What Does Egypt Tell us About Social Networking?

How many 'event' invitations do you get every week on Facebook? I get about 2 or 3 that I could actually attend and then countless more that are inventions of the Facebook junkies which have thousands of people attending (but not really). I'm not going to start to harp on about the wonders of Facebook because I think that we are all fairly well versed in that particular area but the 'event' function has become a huge part of our lives. So when I heard that a large majority of the political protestors in Egypt were informed about the protests by such an 'invitation', I wasn't far from surprised - not that it doesn't worry me.

I'm currently learning about the UK constitution (parliaments, sovereignty etc) at university so I've taken an interest in the developments over the last few weeks in Egypt. The basic facts (but not to belittle the seriousness of the situation as people have lost their lives as a result of this) are that the President in Egypt has been in power for over 30 years and the (younger) people of the country have decided it's time to get him out. Living in a country where we have parliamentary elections in relatively regular intervals we can hardly begin to imagine what such tyranny is like. I'm not a supporter of our current coalition but the silver lining is that they are subject to rules that require elections to be held every 5 years (and 4 years for the Scottish Parliament) meaning that change is always at the forefront of our politics.

I know that the above paragraph is a wafer thin gloss but the point of this post was not to bore people with the politics of the topic. No, the reason (as I mentioned in my opener) for writing this post is that there is now constitutional change on the cards in Egypt which is as a result of the vast protests; protests which were largely organised on our favourite social network, Facebook. What scares me is that there are now reports floating around the internet that there are people in countries that are living under similar regimes who are planning on following the example set in Egypt. For something that is such a muse for so many people for things things such as gossip and looking at last night's photos, is Facebook in danger of becoming too serious?

I think that Facebook is now so much more than just a social networking site. It has quickly developed into a part of our sub-conscious - a place that we all go to when we have a spare 10 seconds. We are in danger of letting it rule our lives, if it isn't already. I'm starting to wonder if it's time to try and slowly make it less and less a part of my life. However the problem with doing that is that you fall behind with everyone else - that's how bad things are getting. I couldn't live without Facebook and neither could anyone that has been using it for more than a day. It rules our lives but in a good way. It's that drug that I promised myself I would never take and now can't give up. It is slowly consuming the internet, bringing every thing together on one simple news feed. It's where I'm going to put a link to this very post. Ironic huh?

I can't help but feel that Facebook has aided some important changes in Egypt but where will it stop? Can it be stopped?

Thanks for reading,

Martin