9 ms·
Guy unknowingly live tweets the Osama raid in Abbottabad
- matthewcieplak 16y agoWow, they couldn't have found a more gracious accidental celebrity.
- JacobAldridge 16y agoThe revolution will not be televised. Live, inadvertant, real-time Tweeting on the other hand... For all the discussion of business cases for technology like Twitter, let's spare a moment to reflect on how impressive it is in and of itself for this sort of event.
- orblivion 16y agoThis includes an early leak of the story too: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384735,00.asp http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384735,00.asp
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- teamonkey 16y agoMeanwhile, the event happened too late to feature on today's print media in the UK. http://www.frontpagestoday.co.uk/2011/05/02/archive.cfm http://www.frontpagestoday.co.uk/2011/05/02/archive.cfm
- joeguilmette 16y agoA lot of outlets are calling this Twitter's CNN moment. It'll be interesting to see if Twitter has the legs to maintain this crowd sourced news momentum that it has been building.
- zaidf 16y agoI was telling my brother earlier today how I have a nagging feeling twitter will end up as the myspace of short-message sharing. From the outside, it seems like a confused org with too many changes at the top much too often. Add to that the main founder cashing out 100M and it sounds a lot different than a founder cashing out to buy a decent house etc. Instead it sounds like a founder who isn't sure twitter's value will increase a whole lot more. To contrast all this, we have Zuck at facebook providing smooth stable leadership that can clearly be seen in how fb as a product has scaled and evolved. Twitter meanwhile may be scaling and sue that can require significant effort - but as a product in year five, it's a relative fail for the hype and valuation.
- coliveira 16y agoTwitter is the kind of company I wouldn't bet against... You have a lot of power when you get free advertisement 24x7.
- benologist 16y agoMySpace in their prime were ridiculously popular too.
- enjo 16y agoI feel like MySpace never quite penetrated the mainstream the way twitter has. It was always something people were largely aware of, but outside of the segments it did really well in, people rarely engaged with it. Twitter seems to be a bit different in that regard.
- benologist 16y agoBack then the internet hadn't penetrated the mainstream like it has now where we're always connected. Relative to that I think they're not incomparable.
- zaidf 16y agopeople rarely engaged with it IMO user engagement is one of twitter's biggest issues. As it stands right now, twitter is a great tool for journalist research and other niche research. That's been true for a few years now. The problem is twitter has done little to break beyond it OR to completely own that space. It's similar to if facebook never really broke out of its college roots or had high account abandonment rates for non-college crowd. Both of those were proven wrong for fb; fb long ago made critical product decisions to break beyond college(such as complete removing course listings) and working country by country to ensure penetration and engagement.
- shimonamit 16y agoLive coverage is only valuable if it is live. For most, this only came in the clear in the aftermath. Twitter is more akin to a real time, universal log + interactions, but it doesn't come with a central studio that sifts through the materials and gives you the good stuff. If you don't know where to look, for most it will always be a hindsight experience.
- palish 16y agoActually, the Twitter stream was the first news I'd read about OBL. I woke up a short while ago, checked HN, thought "Huh, 'Osama'... I wonder if they're referring to Bin Laden?" and read the Twitter stream. (I had the good fortune of not seeing "Osama Bin Laden Is Dead" at #6.) For me personally, that was far more satisfying than hearing about it via "traditional" sources. (Including Reddit.)
- bbgm 16y agoLikewise. I was working when my Twitter lit up. And it's not the first time this has happened.
- brk 16y agoI tend to disagree with this. The benefit to CNN is that almost every household had/has access to CNN. It's some channel on basic cable, even if you didn't regularly watch it, it was easy to find and was pushing the same news out to everyone. Twitter on the other hand is not as simple to just start using. You need to sign up, and then find the right people to follow (granted, Twitter does try to make this easier), but for any given event it's hard to find in real time a tweetstream that is going to be better than just watching CNN or other major news outlet. On top of that, Twitter is filled with parody accounts, people making stuff up, and lots of other noise.
- lreeves 16y agoThat's a pretty narrow view of global access to things. Yes, probably most households in the US have access to CNN - but I'd bet a much larger slice of the planet has Internet access and therefore can reach Twitter.
