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Iranians protesting at the outcome of the recent election have been mobilising through social networks like twitter and Facebook. 

In addition to challenging the ’surprising’ results of the presidential election, social networks are being used to organise protests and direct action.   Moreover opponent of the current regime, who claim the election was rigged, have been taking on one of the world’s largest media organisations via twitter.

Whilst organisations like the BBC and New York Times were covering the events as they unfolded, CNN was singled out by twitter users inside Iran and around the world for failing to give sufficient prominence to the outrage at the reported election result emanating from inside the country.  Twitter users in their thousands started to use the hashtag #CNNfail in their messages to point out the limited CNN coverage.   In a direct response to the demands of web users the TV network increased its coverage of events and made the protests their lead story.  

The major news brands around the world remain our most trusted sources of news and comment but the social web is emerging as a critical provider of checks and balance.  

I’ve been stupidly busy the last few days so my only real info on the G20 summit has been from the radio and occasional glances at news websites and Twitter feeds, until a rather sleepy view of the BBC 10 o’clock news last night. So I took time this morning for breakfast and a proper read of the paper.  (Guardian, but the other broadsheets gave a similar spread of coverage and comment.)  It was a joy. 

The reporting was clear, the breakdown of the communiqué a good mix of fact and analysis, the comment pieces pertinent (these with a clear Guardian standpoint of course, but with Simon Jenkins to leaven the mix). There was a nod to the fashionistas with the provenance of Michelle Obama’s outfits, and a suitably laconic piece on the politics of the official picture. I enjoyed it so much I’m going to find time to read it all again in one of the other broadsheets tonight. So what does this say for the future of newspapers? 

Well, it confirms that in my house at least (which is a very average establishment, I like to thing) Monday to Friday papers have the same status as the weekend ones - best enjoyed at leisure with a cup of tea.  The actual reading of them is the point.  I found time because I wanted to see a real spread of coverage of a story which I had skimmed but needed a longer shot. 

A full fat latte version, if you will, rather than the expresso. There is a crucial difference, though, between that and traditional feature fare - this was current, grounded in real news, hard working and focused. I really felt the passion of the journalists who had been involved.  

Can they replicate this on a daily basis?  Perhaps not, but it will keep me paying the newsagents bill for a bit longer. Will it be enough to sustain their future?  I’d like to think it will.  I think people are rediscovering the joy of a good read, and I think they are likely to be prepared to pay a premium for it. And where does PR fit in all this?  Well someone has been writing all those media information packs…

UPDATE #2: The BBC’s Rory Cellan-Jones blogs his thoughts on the use of social networks - or not - at the G20 protests.

UPDATE: Guardian Online photogallery captures the drama of today’s #G20 protests in London. 

The G20 summit kicks off (so to speak) in London today and Sky News has reporters using that latest craze, Twitter - the future of Guardian newspaper publishing, ho ho  - to send dispatches from the front line.

Apart from the frisson caused by French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, threatening - as the Mirror puts it - to “flounce” out of the summit if he doesn’t see tougher banking regulation, what have other protestors got lined up for the summit, and how will it sit with the armchair public not pitching tents or painting their faces in London today?

The G20 Meltdown group, whose leaders are described with lurid delight by the Daily Telegraph has positioned itself in a way reminiscent of the Poll Tax protest in 1990, with the call of “Can’t Pay, Won’t Pay” and “We’re taking to the streets”.The Poll Tax demo marked one of the most violent public demonstrations the capital had seen “for a century”, but the action undoubtedly hastened the demise of Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister and the abolition of the tax itself.

But will effigies of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, calls for “a very English revolution” in the spirit of 1649 and the “overthrow of capitalism” have a resonance today? As angry as people may be with bankers and politicians right now, do they want to hand over the reigns of power to an organisation which is trying, somehow, to combine the ethics of love and lynch mob?

The Campaign Against Climate Change is opting for the more quietly symbolic, marking “Fossil Fools Day” with a giant block of ice representing the melting polar ice caps while Stop the War Coalition is rallying tomorrow with protestors bringing “shoes, baby dolls, photos and other symbols of death and destruction”.

It’s a hearts and minds battle from both the politicians’ and protestors’ sides of the ramparts - but is the British public ready for revolution? 

Follow the Twitterverse’s on the ground take on the #G20.

Last week, the Murdoch-owned, clearly Republican, New York Post, published a cartoon of a monkey shot dead by police (this actually happened earlier in the week in the city).

