News

Twitter postpones maintenance to continue bringing news from Iran

Worst. Timing. Ever.

That was one of the many criticisms of a planned hour-long Twitter network upgrade, smack-dab in the midst of unprecedented demonstrations in Iran.

The downtime was initially scheduled for tonight (June 15th) U.S. time. That would be morning or mid-day in Tehran. "However, our network partners at NTT America recognize the role Twitter is currently playing as an important communication tool in Iran," notes a recent Twitter blog post. "Tonight's planned maintenance has been rescheduled to tomorrow between 2-3p PST (1:30a in Iran)."

Twitter has emerged as an important communication tool in Iran for those challenging the claim that Iranian president Ahmadinejad won re-election in a landslide, despite many indications that one of his opponents had much stronger popular support.

-- Sharon Machlis: Machlis Musings