LIBYA PROTESTS By Hannah Robinson, Georgina Thomas - Lord

Who, What, When, Where, Why? Date: 15 th February 2011 – 23 rd October 2011 (8months and 8 days) Location: Libya Result: Overthrow of Gaddafi government Muammar Gaddafi led a dictatorship over Libya in which people feared for their lives. The Libyan’s rebelled against Gaddafi and his reign of terror resulting in the mass deaths and conflict. However eventually Gaddafi was killed on the 20 th of October, now the National Transitional Council assumes temporary control of Libya.

Footage LIVE from Libya

Without Citizen Journalism? Without citizen journalism the news stories would not seem as real or serious, with the footage it has the shock factor which people can empathize which you can tell by the quality of the video. This shows the true horrors of the Libyan conflict and not just the propaganda that is being displayed in Libya. Therefore without it the impact on the rest of the world would not have been the same.

Impact? 20 years ago: 20 years ago we did not have the same technology we have today, therefore the story would not have been published as quickly. Phones didn’t have cameras therefore you would not be able to capture the moment like you would today. Also we did not have the technology to upload videos quickly onto the internet and there wasn’t specific sites to upload videos to.

Conflict and Social Media When protests first began in Libya the media presence there was scarce so the story filtered out via social media thanks to courageous citizen journalists. Then, when the fighting intensified, global media numbers increased exponentially. Now there are hoards of international news teams camped out with rebel forces or reporting from the country's capital and Gaddafi stronghold, Tripoli. In January 2010 Libya began censoring the Internet. YouTube was blocked on 24 January following the posting of videos of demonstrations by the families of prisoners in the city of Benghazi, and of footage of members of Muammar Gaddafi's family attending parties. Other independent opposition websites were blocked a the same time. Libya's state-owned TV made no mention of the anti-government protests in the east of the country on 16 February and continued with its usual programming on 17 February. During its morning bulletin Libyan TV continuously showed demonstrations in support of leader Col Muammar Gaddafi, which the TV said had been held "across Libya".

Conflict and Social Media An internet television channel founded by Mohamed Nabbous at the start of the Libyan Revolution to provide news and on-ground footage from Benghazi. It was the first private television station in Benghazi, in the east of the country and the only TV broadcast from Benghazi when the internet was shutdown as the war began. Alhurra TV was able to bypass government blocks on the internet in order to broadcast live images from Benghazi across the world. On 19 March Nabbous was killed by pro-Gaddafi troops during the Second Battle of Benghazi. On 1 February 2011 state security police arrested the writer and political commentator Jamal al-Hajji, who had used the Internet to call for peaceful protests in Libya. At the start of the uprising on 16 February, state security police arrested the director of local news-site Irasa, Taqi Al-Din Al-Chalawi, and its editor, Abdel Fattah Bourwaq. Blogger Mohammed Al-Ashim Masmari was also arrested after he reported on the demonstrations for the BBC and Al-Jazeera. Citizen journalists provided an alternative to the official media in their portrayal of the protests and the turmoil across the country. While state media showed only pro-Gaddafi protests, pictures and video from mobile phones that made their way from Libya onto Facebook pages told a different story. [ When Facebook and Twitter were blocked inside the country, users managed to circumvent restrictions by using satellite connections, proxy servers, and other means. The hacker group Anonymous provided Libyans with tools to get round the censorship and some of its members reportedly managed to set up parallel networks. The group also helped people to pass on photos and videos.

Theorists Clyde H Bentley; “Citizen journalism is no more a replacement for professional journalism than teabags are a replacement for water. Both can stand comfortably alone, but when combined they produce something quite wonderful.” Citizen journalism appeals especially to the integration and social interaction block by allowing individual expression among a group of similar-minded people. The citizen journalism participants had moderate consumption of local media, but very little use of national media.

Conclusion To sum up our opinions, we believe that citizen journalism plays a big part in the media today, when looking at this case study we realized that without citizen journalism, the full story of the conflict in Libya would not have had such an impact on the world, as people would no have understood the extent Gaddafi was going to.

THE END Any questions?