I started tuning into the coverage around 9 pm. I caught a few minutes of Fox 13 news, a station I do not normally watch. They were discussing the Herriman fire and the fact a few hundred homes were being evacuated. As usually I jumped on twitter to see if anything else was being discussed. I noticed Ben Winslow (@benwinslow) was tweeting live updates about the fire and so were many concerned residents of Salt Lake City. They were united under the hash tag #herrimanfire.
For those who are new to twitter or do not understand how it works, here is a short explanation: Twitter is a short messaging system. Essentially you have a list of followers, then you post a short message (140 characters or less). Your message is viewable to your list of followers. Kind of like sending a short text message to 20 or 30 friends all at once, but not having to type in all of their phone numbers. In addition, non-followers can do a search and find your messages as well. Sometimes, during major events, we end our messages with a hash tag starting with a #. An example of this is #contest. I could do a search just for #contest and get everyone who is tweeting about a contest of some sort in the world. This keeps certain topics all in one place and easy to find in a search.
Hundreds, if not more of us were all communicating and sharing information about the fire all under the hash tag #herrimanfire. In many occasions information was being tweeted faster than the news could report it. Herriman City wisely created a twitter account (@bereadyherriman) and used it as way to communicate to everyone. Quickly photos, videos and stories were passed on and shared with all. Fox News (@fox13now) collected all of this and became the leading source of information for Herriman Residents. Why was Fox on top! Well for a few reasons:
- So many people turned to the Internet, the Herriman City website was overwhelmed and practically crashed. Cell phones were jammed; so TV and the Internet is where people got their news.
- People eventually turned to twitter for info and also Fox News and Ben Winslow because they were the only ones reporting (Deseret News and Salt Lake Tribune did show up later).
- KSL 5, Channel 2 and 4 all decided this was a non-story. They showed the nightly newscast at 10:00 then moved on to sports and forgot about the story all together. Their reporters (who are now tweeting and reporting) were no where to be found. In fact News Editor for KSL 5, Graydon Johns, even attacked one twitter user by calling him a loser (see here) when KSL was questioned on their worthless reporting of the story. (Note: He apologized later)
My contributions to the evening were limited, but my tweets and re-tweets were connected to my Facebook page. When this happened, tons of my friends in the SLC/Herriman area began responding and giving me even more info, which I was able to pass a long. In no way did I play a major role in this; but it was fascinating to see live news and hundreds of people come together to contribute to this news.
Fox News really became the "beacon of light" many people were looking for last night and I was amazed at how twitter really helped. Fox took advantage of the situation and was able to do amazing things. One example is when the Herriman City's website crashed, twitter users were quick to redistribute the evacuation map and Fox was able to post it online. The amazing use of photos, videos and stories was in real time and mind blowing. When Channel 2 finally asked twitter users for info at 5:45 am, they were too late. Fox had been doing this for nearly 8 hours, they stopped tweeting shortly after that.
What does this all mean. It means news is still evolving and the way it is reported is too. News agencies and cities can learn from this experience by what Fox News did last night. Consumers want news in real time but they also want to be part of the story. Most people on twitter felt a kinship with Ben Winslow and felt like they were helping him and Fox report.
The saddest part for me was when Congressman Jason Chaffetz and Rep. Carl Wimmer showed up. They began tweeting they were going to take charge and make sure everything was under control. I bet they were just in the way and costing us money. Herriman City, the fireman and their teams did a fine job last night and were the real heroes of this fire.
For the rest of us, news in Utah was amazing last night and Fox 13 was at the top. They are my new, news station of choice. And to the rest of the news agencies, all I can say is - #fail.
Comments welcome.
UPDATE: Holly on the Hill (@hollyonthehill) has a nice post on this same issue. She is a better writer than me: http://hollyonthehill.wordpress.com/2010/09/20/twitte-and-emergency-response/
No comments:
Post a Comment