The sketch caused outcry and mass demonstrations have been held outside the NYP offices calling for a public apology to be printed in the paper and for the resignation of the editor who allowed the cartoon to be published.

So what’s all the fuss about? Well, the caption to the sketch read: “They’ll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill”. This clearly relates to the stimulus bill which President Obama had just signed that week.

On publication, the NYP was at the receiving end of much criticism and subsequently published an apology the very next day stating the sketch was simply conveying their views about the bill which they feel is ‘ineptly written’ and that this was not ‘a thinly veiled expression of racism’.

There’s no denying the cartoon evokes strong, racist references and would inevitably cause an outcry from the public - especially as the world is still on such a high over the appointment of the US’s first black president.

The NYP vehemently denies any racist motive behind the sketch but apparently, on the page before the cartoon appeared, there was a big picture of Obama signing the bill - to me it seems it wouldn’t be hard for the reader to put the two together…

Of course, opinion seems to be divided as to whether this was intentionally racist or not.

The Huffington Post strongly disagrees with the NYP’s defence that “sometimes a cartoon is just a cartoon” arguing that “media images can sway a country to war” and newspapers tend to be a reflection of their communities, deciding who is in favour at a particular time and who is not. On the other hand, a Conservative blogger has similar strong feelings about the cartoon but argues that there are clearly double standards going on here as there have been many cartoons of George W Bush in the past and no one batted an eye lid.

That all said, does this not show a lack of judgement and insensitivity on behalf of the paper? Any person with half a brain would know that this kind of cartoon would be open to interpretation and therefore cause huge debate, and not just on a national scale.

I also wonder what kind of effect this might have on the NYP’s sales as there is so much support for Obama in America? Could this kind of negative publicity have an adverse affect on the sales of the paper? Especially at a time when online is growing so much?

See the cartoon, then read the apology - make up your own mind…

People are painting social networks red to publicise their support for Comic Relief.  Individuals are changing their profile pictures on Twitter, Facebook and elsewhere to red squares to demonstrate their allegiance to the charity.  As red nose day approaches expect these square to pop up all over the social media space. It already has the backing of high profile media influencers Chris Moyles producer (@ahf on twitter) was one of the first to go red.

This phenomenon is not entirely new.  In the last ten days campaigners have been using black squares to show their opposition to  New Zealand’s controversial ‘three strikes’ copyright law which would mean that if a person is accused of downloading copyrighted material three times their internet account would face closure - even if there is no proof to the allegations.

Stephen Fry was one of the highest profile campaigners replacing his Twitter picture with a black square.   There is no hard evidence that the campaign worked but New Zealand Prime Minister John Key has revealed that the implementation of the law will now take place on 27 March this year.

This is a guest post from Thomas Gensemer, Managing Partner of Blue State Digital, the strategy and software company that spearheaded the Obama campaign’s web operation.

He has chosen PRMediaBlog to exclusively reveal his thoughts on how the PR industry can learn the lessons of Barack’s online success.

What can communication professionals learn from the Obama campaign?

The network is better than you are. 

Obama for America changed the economics of campaigns. Instead of seeing supporters as passive recipients of message, they were seen as an integral part of the team that would propel Obama to the Whitehouse. 

And it had a simple strategy behind it all - find your support, recruit them, give them something to do and then say thank you. And by repeating these steps, changing the calls to action, and monitoring how each user responds, the campaign quickly built an organization of unpredicted scale and commitment to Barack Obama. 

While much of Obama’s success came from his capacity to promote a message that authentically resonated with the American people, this connection was dramatically amplified by supporters willing to adopt his messages and then share this endorsement within their own peer groups.   

By focusing the campaign on this process, Obama’s message was strengthened through independent third party support - and then shared with an audience that Obama could never have reached without his networks support.  

They embraced the idea that in a world of communication divergence you can’t afford to be a single message campaign in a multi-message world - and accordingly provided groups and networks for traditional and non-traditional support alike. So what happens when other groups - firms, charities, unions – start talking directly to communities? 

Imagine neighbours, friends, and family members, colleagues uniting for a shared love or cause. And then imagine what’d happen if you asked for their help.   

The key concept of Obama’s campaign still applies; whose advocacy are you most likely to respond to - your best friend or a monolithic organisation’s centralized message? Digital strategists often become blinded by technology.  But the Obama campaign wasn’t about cheap gimmicks, short term tactical wins.

