Monday, August 2

Ilham Aliyev on Twitter

According to News.az President Ilham Aliyev, will now be tweeting live in English and Azerbaijani. The news were announced at the end of July.

It will now be possible to follow "president's speeches, events attended by the president and video material" as website reports.

Whether its a positive development, I don't know... Though I doubt President will be tweeting himself off his mobile. Though who knows, maybe thanks to him, Twitter will now assign sms number to Azerbaijan as well?!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think this is spectacular regardless whether he will be tweeting himself or someone else will be tweeting on his behalf (the chances are it is the latter)

What is more important is him using this technology and therefore opening doors to a direct and open communication with the people of Azerbaijan and the rest of the world. Technology like twitter empowers regular people arming them with tools to cast their voice in a way that was never possible before.

I think (if it has already started) it may not last for long but a least is a step forward.

Arzu Geybulla said...

@Anonymous- thank you for the comment- rather positive one I have to say. True, you might be right in a sense that this might be a step forward, but I am not 100 percent sure whether Ilham Aliyev using twitter is a sign of "opening doors to a direct and open communication with the people". Though I might be wrong and lets hope (I at least would like to hope) that I am wrong. Twitter does empower people, but look at what happens to people empowered by todays technology in Azerbaijan- case in point Emin and Adnan- they are in prison and nothing has changed...

Aaron said...

I'm going to guess that Ilham Aliyev is not the type of guy who feels like he needs to be empowered. And if I'm wrong, then I'm going to go a little further, and guess that Twitter is not going to satisfy the president of a nation in his quest for empowerment.

Maybe he's a little insecure, and he thinks a Twitter feed with scores of followers will satisfy that insecurity.

Anonymous said...

Well, his Twitter probably reaches citizens as well as Obama's. Heads of state really just use Twitter as another press release platform, so Azerbaijan is no different. But glad to see Azerbaijan is keeping up with technology.