Following a crackdown on Iranian media beginning in 2000, many Iranians turned to weblogging to provide and find political news. The first Persian language blog is thought to have been created by Hossein Derakhshan in Canada in 2001. Derakhshan also provided readers with a simple instruction manual in Persian on how to start a blog.We Are Iran By Nasrin Alavi, (Soft Skull Press, 2005) p.1, 341 In 2004, a census of blogs around the world by NITLE found 64,000 Persian-language blogs.We Are Iran By Nasrin Alavi, (Soft Skull Press, 2005) p.1 In that year, the Islamic government began to arrest and charge bloggers as political dissidents, and by 2005, dozens of bloggers had been arrested.The price paid for blogging Iran| By Clark Boyd| 21 February 2005| bbc.co.uk
History In early 2001, the popularity of blogging had become extremely popular. The Iranian government had strict controls in place for print media and had shut down as many as a hundred print newspapers.Alavi, Nasrin. "We are Iran" Soft Skull Press, 2005 Iran has been listed consistently among the bottom countries in violation of freedom of the press by Reporters Without Borders."Cntrl+Alt+Delete: Irans Response to the Internet." Iran Human Rights Documentation Center. Web. 05 Apr. 2012 http://www.iranhrdc.org/english/publications/reports/3157-ctrl-alt-delete-iran-039-s-response-to-the-internet.html?p=36#.T6QYEJ9YveU. Yet the internet provided a new means for widespread readership, which was, up until 2004, mostly unregulated, providing an outlet for mostly Iranian youth to express themselves freely. In 2009, due to the contentious nature of the presidential elections and the rise of the Green Party movement, there was a rise in internet censorship. Despite 43% of internet users predominantly using WordPress to create blogs, the Iranian government strictly controls the internet, making it difficult for users to access blogging websites.
Nonetheless, , according to the CIA World Factbook, 8.214 million internet users in Iran, ranked 35th in the world.The World Factbook Blogs range from updates on art and critiquing movies, to following injustices of political prisoners. Diasporic Persian and Iranian blogs have also become a trend as a means to be part of an international online community. Blogs may be used as a virtual form of social protest without physical assembly, such as when thousands of bloggers renamed their blogs Akbar Ganji for a week in 2005, in support of the critic of the regime who had gotten arrested that year. Hossien Derakhshan, the unofficial "godfather" of the blogosphere, set his blog up in Canada in September 2001. He was later arrested. In 2011, Iranian authorities executed more than six hundred people and imprisoned more journalists and bloggers than any other country.Human rights watch https://www.hrw.org/news/2012/01/22/iran-authorities-defiant-rights-record
Scope The broad usage of weblogs in Iran was staggering. , the NITLE (National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education) blog census found the number of blogs in Persian surpassed 64,000. Some believe that the influence of these blogs have been exaggerated, in that their authors are predominantly upper and upper-middle class. However, the education system in Iran gives access to education and therefore new technologies, computers and the internet as a whole to large numbers of lower-class people.
Political importance Blogging in Iran took on political importance as the regime continued its crackdown on journalists. The Iranian press is highly regulated, especially under the Press Law, which according to the UNHCR, "forbids the publication of ideas that are contrary to Islamic principles or detrimental to public rights." This includes imprisonment for "propaganda," which remains undefined, and for offenses that are "an insult to religion."
Because as many as 100 publications were shut down in the early 2000s, many sought alternative outlets for reporting and freedom of expression. This often came about in critiques of the regime, which was relatively unregulated until 2004. Implicit and explicit condemnation is common, such as is evident in the following excerpts. "11 July 2003: On occasion something happens in life that makes you want to believe in miracles. Like today! Coming across a copy of Kieslowski's Three colours Blue/ White/ Red among the videos at home- without anyone remembering having borrowed it from a friend... This was one of those majestic miracles that only a higher being can bestow on a special someone like me. Thank You God!"Alavi, Nasrin. " We are Iran" p 226 The viewing of movies in ones home is forbidden, as are most western films. More explicit expressions of dissent as also common: "25 November 2002: Every Day new intrigues and tyrannies by our repressive turbaned rulers...And crazy Muslims around the world that bring nothing but carnage and shame...I swear to god...if it weren't for clergy like Eshkavari who keep telling us that what they do is not Islam...I would abandon this little faith once and for all"Alavi, Nasrin. "We are Iran" p. 110 Soft Skull Press, 2005.
Iranian officials became concerned that the 2004 Orange Revolution in Ukraine might induce foreign attempts to support a similar revolution in Iran, by building civil society networks and empowering activists as had happened in Ukraine. This was compounded by the 2006 announcement by the U.S. State Department that it was creating a $75 million fund to "reach out to the people of Iran". This caused the Iranian government to closely monitor foreign support for bloggers and journalists.
In 2004 the government began to arrest and charge bloggers as political dissidents. It also began demanding shutdowns and screening of internet service providers, a big step in restriction that had been relatively unregulated.
