Tracksuit CEO

by Daniel Hope

Almost a year ago I wrote an in-depth analysis of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s blog.  I pointed out the many things he was doing right and also gave him some unsolicited blog advice in the spirit of international goodwill.

One of the points of advice I gave Ahmadinejad was to get a Twitter account, in fact, I set one up for him.  After setting up @PrezAhmadinejad I did an initial tweet:

I then used the email form on his blog to send him a message saying that if he or his handlers wanted the Twitter account that I would send them the password:

In my post I chose not to get into the leader’s human right’s record, his holocaust denial or any other scandalous political matters.  I simply offered the advice and the account in the hope that the transparency that goes hand-in-hand with social networks like Twitter would have some positive effect on its user.

In light of the turmoil surrounding the recent Iranian election results I decided to revisit my post with a few new items to report.

My Twitter Offer is Off the Table

My offer to Ahmadinejad of a Twitter account is no longer valid … mainly because I forgot the password.  I set up a separate email to do the Twitter account and I can’t even remember the password for that account, so it’s pretty much a lost cause.

That said, it looks like there won’t be any more updates to the account.  As it is now @prezahmadinejad only has two followers: @dickcheney and @tracksuitceo (yours truly). And if you look closely at my avatar you will see that it has a green overlay.

If you aren’t already aware of it, to show your support in the fight for democracy in Iran you can got to http://helpiranelection.com and with one click you will get a green overlay on your Twitter avatar.

Guess Who Does Have a Twitter Account?

Okay, my effort to get the Iranian leader on Twitter failed, but look who is on Twitter:  MirHossein Mousavi is Tweeting as @mousavi1388 with no fewer than 21,517 followers at the time of this post!

I also give him some serious Web 2.0 credit for also having a Delicious account so we can see which websites he is reading and bookmarking.

What about Facebook?

According to this news story the Iranian ban on Facebook was done for two reasons:

The Iranian Labour News Agency (ILNA) reports Iran’s new ban on Facebook is aimed to stop supporters of reformist presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi from using the site. But CAP News has learned that the ban also comes in the wake of the failure of its incumbent president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to garner more than a handful of “friends.”

Wow, that must have been embarrassing.  Especially considering that Mousavi currently has 77,974 friends on Facebook.

On Friday we will see what the election results look like and we can only hope that the best candidate will win.

Click here to show your support for Iran on Twitter

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