This post is a copy-paste of my reply to Georges’ post. Read it here.
Great article George!
Was planning on writing about this whole experience myself. Truth is that Twitter really did show it’s practical and informative side, unfortunately in these disastrous occasions.
I can’t say that I followed up on the Mumbai issue through Twitter, but the Athens riots had me refreshing my cell phone every 2 mins.
The pattern was always the same. Twitter posters sent in the information. After 3 or 4 different people posting the same thing, this was a means of cross-checking the info, I noticed TV stations we’re relaying that single piece of information… Amazing! At one instance, a twitterer posted that Kolonaki was under attack. 3 mins later, there was a TV crew headed to Kolonaki following a tip they had.
That tip can be easily identified as Twitter. But let’s face it, Twitter wasn’t the only “high tech” gadgetry used. SKAI TV broadcasted live via 3G video calls, thus rendering the huge and bulky cameras and crews of three people, obsolete. So, what we saw these past few days happening is that, although people headed to the web for immediate information, they were not the only ones.
Traditional media relied on these new technologies as much as we did. So, we can’t really say that the traditional media is fading out, or dying… they’re just adapting, just like we are…