Under the State Department's Whatchamacallit for Public Diplomacy are... Arabic-speaking members of the Digital Outreach Team who respond to blog posts in the region... the State Department has developed its own Twitter and Facebook accounts in Arabic, Persian, and other languages.

Given its lesser standing in terms of international public opinion compared to the West, China should strive for the right to speak in public diplomacy in cyberspace, strengthen the universal participation of the public diplomacy on the Internet, formulate a public diplomacy strategy for cyberspace and proactively build up a national brand.

Facebook announced that it would be putting together a global team of quasi-diplomats, called "policy directors," to represent the company in various countries around the globe. "You literally build a foreign service... to translate the policy environment back into the company."

Wael Ghonim, a Google executive who became a public voice in the Egyptian uprising, said that social networking played a vital role in the rebellion and will continue to do so in many other regions throughout the world.

The rapid political and social changes sweeping the region has transformed the media here... Egypt’s Minister of Culture Emad Abu Ghazi said in his keynote address: “Today’s new media has helped bring about social changes, acting as a tool in the hands of the youth.”

After a page calling for a mass march by Palestinians on the borders of Israel on May 15 was taken offline by Facebook, mirror sites with more than 3.5 million followers sprung up... Will the so-called "Facebook Intifada" tip the Middle East into further turmoil?

On May 03, 2011 the world’s first Jewish social platform, JewishNet, was launched. According to the project creators, its uniqueness is in providing users with a platform to develop their own ideas and fulfil their potential even beyond the virtual world. The platform covers three basic areas: socialization, education and public diplomacy.

The Arab Uprising has shaken the way we understand politics, communications and public diplomacy. Social media may have played a role in the unrest, but pretending that the uprising is a social media revolution is as imaginary as the existence of the Empress of Mancha.