for the reason
that he criticized the Mubarak regime through his blog site. The response for the first post was
immediate and more than 36,000 joined the page in a single day (Ghonim 2012, pp. 60-62).
Using the Facebook page, Ghonim planned multiple events of the Silent Stands of Prayer for
the Martyr Khaled Said in major cities in Egypt from June through August in 2010 (Ghonim
2012). Using diverse social media sites, young participants shared and spread pictures and videos
of the events including the polices ruthless treatment of peaceful participants. Over time, the
We Are All Khaled Said page evolved into a hub to build situational awareness, perform online
polls, express solidarity, charge the corrupt Mubarak regime, and coordinate the ensuing street
protests. Stimulated by the serial Silent Stands events, and encouraged by the Tunisian
Revolution on December 17th, 2010 through which president Ben Ali resigned from his 23 years
of dictatorship, Egyptian people planned the first large-scale non-violent civil resistance in Cairo
on January 25th, 2011. The purpose was to publicly express their grievances on oppressive
emergency law, high 70 inflation and unemployment rate, corrupt government of inflation and
unemployment rate, corrupt government officials, and, most importantly, to demand that their
president of thirty years, Hosni Mubarak, should step down. For this protest, the role of social
media technologies was significant in coordinating the ensuing demonstrations. For instance,
Ghonim documented and uploaded to Google Docs all information relevant to the January 25th
protest which included the reasons for protesting and for choosing this day and these locations
and the unified chants [], phone numbers for activists responsible for supporting arrested
protestors, and for redirecting demonstrators to other locations if the protests at any one place
were obstructed (Ghonim 2012, p. 164). The file was accessed by more than 50,000 people and
distributed through online forums, political websites, Facebook, and Twitter (p. 164). Literally,
what is new in the Egypt Revolution was the sheer volume of the social media campaign.
Appalled by the escalating numbers of protesters and the power of social media technologies, the

Mubarak regime attempted to respond with rubber bullets, security police forces, pro-Mubarak
thugs, and a brutal disconnect of Internet and national cellular wireless services. However,
despite Mubaraks persistence to hold his position, resistances of angry protesters had gotten
more intense and international pressure increased against the oppressive Mubarak regime. On
February 11th, 2011, the vice president announced that Mubarak would delegate power to the
Supreme Council of Egyptian Armed Forces to resign his thirty years of presidency. At last,
revolutionary protesters celebrated the end of 30 years of dictatorship.
Exactly what role did social media play in the Egyptian revolution?
The role of social media is critical because it helps to spread cognitive dissonance by connecting
thought leaders and activists to ordinary citizens rapidly expanding the network of people who
become willing to take action. Brian Solis describes this process as creating the necessary
density of connections, writing If unity is the effect, density is the cause. Similarly, Stowe
Boyd writes:
Ideas spread more rapidly in densely connected social networks. So tools that increase the
density of social connection are instrumental to the changes that spread. [] And, more
importantly, increased density of information flow (the number of times that people hear things)
and of the emotional density (as individuals experience others perceptions about events, or
social contextualization) leads to an increased likelihood of radicalization: when people decide
to join the revolution instead of watching it.
So how was such density achieved in Egypt and what impact will it have beyond its borders?
Lets consider this question in three dimensions vertically, horizontally and in the
compounding effect social media generates from one country to another.
i) Vertical Threshold: Compared to United States and Europe, social media has little penetration
in the Arab world. In fact, there are only 21 million Facebook users across the Arab world. So
how did social media play such a significant role in fueling a popular revolution? Let me explain
by way of an example.
As many commentators have noted, one of the early catalysts for the January 25th revolution in
Egypt was a Facebook page created in honor of Khaled Said, a young man who had been brutally
beaten and killed by the police. This page became a focal point around which 470,000 fans
organized their dissidence while a YouTube video about his murder was viewed by more than
500,000 people fueling further public outrage.
Inspired by the protests against and the eventual overthrow of Tunisian President Zine El Abidine
Ben Ali on 14 January 2011, the Khaled Said Facebook page then became a focal point for the
dissemination of popular protest throughout Egypt. As such, the limited penetration of social
media within the country was overcome by the fact that it first scaled vertically through
key Facebook sites such as those of Khaled Said, 15-year old Asmaa Mahfouz and later, Google
executive Wael Ghonim.
ii) Horizontal Expansion: Buoyed by the success of Tunisian protesters and emboldened by the
courage of young protesters on their own streets, social media also helped expand the ranks of
Egyptians in Tahrir Square from young, well-educated students
to doctors, lawyers, judges,Christians, women and finally State TV personnel.
Such alignment around shared values counteracted attempts by President Mubarak to divide local
and foreign support for the protestors. Tweets, Facebook posts and You Tube videos flooded the

Internet also serving as critical, transparent content for the dominant Egyptian media outlets such
as television including Al Jazeera English (AJE).
iii) Compounding Effect: From Tunisia to Egypt to Syria to Iran toAlgeria and China, social
media is also playing a pivotal role in scaling connections between people, in achieving density,
in disseminating courage and in countering misinformation generated by oppressive regimes in
many countries around the world.
The most powerful consequence of this revolutionary tide is to challenge the false separation
between a countrys ideals and its interests. By allowing citizens from all professions to align
around shared values for the sake of their countrys future, they are challenging the monopolies
of power that have impoverished the lives of millions allowing them to re-assert their core belief
that government officials are democratically elected to serve the interests of the people.
Thomas Friedman, columnist for the New York Times, observed thousands of Egyptians
volunteering to clean up Tahrir Square in the last 48 hours and wrote about the
experience quoting the aphorism that in the history of the world no one has ever washed a
rented car. As he concluded, Egyptians are now re-taking ownership of their national identity,
pride and country after thirty years of an oppressive regime.
Just as Egypt followed Tunisia, citizens of other Arab counties are rising to the challenge of
shaping their own futures in the face of political and military might. Social media did not make
this happen single-handedly, but by enabling people to connect more rapidly around shared
values, it is shifting power back to the people and allowing them to re-align the interests of a
country around the values that serve all its people.
This phenomenon and the contributory role played by social media are a powerful demonstration
of what I call a We First (as opposed to Me First) thinking and behavior. This mindset involves a
fundamental recognition that communities, companies and countries must now embrace and
demonstrate an expanded definition of self-interest that includes the greater good. To do
otherwise not only threatens their own survival, but invites a revolution led by those united by
shared values and connected by social technology.
Do you believe the current wave of revolution will continue through the Arab world? Do you
believe such instability is a positive development?