“In a sense, the local blogosphere precisely mirrored the actual election campaign itself as well as an increasingly polarized media which, rather than remain objective, soon became extensions of the campaign teams of both Ter-Petrossian and Sargsyan. But, following the latter’s predictable election as president, all of that was about to change despite the Council of Europe declaring the vote as “largely in line with international standards.”
YouTube became full of videos depicting electoral irregularities and illegalities such as ballot box stuffing and actual violence in polling stations. Bloggers either embedded them in their entries or posted their own photographs from the daily opposition rallies which soon defined the immediate aftermath of Sargsyan’s controversial and disputed election. The Armenian Blogosphere had never seen so much activity.
The moment when blogging really came of age, however, was on 2 March 2008 – less than two weeks after the election and a day after the dispersal of an opposition camp set up in a central Yerevan Square led to clashes between radical opposition supporters and the authorities which left at least ten people dead and hundreds injured. A 20-day state of emergency had been declared in the capital and all media outlets were restricted to only reporting news based on official government information.
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— Armenia Blogging Comes Of Age. Just a wee bit different than how the home fires burn.
