Don't-Miss Discussion : Tonight! "Iran Hostage 30th Anniversary Meets WikiLeaks"

With a great title like this, and in light of what's happening as we speak across Northern Africa, you don't want to miss this discussion:

Iran Hostage 30th Anniversary Meets WikiLeaks

WHO: Author Stephen Kinzer, Grand Theft Auto Director Navid Khonsari, Newscaster Amy Goodman, Emmy-nominated Mike de Seve, Columbia University Chair of Iran Studies Hamid Dabashi and renown media critic Mark Crispin Miller

WHERE: 2 West 64th St. & Central Park West, NYC, (New York Society for Ethical Culture)

WHEN: TONIGHT! Tuesday, January 18, 2011, 7 p.m.

Event is Free and Open / Wine and Tea will be served.

New York, NY, Jan. 13, 2011 – January 20 marks the 30th anniversary of the end of the Iran Hostage Crisis, when students and militants imprisoned 52 Americans in Tehran for 444 days. The event will occur two days before the anniversary, on Tuesday, Jan. 18th at the NY Society for Ethical Culture. To commemorate the 1981 event, New York Times veteran and best-selling author Stephen Kinzer ( All the Shah's Men ) joins Amy Goodman and Columbia's Dr. Hamid Dabashi (Chair, Iranian Studies) to re-examine this historic incident, and discuss its impact on current events.

Contributing: Media and tech pioneer Daniel Burwen, founder of Cognito Comics and publisher of Operation Ajax (an interactive iPad app about the crisis' roots); renown media critic Mark Crispin Miller; Emmy-nominated Ajax author Mike de Seve; and eBook innovator Harold Moss of FlickerLab. They'll present breakthrough ways history can be brought to new audiences in today's wired world. Also presenting will be iranian-born Navid Khonsari, director of the Grand Theft Auto franchise, who will announce his multi-player game, 1979 - Revolution, in which several players can take roles as Iranian revolutionaries, students, hostages and U.S. soldiers.

Among the panel questions: How would modern technology, wikis and social networking have altered the hostage crisis? What if secret 1953 CIA coup plans had been leaked in 1978 instead of recently? Will new "weapons of mass instruction" including WikiLeaks and iPads aid or harm the causes of peace and democracy? How will popularizing the history of Iran and America's relations alter them in the future?

As an example of breakthrough technologies used to re-examine the era, Kinzer, Burwen and de Seve will unveil Operation Ajax, their new iPad collaboration. Operation Ajax is an innovative "motion graphic novel" that uses cinematic, multi-touch and gaming techniques to teach about the roots of the crisis — and is an interactive source for several leaked CIA documents about the overthrow democratic Iran, and the instigating role of BP. Stephen Kinzer notes: "It's been fifteen years since, during a reporting trip to Iran, I decided to write a book about how the CIA overthrew Iran's Prime Minister in 1953. That's why I was so thrilled when a group of digital visionaries approached me about producing an interactive iPad app about the coup." "FlickerLab is setting new standards for ebooks and digital art, which are truly the news and education tools of the future. We're excited to be part of this panel with progressive journalists and media makers," says Harold Moss, FlickerLab's Creative Director. Mike de Seve adds, "It's an amazing array of voices and ideas about this anniversary." -# # #- Contact: Natalia Mount Mount & Rehbein 130 Barrow #505 New York, NY 10014 USA Day #: 315.440.5036 Evening #: 315.440.5036 Email: natalia@mountrehbein.com Website: mountrehbein.com