Eritrea was one of the last nations in Africa to introduce the Internet, but its people might be one of the most frequent Internet user group compared to the relative size of Eritreans living around the world.

Especially, for Eritreans living outside their country it has become a second home serving as an information source about Eritrea and Eritreans. Nevertheless, in recent years the Internet has also made progress back home in Eritrea according to the latest data for the first quarter 2009.

The data shows that today Eritrea is accountable for 2% of the total African Internet user market. The development can be seen on three phases, starting with the year 2000 Eritrea had 5000 Internet users in 2006 this number increased to 50000 and the latest data shows 120000 Internet users in Eritrea. Read the full story

The social online platform Facebook has revolutionised and facilitated the means of communication and self-expression in today’s world. In the past, “Internet Phobia” was widely spread amongst the early generations of Internet users.

People were scared to use their credit card online or would be very cautious to display personnel information in the world wide web. “There were times you would go to the travel agency to book a flight!.”

This was because people would fear internet fraud or simply would give their personal privacy a high priority. Things have changed and with Facebook a new opportunity had been opened to thousands of young Eritreans around the world. Suddenly, they were able to find easily their alike in order to share and express their common identity.

Facebook for example has functionalities, where people can create groups or become members. The largest group has 2.178.278 members and is called “Can we get all the facebook users in one group ???”, which seems to be quite an ambitious target considering that Facebook has in total 200 million members worldwide.

Young Eritreans have created 334 groups in Facebook out of which 133 are organised under the topic Eritrea and 201 under the topic Eritrean.

A total number of 43.713 Eritreans have joined these groups in order to follow common interests, exchange topics and create new friendships.

The number of 43.713 members can include double counting, because some people have signed up for several groups at the same time. The topics range from “Eritrean mums” to “All Eritrean Manchester United Fans on Facebook” to “Summer 2010 in Eritrea”.

The largest Eritrean platforms within Facebook in terms of members or followers are:

• “Eritrea” 4304 fans (page)
• “Eritrea” 2409 members (group)
• “Da Eritrean Lover” 1640 members (group)
• “How Eritrean are you?” 1590 members (application)
• “You know you’re Eritrean when” 1334 (group)

Facebook has opened new possibilities for Eritreans to get directly in touch with each other, without having to travel far to Eritrean events or having to get to know new Eritreans through relatives or friends.

Goitom a 36 year old Eritrean, who grew up in rural Italy, is saying that for him it was impossible to get in touch with other Eritreans as a teenager, because major Eritrean communities used to be distributed around big cities such as Milan, Rome, Frankfurt or London.

The advances in Internet technology and surely Facebook have changed this for today’s generations of young Eritreans, Goitom adds.