Tag Archives: Internet

Digital Divide In Morocco

As the internet begins to spread all over the world, it continues to spread in Morocco as the internet has become a huge medium for the Moroccan people, especially blogging. The government does not regulate or own internet sites like they do with newspaper, radio or television, which is a draw for people. The only sites they do stop from existing in the country are ones that are affiliated with terrorists and even let rebellious sites to post and exist on the internet in Morocco. Blogs are not regulated, so the people can say their believes and opinions on a forum seen by different people without being reprimanded by the Moroccan government.

However, the internet is still a problem for some Moroccan people as there is a digital divide in the country. Some people have access to the internet, while others do not have any. The Moroccan government has been trying for some time to bridge the gap between the digital divide, but to no prevail. A survey found that wealthier people use the internet more and the country would like to make it accessible for those that do not have a high income. There have been some improvements as from 2010 to 2011, the number of internet users grew by 70 percent. Many companies want to get rid of the digital divide and are helping to work with the government to push towards a future where everyone in Morocco has access to the internet.

Sources:

http://www.oafrica.com/ict-policy/the-use-of-the-internet-in-morocco-measuring-the-new-digital-divide/

http://magharebia.com/en_GB/articles/awi/features/2012/10/12/feature-03

Egypt’s Internet Shutdown

Egypt Internet cutoff

In the winter of 2011, Egypt made history, becoming the first country to shut off Internet access and cell phone service to nearly 80 million people. Autocratic governments often resort to similar tactics, but never on a large a scale as Egypt. The Internet shutdowns lead to a 90% decrease in data usage, and crippled the communication efforts of several anti-government organizations through the country. In order to ensure a mobile shutdown would happen, the Egyptian government ordered all mobile phone companies to cut-off service for an indefinite period of time. Many experts say the ensuing loss of Internet connectivity has never before been seen.

Perhaps the most surprising aspect of Egypt’s Internet shutdown was the extreme ease in which the task was accomplished. Despite the threat of severe diplomat and economic blowback, Egypt quickly and efficiently “unplugged” itself from the world. The shutdown came as a surprise to many, as in the recent months leading up to the event; Egypt had been a world leader in endorsing the spread of Internet use to non-connected citizens. It quickly became obvious that the decision did not work out in the government’s favor. As Egypt turned from a nation that stood as a liberal stronghold in a highly conservative region to a suddenly authoritative regime, many citizens began to take their annoyances to the streets, leading to massive riots.

Sources:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/29/technology/internet/29cutoff.html?_r=0

Couple Arrested in Morocco for Kissing

Kissing Kids

Two teenagers were arrested in Morocco in November because of a picture that was posted on the Internet of them kissing. The picture was posted on Facebook and was considered “public indecency.” Along with the 14 and 15 year olds featured in the picture, the 16 who took it, was also arrested. This kiss caused a huge uprising and questioning of person freedom in Morocco. Online protesting blew up and a hashtag, #Nadorkiss, started trending to support the teens. Shortly after the arrest, supporters staged a “kiss-in” event to protest what had happened. A few dozen Moroccan citizens kissed in courtyard outside the parliament and posted the pictures on Twitter. While Morocco is known to be a conservative, Muslim nation, the citizens feel as though they should have the right to show affection in public. They felt as though the teenagers were wrongly arrested. Even though not as many people showed up as was expected, participants in the event said “For us, the message got through. It was a success. There were couples and single people, and the couples were not embarrassed in public.”

Unknown

However, not everyone agreed that the couple was wrongly arrested. Some people looked at it from a religious standpoint. One person who supported the arrest commented that “We are an Islamic country and kissing in public is forbidden. A simple kiss can lead to other things.” It seems that religious beliefs definitely played a part in this situation. The pressure from the protests caused for the teens to be released three days after the arrest but they are still expected to appear in court. People have been speculating that the arrest was more of an educational lesson to the public rather than a criminal act by the citizens. It is amazing how social media can bring out so much support and controversy at the same time.

Sources:

http://www.france24.com/en/20131013-morocco-protest-stage-kiss-in-support-arrested-teens-picture-facebook-kissing-islam

http://www.news.com.au/technology/online/social-media-outcry-grows-over-moroccos-arrest-of-teenagers-kissing/story-fn5j66db-1226766816498

Mobile Phones in Morocco

Morocco Cell Phone

New studies show that with a population of 32 million, Morocco as 36.55 million mobile phone users. Despite the statistics showing a 100% penetration rate, that number is impossible. Many citizens in rural areas have no means to use or acquire a cell phone, and there are many Moroccans who are either too young or too old to need a mobile device, let alone operate one. The answer to this intriguingly high number; the high use of pre paid sim cards on multiple networks make its very hard to track when a device becomes inactive and the user switches to another. This leads to the appearance of singular customers operating multiple devices.

Still, these numbers are incredibly impressive considering Morocco only recently joined the mobile phone boom. Despite having only relatively recently been exposed to mobile phone use, Moroccans seems to have skipped over television and radio in favor of mobile news; so much in fact, that in Morocco, mobile phone users account for 81% of all internet users. Experts project that the mobile phone boom will only continue in Morocco, leading to a stronger emphasis of mobile news through Northern Africa.

