Twitter has proven a powerful tool for spreading news of developing events in the country, but it has also taken on the role of media watchdog: thousands of Twitter users adopted the hashtag #CNNfail to highlight a lack of Iran coverage from the news organization.
The movement may lose traction today: CNN has stepped up TV coverage of the Iranian election and the CNN.com homepage now lists the protests as its top story. According to the Twitter trend tracking site Twist (image above), use of the term peaked on Sunday morning and has since decayed.
One Twitter user, Michael Pinto, sent us the image below showing the state of CNN's homepage on Saturday, and comparing it to other news sites.
The screenshots tell a tale more nuanced than the provocative "new media beats old media" narrative. Rather, they show that while Twitter, Flickr, YouTube and other social media sites are both a source of unfiltered information and a venue for public discussion, we still look to CNN, the BBC and their ilk to add context and meaning to this flood of data. And when they fail us, we demand more of them.