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The Iranian presidential elections in June 2009 sparked massive civic protests following their outcome.While the Iranian regime barred international news journalists from covering the demonstrations, first person accounts from Iranians of what was actually happening in the streets of Iran were disseminated through Twitter, Facebook and other social media services, thereby reaching an international audience and mobilising awareness and support.The hype surrounding social media reached new heights with mainstream media framing -rather uncritically -the riots in terms of 'Twitter revolutions', a discourse that was continued with the 2011 ' Arab Spring'.Against this background, Blogistan provides a timely, nuanced and much needed introduction to new media in the Middle East.Sreberny and Khiabany provide a historical analysis of Iranian media culture after the Islamic revolution in 1979.The book is written before the events of 2009, and portrays some of the growing unrest among Iranians that eventually broke out into the open in the post-election period.Blogistan begins the important, but daunting task of unravelling the complex set of socioeconomic, cultural, political and religious influences that intersect with the Iranian media system.It focuses primarily on the diffusion and use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) at the dawn of recent political protests in the Middle East.Through eight chapters, the book aims to analyse the infrastructural diffusion and development of ICTs in general in Iran, and the practices and meanings that emerge around the uses of blogs in particular.Blogging is regarded as a new vehicle of political expression in a postrevolutionary nation that has quickly adopted various digital communication technologies,
Stine Lomborg (Wed,) studied this question.