It was about people - and the awe-inspiring capacity of a huge number of individuals to take small actions which in turn generate a huge communal effect. $500 million dollars, 1.2 billion emails, 10 million phone calls, and 300,000 grassroots events later, Barack Obama won the Presidency. And it all started with a “do this now” call to action. 

The Internet did not win the election - it simply provided the capacity to release and develop the communities potential, and in a far more efficient and analytical manner then ever before. 

Few of the two billion watching President Obama’s inaugural address would have imagined that the words spoken were drafted by a man almost twenty years his junior. 

Jon Favreau at 27 is the youngest ever official White House speechwriter. Not that this wordsmith is new to the task.  He has been on the road with Obama for over three years often toiling over campaign speeches until 3am the night before they were delivered.  These late nights were often fuelled with heavy doses of caffeine and it transpires that the first draft of Obama’s acceptance speech was crafted in a Washington branch of  Starbucks.

Many have compared the president’s style to that of the late John F Kennedy but ‘Fav’ as he is known claims to have spent more time studying the words of his brother Bobby Kennedy.  He has also deliberated over Obama’s style and words with an intensity bordering obsession learning all the idioms and cadences of his master’s voice and the final speeches are in the main collaborations.  So much so that he was reputed to have coined the catchphrase ‘Yes we can’.

Fav has even used his unique role as a chat up line, but without much success. ”There’s been a few times when people have said, ‘I don’t believe you, that you’re Barack Obama’s speechwriter,’ to which I reply, ‘If I really wanted to hit on you, don’t you think I’d make up something more outlandish?’

hattip - Rekha/Elinor

I’ve been taking a close interest in the extent to which Eastern European leaders, especially Dimitry Medvedev, have been making attempts to position themselves strategically in the UK media - an FT comment piece here, an interview on Today programme there.

Why bother? Well, the likes of Medvedev need to work their international audience in order to get things done globally, so explaining their actions and pitching a more positive narrative that challenges the old KGB villain-type image will help.

They’ve gone a stage further now with a social media strategy, an interactive video blog that enables Medvedev to give something of his personality (we’ll see whether that’s a good thing or not!) and get into a dialogue. Full marks for trying.

Pulling back, its fascinating to see how international figures use foreign media to play back into their homeland. US globetrotting political consultants like Sawyer Miller were masters of this. Check out how the firm used the US media in the Philippines to unseat Ferdinand Marcos.

They figured that the domestic TV channels, being state controlled, were unlikely to play fair so they used the US TV networks and the likes of the New York Times, which were recieved along with so much US culture, out in the Philippines, and to influence the White House, who at the time were protecting Marcos.

Currently there’s a mini-power game taking place amongst Russian political officials and exiled oligarchs. Whether its billionaires ingratiating themselves into Western society or looking to expose dodgy dealings in their home nation.

In this spirit its fascinating to see the bid for the Evening Standard by ex-KGB agent and Russian billionaire, Alexander Lebedev. He’s known to be an opposition figure in Moscow, a critic of the regime.

It was thought that the days of a rich man looking to own a national newspaper, funding large losses, in return for access and prestige was ebbing away as multi-media strips away the power of the old brands. Perhaps there’s now a new generation of rich men seeking that sort of trophy?

Guido makes an amusing comparison with a figure from years gone by.

Much chatter in the Twitterverse/blogosphere in the last 24 hours about the Labour Party’s new widget - a fake online webchat between David Cameron, George Osborne and William Hague about the economy.

We don’t engage in political tittle-tattle here, we’re all serious media folk :), but the reason I mention it is it’s significant how Labour is getting the fact that its web strategy needs to be about making themselves useful to their audiences where they are already congregating. The approach previously was all about dragging people to the official website and pushing propaganda at them.

This little widget is proving a hit on the blogs but more importantly its prompting liberal leaning (but possibly not Labour supporting) folk to discuss on Twitter - @daljit_bhurji kicked off a discussion yesterday - as well as the amount of people linking to it on their Facebook page. Community building on Facebook is an area I’m studying closely at the moment and its a much better environment for politicians to be useful (CAVEAT) if done right! I understand that Facebook was one of the biggest drivers of traffic to Labour’s site today.

These kinds of ideas emerge out of a process internally, largely involving politicians, Party staffers and the web agency, in this case Tangent Labs. However they need championing and a lot of credit should go to Labour’s new media supremo, Sue MacMillan and Tangent’s Greg Jackson.

Interesting that if you Google ‘Internet Campaigning’ a Guardian piece on this widget is number 2.

UPDATE its slipped to 6th!