- brk 16y agos/CNN/BBC/ or whatever. I bet more people still have access to broadcast news than they do to Twitter.
- noahlt 16y agoHalf of the world has SMS access and can therefore use Twitter.
- brk 16y agoAnd how would they functionally leverage an SMS-only Twitter feed to get breaking info to something like this? Yes, conceptually a lot of people have access to Twitter. However, from a practicality standpoint my personal opinion is that it's not very effective tool for a scenario like this.
- nradov 16y agoCNN is not included with Comcast Limited Basic cable. That's the cheapest TV option, which you get automatically if you sign up for cable Internet service and nothing else.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- nametoremember 16y agoDoes anyone else think this is not important? The guy unknowingly tweeted but without an official release we wouldn't have known it was Bin Laden so it wouldn't have become that important.
- acqq 16y agoIf the helicopter did crash, it's more than important -- that would mean that the operation was not as smooth as the official version.
- nametoremember 16y agohttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13256676 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13256676 One helicopter was lost due to "technical failure". The team destroyed it and left in its other aircraft.
- acqq 16y agoWas that in the news before the tweets were found? And even if they really destroyed it themselves at the end, that also speaks a lot about the circumstances there. Pakistan government is supposed to support U.S. but the helicopter has to be destroyed, obviously to keep it from failing in the hands of Al Quaeda. It's more than interesting.
- nikcub 16y agoare you suggesting that the US military thought 'some guy on twitter mentioned the helicopter we lost, so we should address that in our press statement' ? the carcass of the helicopter is sitting out in a field all blown up. it is on pakistani tv. i doubt they would have even thought about trying to cover that up
- JoachimSchipper 16y agoNot letting military hardware get into other nations' hands is standard practice. Really, "not trusting the Pakistanis that much" is a sufficient explanation.
- Aqwis 16y agoAre we sure that this is genuinely the Osama raid? I've read reports that Osama was in fact killed days ago. If he was in fact killed yesterday, have they really already buried his body at sea?
- Deestan 16y ago> I've read reports that Osama was in fact killed days ago. Interesting. Can you provide links?
- Aqwis 16y agoNo, and I admit that it might very well be wrong. I read this on Slashdot and reddit (I can find some specific comments if you'd like), which obviously are not very reliable sources. But the articles I've read haven't mentioned when he died at all (unless I've somehow missed it), which obviously generates rumours. Edit: According to harshpotatoes I am wrong, so please disregard this.
- fredleblanc 16y agoFor what it's worth, last night -- before and after the presidential address -- on the bottom of a bunch of TV channels (ESPN for one) the reports were that the operation was carried out last week, not yesterday afternoon. You may have been wrong, but you certainly aren't crazy. :)
- harshpotatoes 16y agohttp://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/05/02/press-briefing-senior-administration-officials-killing-osama-bin-laden http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/05/02/press-... The White House transcript "Press Briefing by Senior Administration Officials on the Killing of Osama bin Laden" mentions that the raid happened 'earlier this afternoon' SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Thank you. Earlier this afternoon, a small U.S. team conducted a helicopter raid on the compound.
- Maro 16y agoSo, was the heli shot down in the OBL assassination operation? Does that mean that this was not a secret/covert operation?
- Emore 16y agoOne US helicopter went down. Probably the one tweeted about. http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/2011/05/2011526196121642.html http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/2011/05/201152619612164...
- jonknee 16y agoWhat does losing a helicopter have to do with it being a covert operation? Special forces use helicopters all the time. The official story is they brought two helis, had a mechanical failure with one, destroyed it and then left in the remaining unit.
- Maro 16y agoI guess I mistakenly thought covert means secret, without helicopters hovering over the city and people tweeting about it.
- jonknee 16y agoIt was covert enough that no one knew who the target was until well after the event. The neighbors knew something happened, but had absolutely no idea what.
- ck2 16y agocredit for the leak went to Keith Urbahn, the chief of staff for Donald Rumsfeld How is this not "state secrets" ? If they do not prosecute him for the leak, it's a double-standard.
