The year 2010 was named the Year of Social Media, a technology of communication and for creating and exchanging "User Generated Content". The year 2010 also marked the start of the Arab revolts where, in Tunisia and Egypt, social media served as a critical platform for expressing dissent, organizing, and providing citizen media accounts of events. Social media are incurably commercial, but at the same time carry substantial social and political benefits. This dialogue raises questions about the educational and political significance of new social media in a contested age of cybernetic capitalism. (Contains 13 notes.)