Iran: From Yahoo Messenger to Modern Self-hosted Live Funeral Sessions

By Dr. Javad Zarbakhsh, Cademix Institute of Technology

I remember almost 20 years ago in 1999 or 2000, I was studying in Iran and I had a student job as the supervisor of the Computer Lab and Assistant of the Professor for the Data Science and Computational Physics courses. When the internet started to be available for the students, we were using Yahoo! Messenger and IRC to communicate with colleagues in other departments and meanwhile we started making international friends we never met. Some of my colleagues were very eager and open to learning new software and adopted the new communication tools. The others looked at us awkwardly as we were asocial and crazy nerds. 

We used to learn that not everyone in the society is open to new social habits. Some people just need time to adopt a technology or change their social habits. The others just prefer to be continuously conservative and against any new change. That was a great lesson to learn: You cannot help, change or guide the people if they don’t want to. 

20 years gone and the country lost almost 4% of the brains migrated to other countries, including myself. You probably know the Migration and Brain Drain from Iran is a major issue for the country’s development. For the time I was there, I think I witnessed ICT technology spread into about 1% of the population. 

But something important happened in 2020. The CoVid-19 is changing the habits of the people. Now we hear people have online funerals and live memorial sessions. The number of mobile connections in Iran is now above 150% of the total population, and almost everybody is connected to the internet.

Over the years, sanctions have taken a serious pressure on Iran's economy and people. Since international services such as Zoom are not offering their services in Iran, and a few others are blocked, the people are now trying to use their own self-hosted live sessions. This can be a good sign, to modernize the old social habits. 

It's our responsibility to help the people, fight the unemployment. We should specifically help those talents who need a career development and job security. It's probably a small help in the whole job market, however we need to help each other to expand the Career Autopilot to guarantee a career success for the job seekers and the graduates. The helping hands is there.

From a European perspective, it can be a great opportunity for a better dialogue between Tradition and Modern world. Europe and the West can use this opportunity to get closer to the modern segment of the society and empower them toward modernization. It will be a major benefit for everybody including Europe and possibly the best approach to stand against extremism. Believe me a modern society is more beneficial and more secure for Europe.

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