The former Google executive and political activist tells the story of the Egyptian revolution he helped ignite through the power of social media.
In the summer of 2010, thirty-year-old Google executive Wael Ghonim anonymously launched a Facebook page to protest the death of an Egyptian man at the hands of security forces. The page’s following expanded quickly and moved from online protests to a nonconfrontational movement. On January 25, 2011, Tahrir Square resounded with calls for change. Yet just as the revolution began in earnest, Ghonim was captured and held for twelve days of brutal interrogation.
After he was released, he gave a tearful speech on national television, and the protests grew more intense. Four days later, the president of Egypt was gone. In this riveting story, Ghonim takes us inside the movement and shares the keys to unleashing the power of crowds in the age of social networking.
“A gripping chronicle of how a fear-frozen society finally topples its oppressors with the help of social media.” —San Francisco Chronicle
“Revolution 2.0 excels in chronicling the roiling tension in the months before the uprising, the careful organization required and the momentum it unleashed.” —NPR.org
Wael Ghonim was born in Cairo and grew up in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, earning a degree from Cairo University in 2004 and an MBA from the American University in Cairo in 2007. He joined Google in 2008, rising to become Head of Marketing for Google Middle East and North Africa. He is currently a non-resident senior fellow at Harvard's Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation.