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Here's what's at stake. December of 2010 saw the most substantial civil unrest in Tunisia in the reign of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, which began with a bloodless coup in November 1987. Beginning with street protests in the country's poor interior region of Sidi Bouzid, the calls for change were soon echoed by more powerful civil society organizations, notably the country's only labor union, the UGTT. But despite the turmoil, it wasn't clear what exactly might happen.

"It is too early to know if these protests signal the beginning of the end for Ben Ali," wrote Christopher Alexander in Foreign Policy on January 3. "However, Tunisia's current political scene looks a bit like it did in 1975 and 1976, the beginning of the long slide for Ben Ali's predecessor, Habib Bourguiba."

That is to say, even expert analysts of the country couldn't tell if Ben Ali would remain in power for a few more weeks or a decade. It did not feel inevitable that Ben Ali would be deposed. People had protested in the streets before. Revolution had been in the air. It wasn't clear that this time would be different.

There has been a lot of debate about whether Twitter helped unleash the massive changes that led Ben Ali to leave office on January 14, but Facebook appears to have played a more important role in spreading dissent.

"I think Facebook played a bigger role in this case," said Jillian York of the Berkman Center for the Internet and Society, who has been tracking the Tunisian situation closely. "There are a lot more Facebook users than Twitter users. Facebook allows for strong ties in a way that Twitter doesn't. You're not just conversing."

One early sign that Tunisians felt Facebook could be useful: Back in July, bloggers Photoshopped a picture of Mark Zuckerberg to show him holding up a sign that read, "Sayeb Sala7, ya 3ammar," the slogan for a freedom of expression campaign late in 2010. Later, Zuckerberg popped up on a sign outside the Saudi Arabian embassy carried by Tunisian protesters demanding the arrest of Ben Ali.

York said that Tunisian bloggers and activists had told her that the ability to upload video to Facebook drove its usage because many other video-sharing sites had been blocked by the government.

The videos -- shot shakily with cameraphones -- created a link between what was happening on the streets in the poor areas of the country and the broader Tunisian population. Many are graphic. In one video -- since taken down, apparently -- a young man is lying on a gurney with his skull cracked open. Brain oozes out. Cries are heard all around. The video focuses in on the man's face and as the camera pulls back, we see that there are two other people with cameraphones recording the injury. Video after video of the revolutionary events captures other people videoing the same event. Those videos, and the actions they recorded, became the raw material for a much greater online apparatus that could amplify each injury, death, and protest.