I woke up around 4:30 this morning trying to figure out why the house was shaking. Perhaps if I was in California I would have just rolled over and gone back to sleep. However, I live in the Midwest and earthquakes really just aren’t the norm here. Apparently, the last one was about 40 years ago. So once I was firmly awake, I really wanted to know what was going on. Where can you turn at 4:30 am for breaking news? Well it turns out that it’s not the local news. Judging from this morning’s response that takes about 30 minutes.
So if you don’t want to wait 30 minutes to confirm something is going on, where do you go? The answer is Twitter. If you’re not familiar with Twitter, it is a microblogging platform that allows you to type short text messages of 140 characters or less. Just enough to shout out to your friends … things like “What the hell was that?” “Was that an earthquake?” “Everyone OK?” You can find me on Twitter as NaturalWoman. (Why not Jedimom? I guess I haven’t told you about my multiple-personality disorder yet.)
I was both comforted and entertained in the wee hours of the morning today by my friends on Twitter. From my Twitter stream I was able to share in Jason Falls‘ running commentary of the traditional news coverage of the event. I was able to tweet with a neighbor about how her household was reacting. I sent a high five to St. Louis blogger Holly McCaig who had a quake reaction blog post up by 5:15 am. When the journalists did get on the air with the story, the Twitterworld shared their reactions to the mad scramble they were seeing on TV.
To be fair to the local news guys, there are constraints on journalists. They can’t just blurt out speculation. They have to check the facts, line up sources and have some real information to provide people before they go on the air. This is important to avoid wide-spread panic and misinformation. Twitter doesn’t have those restraints. That’s part of what makes it so immediate and so fascinating.
And to put in a plug for my favorite Social News site Mixx, I submitted an AP wire story about the quake and by 7 am it was already in the breaking news section. Fresh breaking news for the rest of the country to absorb, share and discuss with their morning coffee.
I love social media!
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April 18th, 2008 at 7:13 am
i know - i was so proud of us “twitterers” twitting the breaking news before fox! HA HA you guys rock! my new reliable newsource for sure!
April 18th, 2008 at 7:14 am
p.s. - ack, why don’t i have you in my reader yet - doing that now.
April 18th, 2008 at 7:58 am
Great post! At 4:30 am, it was comforting to see I wasn’t loosing my mind and that a quake had happened. Thanks twitterer’s!
April 18th, 2008 at 8:26 am
@holly found you recently through twitterlocal.net. I love to “stalk” locals who get social media.
April 18th, 2008 at 9:01 am
I am that neighbor, and Lisa’s twittering saved my sanity!
April 18th, 2008 at 9:09 am
OK, that’s it, I must get into Twitter. I’ll put it on my list.
April 18th, 2008 at 10:44 am
Some people duck and cover during an earthquake; my wife twitters and blogs.
May 28th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
I heard twitter also broke news of the earthquake in China - and have continued to break news of aftershocks. I was a bit dubious about twitter at first, but now think it’s amazing and will change the way the world communicates.