5 ms·

I don't want to be disrespectful to anybody affected by the earthquake but your comment made me remember this: http://xkcd.com/723/ http://xkcd.com/723/

by mitko 16y ago

ugh 16y ago
I actually first heard about this earthquake on Twitter (all eyewitness reports, no second hand information). I immediately checked all news sites I could think of (European, US) but none were yet reporting on it.
- flyt 16y ago
  Facebook for me; I know two people living near Tokyo that instantly updated their statuses and it just snowballed from there. It took the US news (nytimes.com) at least 20 minutes to have anything up, but twitter and facebook exploded instantly.
  - ugh 16y ago
    I just want to make clear that my comment was in no way intended to criticize mass media. It’s just an interesting new development – if you are not directly affected mass media is no longer the fastest way to get breaking news. I want mass media to diligently collect all the information they can get and I know that that takes longer than just sending a tweet. Whether the New York Times writes about the event five minutes or an hour after it happens doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things.
    - edanm 16y ago
      Just as another data point, I almost never read "mass media", since most things there don't really interest me. (Excluding Technology-related news, which I get from TechCrunch etc.). This used to be a huge problem for me, sine I would be constantly out-of-touch. But nowadays, I find that Twitter/Facebook tend to keep me up to date on anything that's really big.
- wtn 16y ago
  Time Magazine online posted links to Al Jazeera English streams. They had live reporting very soon after the earthquake.
- angus77 16y ago
  It was on Japanese TV news almost immediately. We were watching it in the office while we were still shaking.
  - TorKlingberg 16y ago
    I bet the NHK has a special team always waiting to report on earthquakes and tsunami warnings. They report on many of the smaller quakes very quickly too.
    - angus77 16y ago
      Yeah, whenever there's a quake sizeable enough to feel it, just turn on the TV---they're on it before you even have time to tune it.

I don't want to be disrespectful to anybody affected by the earthquake but your comment made me remember this: http://xkcd.com/723/ http://xkcd.com/723/

by mitko 16y ago

I don't want to be disrespectful to anybody affected by the earthquake but your comment made me remember this: http://xkcd.com/723/ http://xkcd.com/723/

ugh 16y ago

I actually first heard about this earthquake on Twitter (all eyewitness reports, no second hand information). I immediately checked all news sites I could think of (European, US) but none were yet reporting on it.

flyt 16y ago
Facebook for me; I know two people living near Tokyo that instantly updated their statuses and it just snowballed from there. It took the US news (nytimes.com) at least 20 minutes to have anything up, but twitter and facebook exploded instantly.
- ugh 16y ago
  I just want to make clear that my comment was in no way intended to criticize mass media. It’s just an interesting new development – if you are not directly affected mass media is no longer the fastest way to get breaking news. I want mass media to diligently collect all the information they can get and I know that that takes longer than just sending a tweet. Whether the New York Times writes about the event five minutes or an hour after it happens doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things.
  - edanm 16y ago
    Just as another data point, I almost never read "mass media", since most things there don't really interest me. (Excluding Technology-related news, which I get from TechCrunch etc.). This used to be a huge problem for me, sine I would be constantly out-of-touch. But nowadays, I find that Twitter/Facebook tend to keep me up to date on anything that's really big.
wtn 16y ago
Time Magazine online posted links to Al Jazeera English streams. They had live reporting very soon after the earthquake.
angus77 16y ago
It was on Japanese TV news almost immediately. We were watching it in the office while we were still shaking.
- TorKlingberg 16y ago
  I bet the NHK has a special team always waiting to report on earthquakes and tsunami warnings. They report on many of the smaller quakes very quickly too.
  - angus77 16y ago
    Yeah, whenever there's a quake sizeable enough to feel it, just turn on the TV---they're on it before you even have time to tune it.