The organization of the 25 January Movement was impressive, led by a coalition of groups which occupied Tahrir Square and succeeded in deposing Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. The nonviolence strategies and techniques used are documented and assessed in this paper. The participating groups did many things “right,” in terms of the body of praxis of nonviolence. They identified their goals clearly, posting them prominently in Tahrir Square. They built the cooperation of a broad spectrum of groups, from the Muslim Brotherhood, Christians, workers, farmers, youth groups, bloggers, and secularists. They involved both women and children as participants. They demonstrated samoud, or gentle persistence, not moving until their achieved their main aims. They were creative with slogans and symbols to build mass support for the Movement and were media savvy in getting out their message, especially in their use of new technologies. In addition, the 25 January Movement busted two common misconceptions about using nonviolence for making change: (1) the myth that a charismatic single leader is needed to inspire and lead such a movement; and (2) the myth that the use of nonviolence takes a long time. The paper’s author has extensive background in both the academic study of nonviolence, as well as practical nonviolence organizing experience in the Middle East.

Over five days extending from January 28th until February 2nd, Egypt endured an internet and cell phone blackout. At exactly a time when Twitter and Facebook were being described as integral to the demonstrations, many pundits seemed to suspect that without access to social media the momentum of the protests would be in jeopardy. But as events played out, it became clear that organizing continued by other means. Crowds in Tahrir Square and across Egypt continued to swell in number, and rumors circulated that tactics borrowed from the liberation struggle in Algeria were being used on the streets. It is, in fact, out of the struggle in Algeria that Frantz Fanon discusses not Twitter or Facebook, but the role of radio from 1954-1956. He distinguishes between two critical moments. In the first, when radio broadcasts were dominated by the French, Algerians found ways of passing information over long distances “that vaguely recalled some such system of signaling, like the tom-tom,” and helped “give the impression of being in permanent contact with the revolutionary high command” (78). In the second, with the advent of the “Voice of Fighting of Algeria” in 1956, Algerians saw liberation radio broadcasts routinely jammed, interrupted and alternately communicated. As Fanon notes, “The listener would compensate for the fragmentary nature of the news by an autonomous creation of information” (86). In both instances, it is not technology as such, but the revolutionary context that helps create the demands for new modes of address and the circulation of information. What might be gained by reading Fanon’s reflections on radio in the context of the Egyptian revolution--and the internet blackout in particular? What does the situation in Algeria lend to an understanding of a seemingly radically different context in Egypt? For one, rather than ask what role media plays in facilitating the revolution, Fanon addresses how revolutionary movements reform and retool the media. And secondly, by addressing radio jamming and communication challenges, he helps to complicate the teleological and self-congratulatory myth of technological development. Linking colonialism and media means thinking through conditions of appropriation and transformation, whether the “Voice of Fighting Algeria” or the now-famous vlog of Aasma Mahfouz. Following this movement between radio and Twitter, Algeria and Egypt, my paper explores both the commonalities of networks past and the birth of imagined national futures.

As our attention is focused on the power of cyberspace in shaking up regimes and ousting others, we tend not only to marginalize the power of resistance forces that have been fighting hard against corruption and abuse of power, but also the power of early movements and intellectual achievements in the media that could have been no less significant had they made use of the present cyber activism. While gathering information on the interchangeable space, private and public, in Arab intellectual life, I was struck by the powerful messaging in Mayy Ziyadah's short articles, articles that may fit the blog space and deserve to be central to forums of discussion. Monopolizing the public sphere of her time, including the post, the press, the lecture hall, and the telephone, along with her salon, Mayy Ziyadah was able to forge an impressive discourse. But, one may ask: how far could she make use of the internet had she been with us today? How pleased she would be by the growth in tact and sacrifice among youth versus cronies' greed? What would she have done had she been using facebook, twitter, and text messaging?

Technological conditions under globalization created new possibilities for the production and circulation of new messages. This facilitated the emergence of a political vernacular using revitalized old symbols in this virtual community perhaps expressed through “viral” sentiments exchanged on the “Wide World Web.” I argue that the brutal murder of Khaled Said, the attack on the Church of Saints in Alexandria as well as the Tunisian uprising and its subsequent success were some of the events that fueled this new globalized virtual vernacular expressing and provoking Egyptian national sentiments. This paper investigates the impact of technology on people’s ability to mobilize for political action. One of the most important tools that led to the January 25 Revolution in Egypt and the eventual toppling of Mubarak regime were social networking forums such as Facebook and Twitter. This mobilization was supported by other mass communication devices such as smart phones used as commemorating tool at the same time that they disseminating text messages, images and videos. This amazing technology afforded by video sharing capability led to dissemination of posted eye witness video reports that connected previously separated social worlds. The successful effectiveness of these globalization technologies in mobilizing “the people” (al-sha3b) provoked the temporary strategic shutdown of internet, and cell phone communications by the Mubarak regime. The production and circulation of radicalized and accessible images became part of the language of Egypt’s new revolution. Young and old, rich and poor, and Muslims and Christians were moved to unprecedented mass protests in Tahrir Square in Cairo. Symbolically meaningful images and messages articulated and provoked an array of sentiments in response to specific national and transnational events. This paper traces the emergence and transmission of some of the most popular symbols that spread by going ‘viral’ during the month of January 2011.