I would love to hear from some of our Iranian members about the current situation in Iran.

News Notes (new information goes to the top)
- At 5pm ESt Obama to Address the World on Situation
- Authorities in Tehran have revoked permissions to film/broadcas
- Tomorrow rally at ValiAsr Sq at 5pm Tehran time
- Tehran currently has a protect which is 5 miles long, with possibly 2-3 million people involved.
- just heard that 7 people have been reported killed by gunfire in Iran by the Police.
- Iran is blocking facebook, and is trying to block Twitter for it's Iranian citizens

Images/Videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZErZx9JVS0 (Obama reaction)
http://ow.ly/eewo
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/06/i...d_election.html
http://twitpic.com/7c85l

Questions for members:
Was the election a fraud? Give your opinions.

Proxies for Iranians:
These should all work in Tehran and other areas of Iran to access sites like Twitter and Facebook:
148.233.239.24 Port:80 in Tehran
218.128.112.18:8080 218.206.94.132:808 218.253.65.99:808 219.50.16.70:8080
- Virtual proxy: http://proxy.nadim.cc/

Accounts to Follow From Iranians on Twitter:
- http://twitter.com/azarnoush
- http://twitter.com/VoiceofIran
- http://twitter.com/persiankiwi

Just thought this was rather telling of the situation in Iran. Ahmadinijad released an apparent photo of a rally for him, but it is photo shopped to make it look larger then it really is:

http://www.boingboing.net/2009/06/17/ahmad...d-sucks-at.html

Typical of a hidden society.

Google and Facebook roll out Farsi language tools

Google and Facebook both launched Farsi-language tools last night in response to the activity around the Iranian election and demonstrations.

Perhaps not wanting to be eclipsed by very Twitter-heavy coverage, Google added Farsi, or Persian, to its translation tool to the 40 or so languages on the service. Roll out was brought forward because of the interest around the election so the service works best between Farsi and English, but translations between Farsi and the other languages on the site will be improved gradually.

"We feel that launching Persian is particularly important now, given ongoing events in Iran," wrote principal scientist Franz Och on the official Google blog. "Like YouTube and other services, Google Translate is one more tool that Persian speakers can use to communicate directly to the world, and vice versa - increasing everyone's access to information."

Facebook said much the same. They had noticed increased activity and news sharing around the election and though much of its was in Persian, users had to navigate the site in English.

"We're making the entire site available in a beta version of Persian, so Persian language speakers inside of Iran and around the world can begin using it in their native language," said Facebook engineer Eric Kwan on the Facebook blog.

"We could not have made this happen so quickly without the more than 400 Persian speakers who submitted thousands of individual translations of the site. Thanks to everyone who has contributed so far."

Guardian.co.uk

BBC's Persian television service blocked

A powerful jamming signal coming from Iran has blocked the satellite channel on which the BBC broadcasts its Persian television service into the country, the broadcaster said yesterday.

As a result, the BBC World Service has added broadcasts from three other satellites that are out of reach of the jamming equipment being used. The BBC said the jamming began on last Friday, the day Iranians went to the polls, rather than when popular unrest began to grow.

Eutelsat, the owner of the Hotbird 6 satellite that has been targeted, knows to within a city block where the jamming signal is coming from and is working with the International Telecoms Union, the global regulatory body, to stop it, according to BBC officials.

"It does not need incredibly sophisticated equipment," a satellite expert said. "They just need a 7ft dish and they send a more powerful uplink signal than the signal we are using and it overwhelms it. It has only happened rarely before."

He said it was unlikely that any ITU action could stop the jamming.

BBC Persian has been broadcasting Farsi news since January to Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. The jamming signal is also affecting other broadcasts using Hotbird 6, including the BBC's Arabic television service.

The BBC's signal could now be received on the Eutelsat W2M Nilesat and Telstar T12, a spokesman said. These would be immune from interference because the Middle East and Gulf region was served by several satellites, many viewers had motorised dish receivers and were accustomed to switching from one to another, the expert said.

ft.com

To view the existing situation in Iran as an opportunity and to build policies based on this perception, experts believe, may lead to unpredictable.

In my opinion this situation is rapidly getting out of control.

The world powers that be are being far too lenient with a section of the WORLD (I'm tired of thinking in terms of countries in the year 2009) that reminds me of a child....with a temper tantrum......holding a bomb.

Broker

Iranian culture could be described as having two dimensions, nationality and religiosity, or Iranian as well as Islamic. These two are so tightly woven together that their separation is almost impossible.

Iran is an example of the U.S and European weakness to influence something)

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