I read this story on MercuryNews.com and quite a few points jumped out at me right away.
When Egyptian police scooped up UC Berkeley graduate journalism student James Karl Buck, who was photographing a noisy demonstration, and dumped him in a jail cell last week, they didn’t count on Twitter.Buck, 29, a former Oakland Tribune multimedia intern, used the ubiquitous short messaging service to tap out a single word on his cellular phone: ARRESTED. The message went out to the cell phones and computers of a wide circle of friends in the United States and to the mostly leftist, anti-government bloggers in Egypt who are the subject of his graduate journalism project.
The next day, he walked out a free man with an Egyptian attorney hired by UC Berkeley at his side and the U.S. Embassy on the phone.
James Buck was lucky he had a cell phone.
James Buck was lucky he had cell phone coverage in the area.
James Buck was lucky he had a Twitter account.
James Buck was lucky he had a bunch of Twitter buddies.
James Buck was lucky he is a student at UC Berkley.
but most of all…
James Buck was lucky he is an American.
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Lucky to be to be a wealthy American. In truth, the Egyptian authorities must have known they were not going to keep him for long. Would he be rotting in a prison if not for Twitter? I doubt it. The State Department and UC Berkeley are what saved him.