Iran Request: Nonsense about "Twitter Revolution". Please Stop.

UPDATE 1825 GMT: Jared Keller has modified his final paragraph so it now reads, "The Green Revolution in Iran was muzzled, sadly, although the movement continues to put pressure on the Iranian regime a year after its initial protests. The Twitter Revolution, however, is far from over." He has also engaged in a productive dialogue over the original piece, noting his main intention was to establish the role of Twitter in events, correcting misconceptions, and adding, "I regret using 'totally stifled' as a rhetorical flourish [about the Green Movement]; I don't intend to make the same mistake in the future.

It's been wearying to read the recent mis-interpretation of social media and its place in the post-election conflict in Iran.

There is, however, a step beyond today, as Jared Keller of The Atlantic tries to set the record straight --- for which he should be thanked --- only to walk face-first into an even worse two-dimensional error. My response:

I am grateful that Jared Keller corrects the superficial notion --- sometimes put out in misunderstanding, sometimes to grab a cheap headline --- that Twitter is the movement for change in Iran.

Twitter is a tool --- a very powerful tool --- to keep information moving in and out of Iran even at the height of represssion by the regime.

It's ironic, then, that Mr Keller seems not to have used Twitter to lead him to the information of what is happening day-by-day in Iran, more than a year after the 2009 election. Had he done so, he would not have made the assertion --- as superficial as the notion of the "Twitter Revolution" and as ill-informed --- that "the Green Revolution in Iran was muzzled, sadly, its political organs now defunct and its development totally stifled".

The movement for civil rights is still much alive, with thousands defying arrest and intimidation to show up on streets in cities across Iran last Saturday and with political pressure building against the Government on a daily basis, both from the opposition and from "battles within the establishment".