Above: 31 results since I started searching? I did my search only 10 seconds previous. So at 7:30am EST, that’s about 10 tweets per second I have access to. Amazing.

The recent events in Iran have be a testament to the importance of social networks in the lives of every day people. Today, even The New York Times, “America’s Newspaper”, has reported on the overwhelming trump of sites like Facebook and twitter over traditional media outlets for Iranian Election News.

Why? Well, we know the printed media is yesterdays news, and TV media is faster, but not as fast or efficient as the internet. Social Networks have proven king.

As the Iranian government is desperately trying to block various websites that election protesters are participating in, its proven to be too big of a beast to tackle. The people have even threatened to overload the servers of government websites by bombarding them with web traffic.

What is the method here for beating the censorship? Twitter, Facebook, and other pop-up websites, have there own code written that allows a web programmer to build a website, or mobile application, that can access the said social networks content. These Application Programming Interfaces are free to access, and can be installed on any server. Thus the issue for Iranian Government blocking one site after another.

It is a true viral mechanism, and the more you tell them ‘no’ the more it inspires them to move forward faster, smarter, and more efficiently.

If you do frequently watch cable news, you have probably seen the ever increasing competition squabbles between networks about amount of coverage on a certain topic. One network blames another for lack of coverage to adhere to an agenda. Its no surprise really, with the use of social networks and the impact they have. On social media, you don’t deny your agenda or bias, you just create a Twitter tag or handle to organize it, thus creating complete transparency. Less money spent, more eyeballs for content.

It is a “Move up, or Shut Up” for traditional news outlets, and the Iranian Election is defintaly a big win for social media, and one for the record books.