Morocco catches Twitter and Facebook fever

2009-07-24

Morocco's 9 million internet users are using the social networking tools Facebook and Twitter to reach out to people at home and overseas. Magharebia checks out the chorus of tweets.

By Rachid Jankari for Magharebia in Casablanca – 24/09/09

[File] Social networking and micro-blogging sites are taking Morocco by storm.

Facebook and Twitter, the latest Web 2.0 tools to captivate Moroccans, are winning new users among everyone from chatty teens to dedicated cyberactivists.

The growing popularity of the two tools indicates that Morocco's Web users, who now number 9 million, are moving beyond blogging to share information with each other and the world.

Facebook is witnessing intense activity, with 840,000 subscribers in Morocco. Many of these are young people posting photos and writing back and forth with their friends.

"This network has become an electronic mouthpiece for cyberactivists to speak out in defence of the freedom of expression online and in the media in Morocco," said Sami Ben Gharbia, who manages the advocacy component of international blogging network Global Voices Online.

Morocco is also home to the very first person in the world to be convicted for using Facebook: young engineer Fouad Mourtada, In 2008, he was sentenced to three years in prison for posing as Prince Moulay Rachid. Web users mounted a worldwide campaign to win his release. After spending 42 days in jail, Mourtada received a pardon from King Mohammed VI.

Facebook has also generated interest at home and abroad via its "Official Moroccan Group", which now has over 2,600 members. The group's bilingual Arabic/English page features basic facts about the country, well-trafficked discussion boards, and related videos and pictures.

Digital diplomats are also harnessing Facebook's opportunities. The European Union delegation to Rabat, for example, has been using a dedicated Facebook page to communicate with the Moroccan media and other local audiences. The US Embassy in Rabat and USAID in Morocco also set up pages.

"The aim of this digital presence on the social networks is to keep Facebook members up to date on the news and activities of the embassy in Morocco," said Ghassane Hajji, the embassy's social media officer.

The micro-blogging site Twitter is also piping up to gain a share of Moroccan fans. This social networking tool allows its users to send 140-character messages (or “tweets”) to a list of friends. It can be accessed from a computer and/or mobile phone, making it easy to bombard people with mass updates.

"At the moment, the Moroccan community, nicknamed Twittoma, is very select," said Siham El Moudden, a member of Morocco's micro-blogging community. "It’s still in its infancy."

Nevertheless, Twittoma includes Ahmed Reda Chami, the minister for industry and information technology, who recently started "tweeting" about his work to pass legislation to protect personal data and his plan to roll out broadband internet service.

Other political figures are joining the chorus of tweets. "The use of Twitter is an extension of the detailed posts published on my blog. It’s also an effective way of alerting Web users to events that could otherwise go unnoticed," MP Khalid El Hariry said.

Politicians are not the only ones tweeting, however. Many young people are beginning to use Twitter to communicate about new technologies and internet trends.

One measure of Twittoma's popularity is evident simply from typing the keyword "Morocco" into the search engine http://search.twitter.com. The search returns threads from the top 100 users in Morocco online at http://minyurl.net/twitt_maroc.

With over 250 million Facebook members worldwide, and with Twitter claiming over 3 million users, it's clear that Moroccans are tapping into a global trend. What happens next is up to Moroccans themselves, as they innovate and modify their own communication.