Saturday, January 29, 2011

Have a Facebook and Twitter addiction?? Maybe you should head to Egypt

What does the President of Egypt and most Manitoba School Division have in common?? They have both blocked Facebook and Twitter.

As I've been watching the news the past few days I couldn't help but notice the enormous protest taking place in Egypt, Tunisia and Lebanon. Egypt is becoming even more interesting now that their President has blocked social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. The reason?? The President believes that if he blocks these sites the protesters will be unable to organize these large scale protests. How's that going for ya President Mubarak??

This shows you how big social networking has become in the last decade. And it doesn't appear to be going anywhere soon. Using Facebook and Twitter are great ways to allow students to network and communicate with people around the world, but there are still lots of other ways to get the job done. Just like the protesters in Egypt, we just have to get creative in how we communicate and get the message out there.There's always a solution to every problem.

3 comments:

  1. I have also been thinking about how social media and the internet are having massive social impacts. One of the concerns we have to have as teachers is not that the internet is a powerful tool, but instead that students have to have the tools to use the internet effectively and properly. Instead of blocking (which as you have said is basically copying what a dictator would do!) we should be opening up the internet and showing them what they can do, how to do it and most importantly how to use it responsibly.

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  2. Some people have been calling for Internet access to be declared a Human right. Thoughts?

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  3. That might be taking things a little far? Does that mean that countries like Canada would have to spend millions of dollars making sure everyone in developing countries has a laptop? I think we need to get these people the essentials first.

    I do think that it is wrong to deny people internet though. The President of a country cannot play God when it comes to the internet.

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