3208 Ronan Lee International Journal of Communication 13(2019) military’s hold on power was growing increasingly tenuous (Lintner, 1990; Steinberg, 2010). In 2008, a new military-drafted constitution set the scene for future multiparty elections, and in November 2010 Myanmar held its first nationwide elections in a generation: 22 million Myanmar residents cast votes to elect 75% of the parliamentary seats, but Myanmar’s military retained significant influence within the new government structure (Republic of the Union of Myanmar, 2008). The remaining parliamentary seats were reserved for serving members of the military who would be directly appointed by the country’s military chief. Parliament’s military-appointed MPs maintain an effective veto over future constitutional changes, which require threequarters support of parliament, meaning further progress toward full democracy remains in the hands of the military leadership. The Myanmar military also retained direct control of the key ministries of border affairs, defense, and home affairs (Republic of the Union of Myanmar, 2008). After taking up office in early 2011, the new quasi-civilian administration, led by ex-general President Thein Sein, liberalized some elements of Myanmar’s economic and media landscape (Kulczuga 2013; Shobert 2014). These reforms included economic liberalization, political prisoner amnesties, and new media freedoms, which convinced some international actors that Myanmar was transitioning toward democracy. This contributed to decisions by Western governments to ease long-standing economic sanctions (“EU Lifts Sanctions Against Burma,” 2013; OECD, 2014; U.S. Department of Treasury, 2016). Until prepublication press censorship ended in 2012, Myanmar had one of the world’s most restrictive news media environments (Farrelly & Chit Win, 2016; Freedom House, 2007, 2008; Holliday, 2013). During the military-controlled era, media reporting of issues deemed sensitive by the authorities was heavily censored. Generations of Myanmars grew up without experiencing a free domestic press. This rapidly changed during Thein Sein’s term in office, when prepublication censorship was formally ended and the country became awash with smartphones. Despite the continuation of postpublication censorship, two changes to Myanmar’s media landscape during this time would have far-reaching consequences: the 2011 decision to unblock access to foreign media and the 2012 decision to end prepublication media censorship (Pidd, 2012; Renshaw, 2013; Watkins, 2012). This meant Myanmar’s residents could now freely access foreign news outlets as well as use previously blocked social media channels. Understandably, Myanmar was a latecomer to the Internet revolution. Before 2012, Myanmar’s mobile phone ownership level was so low that, per capita, only North Korea had fewer mobile phones (Motlagh, 2014). Policy changes during Thein Sein’s tenure saw mobile phone SIM cards reduced in price from thousands of dollars to as little as one dollar (Motlagh, 2014). In a country where the GDP per capita scarcely exceeded US$1,000, mobile phone technology was previously a luxury well beyond the reach of the average person (World Bank, 2018). When the mobile phone market was opened to international carriers and prices fell, there was a huge growth in mobile phone penetration. From a very low base, mobile phone penetration rates grew quickly to more than 50% by 2015, were expected to pass 80% during the 2015-16 financial year, and were estimated to have topped 90% by the end of 2016 (Matsui, 2015; Aung Kyaw Nyunt, 2016). This made the Internet readily available to the majority of Myanmar’s 51 million residents and altered the way Myanmar’s residents communicate. Media reforms also ensured that for many in Myanmar, their first experience of Internet technology was on their smartphone, using Facebook, rather than on a desktop computer using a search engine like Google or Yahoo (Gowan, 2014; Kulczuga, 2013). Facebook’s aggressive chasing of market share in Myanmar—Facebook’s Free Basics program was available