Effective global networking has opened wide the world of commerce for millions. But peer to peer networking groups look a little bit different when business is not at stake. Not all network strategies have to do with commerce. Some have to do with freedom and survival.

” We may be tired of hearing about the “revolutionary” blogosphere…The ubiquity of blogs has in some ways blanched the medium of much of its importance.

But in Egypt, where President Hosni Mubarak personally picks the editors of major newspapers and quickly replaces them for disloyalty, the importance of blogs is hard to miss…Ha’aretz reported this month that “blogs have become one of the most effective means of expression for the Egyptian opposition recently.”

In February a 22 year old Egyptian blogger was imprisoned for 4 years for insulting the clerics and Mubarak. New laws were ratified that increased the list of offenses for which you can be jailed. But what has been noted is that they have not been able to silence the bloggers as thoroughly as they have the legacy news media, and that is when networking becomes all about hope.

“To Americans, perhaps, blogs may not seem exceedingly groundbreaking because our country has taken pains since its inception to protect “the lonely pamphleteer” - that thinker on the local corner disseminating his idea…
Not so in Egypt and most other Middle Eastern countries, where the lonely pamphleteer has historically been quite lonely indeed, often alone in a cold cell. Fifteen years ago, it would have been highly unlikely for the young man I saw in the Internet cafe to share with more than a few people his take on Egyptian politics…”
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