According to Al-Ahram (“The New York Times of Egypt”) a man in his twenties named his first born daughter Facebook in tribute to the role the social media service had in organizing the protests in Tahrir Square and beyond. Helmed by now-famous Googler Wael Ghonim, the We Are Khaled Said Facebook page showed up within 5 days of Said’s death in June and served as a hub for dissidence against Egyptian police brutality as well as a way to disseminate logistical information about the escalating anti-government protests. Other activist pages like one actually called Tahrir Square cropped up shortly afterward.
There are five million Facebook users in Egypt, moreso than any other country in the Middle East/North Africa region, and Facebook itself has reported an increase in users from Egypt in the past month, with 32,000 groups and 14,000 pages created in the two weeks after January 25th.
While the baby girl could just have easily been called “YouTube,” “Twitter” “Google” or even “Cellphone Camera,” it seems like Facebook has become the umbrella symbol for how social media can spread the message of freedom. There are countless manefestation of this, the above graffiti in Cairo, “Thank you Facebook” protest sign, and Wael Ghonim himself personally expressing his gratitude to Mark Zuckerberg on CNN.
Translation:
A New Day
Man Names His Newborn Girl Facebook
A young man in his twenties wanted to express his gratitude about the victories the youth of 25th of January have achieved and chose to express it in the form of naming his firstborn girl “Facebook” Jamal Ibrahim (his name.) The girl’s family, friends, and neighbors in the Ibrahimya region gathered around the new born to express their continuing support for the revolution that started on Facebook. “Facebook” received many gifts from the youth who were overjoyed by her arrival and the new name. A name [Facebook] that shocked the entire world.
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