Twitter: Up All Night For Iran

Earlier today on Word of Mouth, we talked about the role social media sites have played in Iran’s political campaigns and ongoing protests. The folks at Twitter apparently take their role in the region seriously: They’ve rescheduled a planned network upgrade that would have disabled the site for a while this evening. They announced the change in plans this afternoon on their blog:

“Our network partners at NTT America recognize the role Twitter is currently playing as an important communication tool in Iran. Tonight's planned maintenance has been rescheduled to tomorrow between 2-3p PST (1:30a in Iran)”

A cynical person might say Twitter is taking advantage of a good public relations opportunity (or at least trying to avoid a bad PR situation). But no matter the motivation, it’s good to know an international communications tool won’t be disabled during a national crisis in the Middle East.

(Photo by mark_am_kramer via Flickr/Creative Commons)