The power of e.people....

With the quick gathering of huge amounts of people to join in protests around the world tourism hotspots, we are in a unique position to consider the effects of social mediums (such as this)...

Love 'em or hate 'em, the effects are huge, and when looking at the effects of social media on the uprising in Egypt, Nick Varner said "though social media had an integral role, it was not an all-new use of Facebook...

“Egypt wasn’t the first to use social media in this way,” he said. “Tunisia, a few weeks before, had used Facebook and Twitter to depose their old regime.”
Jim Melton, assistant professor of business information systems, related the movie “The Social Network” to parts of the world with more government control and how the image of Mark Zuckerberg is received in comparison with his image in the U.S.
“Zuckerberg has somewhat of a negative image in the U.S., especially after the movie was released,” Melton said...

”People are concerned about privacy. But when the government has control, people want things like Facebook. In Tunisia, there were people holding up posters of Zuckerberg saying he was great...”

Melton informed students of the relevance of the topic to the events in Egypt in his new class, BIS 280: Social Media and Emerging Technology in Business...

Though the protests in Egypt were not business-related, they have the same idea of viral information, Melton said. One main protestor got the word out through Facebook and created a group, just like a business, he said...

“Social media really empowered the protests,” Melton said. “It’s harder to control news through these social networks...”

East Grand Rapids sophomore Alyson Cole said Facebook made people more willing to get involved...

“If I were an Egyptian youth, I would be more inclined to get involved if I were to find out about a protest via Facebook, seeing as how it is a huge part of young adult communication these days,” Cole said."

So surely the next step is to create some form of "response unit" that can read into what is going on through the use of social media, and to try to predict areas of uncertainty before they become a problem so that tourists and tourism are not affected.

For more on this, please look at http://www.cm-life.com/2011/02/16/social-medias-influence-on-protests-in-egypt/

Barticus.