Magda El-Ghitany watches as new modes of technology are used as tools for political mobilisation "The Facebook nation: future makers... the Facebook nation: change makers... Facebook [is] Egypt's hope," read a statement posted on the home page of the "6 April -- A Nationwide Strike" group, created last month via Facebook. The group was formed by Esraa Abdel-Fattah Ahmed to rally support for last week's national strike and for the first time in Egypt's history opted for the digital media in order to propagate calls for political mobilisation. Ahmed was arrested on 6 April. The social networking site Facebook was used by the group as a forum. Many of the group's 70,000 members do not know one another and few are likely to have met -- a large number, in fact, do not actually live in Egypt but are expatriate Egyptians residing in other Arab states, the US or Canada. Yet day in, day out, they were busy conferring on what actions the strike should incorporate and how best to drum up support for them. They were keen to "do anything to help make 6 April a success" as one member said on the group's public wall. They exchanged tips on organising peaceful demonstrations and on dealing with the police while some group members designed posters publicising the strike. One, a predominantly red and orange design, became so popular that many individuals who were not group members opted to use it as their Facebook profile picture. The flow of communication and the astonishing growth of the group -- it increased from 44,000 members on 5 April to 70,000 two days later -- highlights the increasingly central role de-territorialised forms of technology and new media can play in rallying support around a common cause. Facebook has created a free environment that allows the group's members to be everywhere and nowhere as they carve out a space beyond censorship and control, transcending geographic and social ties to create a virtual community with a shared goal. Believing themselves safe from any forms of coercion, members of this cyber community freely expressed their political views. "From now on no one needs to buy a paper, a pen or a magazine. From now on [we do not need] state owned radio or TV [to express our views]... we got the Internet... we got the Facebook, until we find a faster means of communication," announced the group's introductory statement in celebration of their new found freedom. Although it is the first time in Egypt that new modes of technology have played such a leading role in coalescing efforts towards a single political cause the phenomenon has happened elsewhere. And there are historical parallels, with the digital media playing a similar role to that of the printed word during the imperial age, and of audio cassettes in the 1970s. Facebook is not alone in demonstrating the ability of the new media to create venues for people to express their political thoughts. Internet websites like arabist.net and omraneya.net hosted hundreds of bloggers' views and discussion threads on whether to support or oppose the 6 April strike. The "6 April -- A Nationwide Strike" group continues to make use of cyber space, and is now calling for a second strike next month. The new group has posted a flier in the same colours as the 6 April strike. Its home page stresses that despite what they claim to be police "coercion" this week, it's worth another try.
