Right on the heels of the Middle East unrest came the Great Tohoku Kanto Earthquake that rocked northern Japan. Again Social Media played a large role. Survivors used Twitter to contact relatives, Facebook to organize search parties, and Google Maps to organize emergency response. Right after the quake, tweets were being sent at a rate of 1,200 per hour.
The sudden burst of tweets about the disaster made it difficult to distinguish between those on location and those interested in helping. Wouldn’t it be useful if there were a separate convention for tweets from witnesses to major events versus those just involved in the discussion? How about #jpquake! for witnesses and #jpquake for discussion?
This idea or using a bang (!) or other special character to separate those on the scene from the rest of the crowd seems to have emerged from a number of simultaneous sources. Apparently it was discussed on a panel at SXSW (otherwise know as Spring Break for Geeks) which was taking place right at the same time as the earthquake. I saw it mentioned on TV by a startup wizard whose name I don’t remember. However, it doesn’t seem to have taken hold as a common practice yet – perhaps the next political or natural disaster will bring it up again.
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