"I never wondered if I had done the right thing

. . . because it was so strong, so strong. It was so important, those days and weeks of the change happening. First of all, every day, being alive was a gift. There was shooting everywhere, and this was the first thing: being alive. There was so much going on that you didn’t even have time to think about it. There were demonstrations everywhere, everybody’s shooting, people running, and it was really, really, very tough days.

"The impact, especially now, will come more from the individual journalist. The old media, somehow, are going to give away to a new type of media. Obviously, the Internet is going to play a very important role. I believe that the real democracy that we always talk about, the idea that everybody has a possibility to give his voice, that is what is coming . . .

"I believe that, more and more, individuals will be important . . . because
they are the ones that are going to change the world. Not CNN, not ABC
News, or FOX, or whatever. The future is people like you, people that
hold blogs, using the Internet . . .

"I too believe that, especially in the 21st century, there will be
great opportunity for images to change the world—-the image is going to be,
probably, one of the main factors of the change in the world."

-Reza, National Geographic photographer who began his career upon his exile from Iran three decades ago, in his DarkTopo interview.