By Cynthia Lee for UCLA Today

An urban planning doctoral student in Los Angeles is helping Egyptians at all levels broadcast their stories to the online world during the chaotic days of protests and rioting through the only means of communication they have left — phone land lines.
 
John Scott-Railton, who has done research and studied in Egypt, decided to begin tweeting and sending out audio reports directly from Egyptians via Twitter and Youtube when the Egyptian government shut down Internet and  cell phone service last Thursday.
 
Calling his contacts, Scott-Railton sent out word that he wanted to help get their land line messages out to the broader world. As word spread via friends, their contacts and journalists in the country, his network of correspondents has grown tremendously. So far, he has posted 366 tweets, including links to audio clips which have been played 272,000 times. Nearly 4,000 people have subscribed to his tweets.
 
“Egypt has tried to prevent Egyptians from speaking by shutting off the Internet,” said Scott-Railton in an email message. “But these events are made up of individuals, smart people with aspirations and voices. I am letting them speak as people to the world, unsilencing them.”
 
This is not the first time that Scott-Railton, a student in the School of Public Affairs, has come to the aid of people on the other side of the world. A student of urban vulnerability to climate change and the obstacles that communities face adapting to these changes, he has coordinated with politicians, climate scientists, academics and the community to design a plan to protect slums in Senegal from the flooding. By combining the maps with data he obtained from NASA and using sophisticated modeling formulas that he developed, he was able to create a model to help solve this problem.
 
To map out the areas of flooding in Senegal, he rigged a remote control camera to kites that he then flew to take aerial photos.
 
"One man, a student from UCLA … became a catalyst for an entire country to figure out how to tackle a devastating problem. John has been able to create detailed topographical maps of the flooded areas of Senegal,” said UCLA alumnus Brian Rishwain, who presented to two $2,500 awards to Scott-Railton and Ava Bromberg, another student, for their work in social justice.
 
To connect with Scott-Railton’s Twitter account: http://Twitter.com/jan25voices
To hear audios of calls on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/jan25voices
 
See a video of Scott talking about what he’s doing and how he did it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTSvc6LsqWY

Published: Monday, January 31, 2011