Egyptian Revolution Unfolds On The iPad, Courtesy of CNN

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NileTViPad

Going around town today, I didn’t have time to plop myself in front of a television, and so I constantly checked my iPad when at WiFi hotspots to update myself on the exciting developments in Egypt.

Being a news junkie, I have a number of wire service apps, The Daily, the NYTimes, ABC News, as well as Slate, on my iPad. (I couldn’t access Al Jazeera’s live stream on my device.)

I’ve also been looking at photos of events from protestors on Flickr.

However, I found the most interesting app to be CNN’s because it has piped in Egypt’s state-run television station Nile TV, streaming live.

Instead of pundits, it simply has a news anchor interviewing various public figures and analysts, as well as a stream of television footage of street activity from around Egypt.

There’s a fascinating analysis on the role that Nile TV played during the revolution here.

Here’s an excerpt:

As of this writ­ing — actu­ally, dur­ing this writ­ing — Mubarak for­merly relin­quished his posi­tion as pres­i­dent. The cam­eras of state-controlled tele­vi­sion were again show­ing images of Tahrir Square and the hun­dreds of thou­sands of Egyp­tians cel­e­brat­ing this moment. The same pre­sen­ters who called the pro­test­ers for­eign spies hap­pily showed clips of these same peo­ple singing the national anthem and scream­ing their joy into the channel’s micro­phones. After Mubarak’s speech on Thurs­day, thou­sands of pro­test­ers sur­rounded the state tele­vi­sion build­ing demand­ing that it be turned over to them, the voice of the peo­ple.

How have you been keeping track of what’s been going on in Egypt, and what are your favorite apps and news outlets?

Share all in the comments!

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