Voice of the Digital Class, Voice of the People

So, about the Iranian election aftermath and the role of social media:

I (may) have said before in this space that one of the challenges of assembling a balanced view of any country, especially a developing one, based on non-traditional media such as blogs, twitter, youtube, etc, is that the more powerful/sophisticated tools for gathering and disseminating information are still largely concentrated in the hands of a particular class of people whose views are legitimate, certainly, but are not necessarily representative of all views, and may not even be the majority view.

In Iran and in Kenya, an urban technosavvy middle class with reasonable access to diverse online tools makes full use of these tools. This is a good thing, a great thing even. Bully for us. I do not mean to suggest in any way shape or form that the views we express are not heartfelt or legitimate. I do however deign to suggest that they are oftentimes only a small part of the picture, like looking at a portrait and staring fixedly at the nose while determinedly (and a little curiously) ignoring the rest of the face.

The fact that any one person is in possession of, or has access to a microphone or other amplifying device doesn’t make his or her view more legitimate than that of the next citizen. I say this as one who has the platform that is this blog and who has been known to differ significantly on matters political et al with her equally opinionated rural cousin of a proximate age. If he and I were to lock horns in this space it would make for a very lively exchange, trust me. You do not know him. He does not blog. He does not twitter. He is not on facebook. All these technological ‘shortcomings’ notwithstanding, his opinion is no less legitimate than mine.

In this scenario, traditional media sources must continue to play a pivotal role in amplifying the voices of those who do not have their own platforms/microphones to reach the rest of the world. They must play a role in distilling fact from fantasy and rumour from reporting, and in making the best attempt they can to serve up a balanced news diet.

Yes, they’re imperfect and our antennae should always be up, always alert to bias, but we must acknowledge that often times they have the resources, the contacts and the operational capacity to dig deeper and go further in sourcing and verifying the news and that they are bound to some extent by professional rules of practice and conduct and our high expectations. (Even though they constantly fall short, at least we hope they aim.)

They cannot afford to sulk and walk away in the face of the emergence of new media sources. Never has it been more crucial for them to penetrate the places where ordinary folk do not yet have the resources at their disposal to make themselves heard and to enable those people have their say.

It never ceases to amaze me how easy it is to slip into an ‘either or’ view of things on a wide range of subjects when a ‘both and’ perspective makes so much more sense.

In the case of the Iran election, it was useful to hear from individual Iranians on the ground about what was going on inside the country and to watch them leverage social media so effectively to rally the world to their cause. At the same time, it took a great deal of time and effort to filter the signal from the sheer volume of noise. This is why I really appreciated the reporting on Iran of such Middle East veterans as Robert Fisk.

Speaking of keeping our antennae up and being alert to bias, I really appreciate this post by Hamid Tehrani, journalist, blogger and Global Voices Iran Editor. While appreciating the pivotal role social media such as
Facebook and twitter have played, he also points out that

“Twitter is both a source of information and mis-information”

and that

“Most Iranians who tweet are activists supporting the protest movement and promoting a cause. Their information should be double-checked and not be accepted at face value, or as an eyewitness observation.”

I wholeheartedly agree. I believe the onus is on the prolific user of social media to take personal responsibility for proactively assessing/evaluating what information comes her way before passing it on. In the absence of a paid/dedicated gatekeeper, Craig Kanalley over at Twitter Journalism is right in suggesting that we are all gatekeepers. We all must be the social media equivalent of ‘active listeners’, interacting rationally with what we’re receiving, triangulating the information with other sources and making the best judgment we can of the value of what we receive based on what we already know, who the information is from and whether is corroborating evidence.

Likely, even with the best of intentions, we will get it wrong some of the time, but if we are alert, we are more likely to be right than wrong.