Absolutely, every means of communication have to be used.
Regarding service shutdown, this is why we need nanonetworks, or mesh networks beetween phones. Each phone becomes a provider to every other phones around and they can communicate without cell towers... only beetween themselves.
Then data travels through the network, and the first phone getting a signal out can upload to the outside... like people living near borders and catching another countries signal.
It could also be through wifi, satellite or any other way out.

My idea is that the Tunisian revolution had been there for years. It then exploded, and the networks were assisting in propagating the wave and have the world as witness.