Storytelling through Digital Threads- Story of the Iranian Elections as Told through Social Media (Recorded)

A couple of weeks ago, I had another opportunity to share the compelling story of the elections in Iran as they were told through social media then captured and retold through this presentation. This is a story that I have been sharing across the country since I assembled it for an unplugged, unscheduled session at last year’s NECC conference.

This time, I shared it at the annual meeting of the Texas Distance Learning Association (TxDLA). The difference this time was that it was recorded and posted on the web for all who are interested to see. The presentation is about 45 minutes and chronicles events from June 12, 2009 when the election results were released to approximately June30th. The story is woven out of the fabric of today’s web starting with tweets linking out to blogs, Facebook, videos, photo collections and other social media sites.

My original intent with this story was to demonstrate a powerful use of Twitter and the way the “social” is woven into the Internet. It was also to demonstrate a new way to tell a story, a digital story that maintains the threads of this global tapestry. Read a tweet and it pulls on you… Pull on the tweet and it pulls back…Follow the tweet and it takes you to another place that tugs again drawing you deeper and deeper into this Iranian story that involved many from around the world.

My hope is that you take 45 minutes out of your week to watch this story, send it to others, tweet it around the globe and share it with your community. It will pull on your heart, it will take you to places you may not have known existed. It will demonstrate the power of twitter to tell a story that reaches beyond borders.

Twitter Goes to School: Telling Stories through Digital Threads

I share two videos at the end of the presentation that I found through Twitter and speak to current thoughts about and from Iran. These did not make the recording of the presentation. However, I include links to them below and encourage you to watch them at the end of the story as they are important in concluding the story. It will be very clear where they go but I have placed the time stamp where you should place each video. However, I would suggest you not watch them unitl you have seen the first part of the presentation.

1. Video 1 (27 min. Neda’s mother at her daughters grave-Persian New Year)
2. Video 2 (27:30 min. Gift to Prisoners in Iran)

Closing with “On Twitter, the wings of hope take flight and ideas flow freely like it should be” (final tweet)

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