Today a new website has been launched that, in real time, relays key information from the front line of the Egyptian revolution. Tweetsfromtahrirlive.com groups together a selction of high-quality tweeters who have participated in the Egyptian uprising. The website notes that its stream of activists is not comprehensive, but it’s nonetheless a vital source of knowledge of developments on the ground.
The site was created in response to the brutal attacks made on protestors in Tahrir Square, and seeks to draw attention to their plight, as well as to amplify their calls for a society free from repression. It is a collaboration between Sonnet Media and OR Books, who first used Twitter to document history in book form with Tweets from Tahrir, which has been featured on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. The book comprises Twitter posts from Egyptians who helped bring about the downfall of Hosni Mubarak’s over just 18 days at the beginning of this year. The book’s editors are Alex Nunns and Nadia Idle, an Egyptian who was in Tahrir Square when Mubarak fell.
OR Books co-publisher Colin Robinson commented:
Tweets from Tahrir was the first book of its kind, capturing fleeting tweets and pinning them permanently to the printed page. This is the reverse – it’s the same contributors who appeared in the book, but here they are live … It’s vital to the protestors who stood up so bravely in January and February, and are now having to do it all over again, that the world sees what’s going on. This is our small contribution to helping with that.