Twitter Deserves a Nobel Prize

(NEWSER) - Iranian police beat demonstrators gathered in a Tehran cemetery to mourn victims of post-election violence, including Neda Agha-Soltan—the 26-year-old whose killing was witnessed by hundreds of thousands on YouTube. A witness told Reuters that some mourners were arrested. Opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi defied threats from the Revolutionary Guards and tried to attend the ceremony, but he was forced back into his car minutes after arriving. More»

Internet companies rush new tools for Iranian protesters

(NEWSER) - Twitter has taken extraordinary measures to keep its site running during the Iranian election protests, and now other websites are speeding up developments. Today Facebook launched an early version of its site in Persian, relying on 400 volunteers to translate pages into the local language. "We felt it was important to help more people communicate rather than wait," said a spokesman. More»

(NEWSER) - Tech-loving journalists need to chill out about Twitter’s supposed role in Iran’s unrest, writes Jack Shafer of Slate. “I’ve found it more noise than signal,” he writes. Twitter’s already produced a lot of erroneous stories—like the 3 million people tweeters claimed were at one demonstration, or the house arrest of Mousavi, or the annulment of the election by authorities. More»

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urges high turnout

(AP) - Iran's supreme leader urged Iranians to vote in large numbers as the country holds parliamentary elections today, saying a high turnout would send a strong message to the enemies of the nation amid the nuclear standoff with the West. The balloting for the 290-member parliament is the first major voting since the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June 2009 and the mass protests and crackdowns that followed. More»

February 11 will test regime, international community

(NEWSER) - Feb. 11, the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran, promises to bring tests for all parties with a hand in the nation's fate, writes Gerald Seib. Big marches traditionally herald the anniversary, and members of the opposition movement that has bloomed since last June's election will undoubtedly come out in big numbers. That's the test for Mahmoud "Ahmadinejad and his government, which will have to decide how hard to bring down their iron fist." More»