In 2005 the BBC World Service Trust started the Iran Media Development Project, to support new media in Iran, following on from earlier projects such as Jadid Media funded by the Netherlands. In 2006 it created a secure training and mentoring website for aspiring Iranian and Afghan bloggers and journalists, with an online magazine edited by Sina Motalebi for the trainees supported by a radio programme for young people in Iran, called ZigZag.
Circa 2006 estimates suggested there were about 500,000 to 800,000 blogs in Iran, though not all were active.
In 2009, internet users and particularly bloggers and online journalists were targeted for arrest and violence after the contested re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who won by a landslide, inciting fraud allegations. Critical publications were shut down and the largest number of journalists were jailed since the 1979 revolution. The Press Law was also formally extended to "all internet publications" which may include blogs, requiring the authors to get licenses. According to ONI, with the sophisticated system of internet filtering developed by Iran, the websites Blogger and Persianblog are often blocked. Yet in response to the vitality of the Iranian blogosphere, the government decided to pursue other tactics simultaneously, announcing in late 2008 its intention to create thousands of pro government blogs, including one by the president himself. Thus the internet, and in particular blogs became an important front in informal political debate, declarations, and dissatisfaction.
Hossein Derakhshan Born in Iran in 1975, Hossein Derakhshan, commonly referred to as the "blogging godfather" or the "blogfather," moved to Canada in 2000. His blog became the first Persian blog, and took off in 2001 with his simple instruction manual on how to set up and write a Persian-language blog. In 2003 his blog became highly political, encouraging opposition through writing.
In 2006 he went back to the middle east, visited Egypt and met with Egyptian blogger when the Egyptian blogosphere was also at its peak activity. In the same tour Hissein visited Israel publicly, seeking to mend relations between Iran and Israel, which are sworn enemies. In the same year, he also backed presidential candidate Ahmadinejad. In 2008 he was arrested while visiting family in Iran and was sentenced to 19 and a half years in prison, banned from political party membership for five years, and ordered to repay earnings of around $44,500 for "propagating against the regime" and "co-operating with hostile states." In 2010 he was temporarily released on bail of 1.5 million dollars."Iran Blogger Hossien Derakhshan Temporarily Released." BBC News. BBC, 9 Dec. 2010. Web. 20 Apr. 2012. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-11962032.
Shirin Ebadi nobel peace prize news The power of the Iranian blogs was demonstrated in 2003, with the Iranian human rights lawyer Shirin Ebadi winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Because her human rights work had much to do with representing women, children, and dissidents against the regime, the official Iranian news failed to report the win. Several hours later it included in the nightly news a 15-second mention of the win, while failing to report her actual accomplishments aside for "a children's charity." Rather than traditional channels, therefore, the news and reactions to it spread on multiple blogs. Nasrin Alavi, author of We Are Iran, brings the statistics of www.damasanj.com, a website which works out which stories are most talked about in the Iranian blogosphere, which found that Ebadi dominated the top ten Rankings. 8 Most were congratulatory, and sought to provide bios and facts on the nature of Ebadi's work, which the traditional press had failed to print. Bloggers went a step farther when they organized a reception for Ebadi at the Teheran airport upon her return on October 14, 2003. They called for people to celebrate her victory, as well as use the venue to protest the current situation of women's rights and oppression. Rather than the media, it was bloggers that provided up to date pictures of the reception to the public. Thousands of people attended, proving that bloggers could translate to actual events. Eventually this forced the government to respond to Ebadi's Prize in a more serious light: it cast Ebadi as an apostate and a member of a foreign conspiracy against Iran.Alavi, Nasrin. "We are Iran" P. 280-289
Bam The December 2003 Bam earthquake caused particular outrage and made clear the necessity for blogging as a news source. While the regime was ill-equipped to deal with the disaster where an estimated 30,000 people lost their lives. The aftermath was tremendous in damages, and a lack of journalists to cover the quake. Blogs, therefore, became a central source of information. For example, Dr. Marajan Haj-Ahmadi's blog became one of the most read, as she was based in the bordering city of Kerman and was able to report from the area and provide information as to the medical inadequacies. Others included Baba's blog, an anonymous ex-newspaper journalist who entered the region to provide accurate news reports from the disaster zone. The survivors of the Bam earthquake also began protesting due to lack of governmental support, which went unreported in the official news but the shooting of two individuals at a Friday prayer was reported by bloggers.
In her book "We are Iran: The Persian Blogs" Nasrin Alavi claims that the earthquake was a turning point for blogs being organizing forces as well as partnering with NGO's rather than governmental organizations:
The translation from a virtual page into actual human mobility lent legitimacy to the blogger movement, as well as proving it to be a resilient form of networking that had practical applications. It also proved the fears of the government in that it began to resemble a movement rather than simply disconnected expressions of personal experiences.
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