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Tufekci: Autocratic regimes don’t stay in power for decades by governing randomly; rather, they do so by following a tried-and-tested playbook of strategic censorship, isolation and repression of dissent. And control over information flows and the public sphere is a key element of this model of autocratic regime. Regimes in the Middle East actively sought to prevent and control the spread of information because they understood that keeping sparks of dissent from lighting prairie fires of uprisings was crucial. Dissidents were punished disproportionately – long prison sentence for the smallest offenses, torture — not just because the security forces happened to be composed of sadists, but because of the same problem: to prevent cascades of dissent from taking off. The Internet has opened up the public sphere; it has allowed citizens to express their views and coordinate with each other. Does that always lead to revolution? No, you need the dissent to be there on the ground. But it does mean that such that regimes cannot continue to govern as before. They are forced to play a new game.