Source:

http://riadzany.blogspot.com/2012/01/morocco-mobile-phone-mania.html

Egypt: The growing role of Twitter

It was not too long ago that Egyptians saw their access to twitter and Facebook blocked under the regime of Hosni Mubarak. Throughout the civil unrest of 2011 and 2012, Mubarak revoked access to Twitter and Facebook in an attempt to prevent social media from stimulating unrest, even going so far as to restrict blackberry internet aces throughout the country. Much has changed in the years following, as access to social media in Egypt has grown, allowing coverage of recent revolts to go viral across the Internet, perhaps most prominently through Twitter.

In the summer on 2013, Twitter “coverage” of the strife in Egypt became so widespread that Twitter began using a “tweet translation” service that allowed users to read highlighted tweets by notable Egyptian accounts in the users own language. Twitter ran the tweets through the @Egypt2013 account, which had been created to streamline the highly demanded coverage of Egypt.

Among the Egyptian accounts included in the translation service belong to Egyptian President Muhammed Morsi (@MuhammedMorsi). Unlike his predecessors, Morsi supported the use of Twitter, and often used the social media site as a tool to connect to Egypt’s youth. In April of 2013, Morsi went so far as to use Twitter to respond to criticism of his lack of democratic reforms. Through a tweet on the Egyptian Presidency’s twitter, Morsi offered to answer question from twitter users sent to his personal account.

Muhammed Morsi's twitter account

Muhammed Morsi’s twitter account

In just a few years, Egyptian government moved from imposing heavy restrictions on social media to embracing those same social media sites as a means to communicate with citizens. Despite government efforts to increase social media usage in Egypt, on 35% of the population have Internet access and an even smaller percentage (14.5) use social media.

 

Sources:

http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04/10/17693090-egypts-morsi-uses-twitter-to-talk-to-youth

http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/follow-egypt-unrest-using-experimental-twitter-translator-6C10551493

http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats1.htm

All About Morocco and Egypt

Morocco-flag

The Kingdom of Morocco is located on the west coast of Northern Africa in a mountainous area known as the Arab West.  It has a population of about 32.6 million people and the most practiced religion is Islam. The political system in Morocco is a constitutional monarchy consisting of a king who holds most of the power and a bicameral parliament. The government owns the radio and television in Morocco. In addition, Moroccan citizens have access to over 2,000 Moroccan and foreign publications. The newspaper was the first major news publication in the country. Since the rise of the Internet, daily news is able to updated on the websites and many people follow it there. The journalists in Morocco are technically allowed to practice self-censorship meaning they have the freedom to report what they want to. However, this is only tentative though, because in the past it has been rule of thumb to avoid covering controversial political and social issues.

egypt-flag

Egypt is located on the edge of Northeast Africa and is the world’s largest Arab nation. The population consists of around 83.9 million people and the most practiced religion is also Islam. The Egyptian government is a republic, which is considered a representative democracy so the elected officials make the decisions instead of the citizens. Egypt is a major source for media in its Arab-speaking region because of the huge population and the independence from the government. Many people read their press and the TV industry supplies a lot of material for that region of the world. In Egypt, the most popular way to get news is through the television. Cairo, Egypt is the popular television hub among the Arab countries because of its use of satellite television. In the Egyptian constitution, it states that the freedom of the media is guaranteed, however this is not carried out the way it would seem. There are many laws and problems against this and the people are far from having freedom of the media.

 

Sources:      http://www.mongabay.com/reference/new_profiles/295mo.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-14123019

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13313373

http://www.al-bab.com/media/freedom.htm

Overview Of Media Structure in Morocco

The country of Morocco has a diverse ownership in the way the media is owned in the country. Seventy percent of the print media is owned privately, but the government owns a good amount of the broadcast media. In the print business, magazines control most of the landscape and production, but Morocco also has a variety of newspapers that are published. Despite being privately owned, the government has helped the print business by giving aid to newspapers. In 2005, the state gave about $5 million U.S. Dollars to newspapers to help the business, which was taking a hit similar to what is happening to U.S. newspapers.

The broadcast media began taking a more privately-owned shift when the government established the High Authority of Audiovisual Communication, which allowed for independent broadcasters. One of the first television stations to take adavntage of this was 2M-TV, which was the second station in Morocco. Despite being privately owned at the time, the government now owns 80 percent of its shares. The government also owns a television station named ‘Société Nationale de Radiodiffusion et de Télévision.’ A privately owned station, Medi-1, is independent and one of the more popular stations in the country.

Online is a growing medium for the people of Morocco as more and more use the internet to view the news. Morocco follows the Initiative for an Open Arab Internet, which says citizens are free to browse any sites they choose, but the country still blocks some sites. Most of the blocked sites are ones that encourage radical Islamist activities and terrorism. However, Morocco does not block sites of the Polisario independence movement, which the country has been in a conflict with for 26 years. A popular tool of the internet for the Morocco people are blogs. Over the past few years, blogs have been a growing phenomenon and people use them usually for causes, which are generally not blocked by the government.

Sources:

http://www.journalismnetwork.eu/index.php/_en/country_profiles/morocco/

http://www.linktv.org/mosaic/broadcasters/morocco