- nikcub 16y agohe found out from a news producer because the press corps were being readied (they were literally sent an email with 'get ready') http://twitter.com/keithurbahn/status/64989522378764288 http://twitter.com/keithurbahn/status/64989522378764288 it wasn't a 'state secret' at that point besides, i thought most people here supported government leaks of this kind not being treason/state secrets/whatever
- eli 16y agoThe press corps went to great pains to stress how unusual it was that a speech was announced with one hour warning and they had no idea what it was about. Chuck Todd said he got an email from the WH that literally said, "Get back here now. I can't tell you what's going on, but it's a BFD"
- JoachimSchipper 16y agoNote: the above comment should probably be a reply to http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2505673 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2505673 by orblivion, which links to > The news that Osama bin Laden had been killed (...) was broken via Twitter (...). > (...) credit for the leak went to Keith Urbahn, the chief of staff for Donald Rumsfeld (...)
- shadowsun7 16y agoThe NYT on how the bin Laden announcement was leaked to the press: http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/05/01/how-the-osama-announcement-leaked-out/ http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/05/01/how-the-osa... Mr. Urbahn quickly added, “Don’t know if it’s true, but let’s pray it is.” He was credited by many on the Web with breaking the news, though he did not have first-hand confirmation. Within minutes, anonymous sources at the Pentagon and the White House started to tell reporters the same information. ABC, CBS and NBC interrupted programming across the country at almost the same minute, 10:45 p.m., with the news. “We’re hearing absolute jubilation throughout government,” the ABC News correspondent Martha Raddatz reported. Seems like the leak was planned, or at least, unpreventable.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- shareme 16y agoahem folks raid happened at least 7 days ago..its fake
- noarchy 16y agoI would've guessed the same thing, but it looks like he hasn't been dead for long. I'm almost alarmed that we got the announcement without DNA testing having been completed (as appears to be the case), and no photos or videos have been forthcoming as of yet. This can only fuel conspiracy-minded chatter, even if temporarily.
- kaerast 16y agoAssuming this is even true, it was faked before the news came out and was thus an inside job. What possible reason would they have for doing this? How do these tweets improve the position of the US?
- sharjeel 16y agoHe's a friend of mine and he's also into CS. Sometime back he tried startup stuff but now he is into consultanct. I've been doing a startup for years and I never made it to front page of HackerNews, TechCrunch, NY Observer and many other hot places at the same time. I've advised him to launch a product ASAP. Its gonna be hot and I'm definitely gonna invest :P
- nitro9590 16y agothe irony is that he has been buried without any autopsy/DNA test in sea.and moreover, there is no sea around Abbottabad and in Afghanistan either maybe they took him to Karachi or somewhere and As a pakistani and Muslim i want to clear that we have no tradition to bury a body in sea.
- Tomek_ 16y agoNYTimes: "Muslim tradition requires burial within 24 hours, but by doing it at sea, American authorities presumably were trying to avoid creating a shrine for his followers." [http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/02/world/asia/osama-bin-laden-is-killed.html http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/02/world/asia/osama-bin-laden...] "It was 3:50 on Sunday afternoon when President Obama received the news that Bin Laden had tentatively been identified, most likely after a series of DNA tests." [http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/02/world/asia/02reconstruct-capture-osama-bin-laden.html http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/02/world/asia/02reconstruct-c...]
- nitro9590 16y agook... thanks
- tkahn6 16y ago> but by doing it at sea, American authorities presumably were trying to avoid creating a shrine for his followers." This is exactly what the Israelis did with Eichmann. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Eichmann#Execution http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Eichmann#Execution
- cosmicray 16y agoOne thing that isn't particularly clear, is the timestamps on tweet library. Based on the top entry, I presume those are UTC. So if the action kicked off at 1 AM PST (UTC+5 according to wiki), then it would have been 4 PM EDT (UTC-4) in Washington. 3:50 PM doesn't jive with this (unless Pakistan is on DST). Another article said that the burial at sea was completed by 2 AM EDT (so they presumably were done by 3 PM in Pakistan, about 14 hours after the first tweet).
- keeptrying 16y agoI wonder when photographic proof will be available?
- jessedhillon 16y agoHere is his compound on Google Maps: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=osama+bin+laden+&hl=en&view=map&mcsrc=google_reviews&num=10&ie=UTF8&start=20&cid=11196890339658103699&t=h&ll=34.184471,73.246193&spn=0.010331,0.01929&z=16&iwloc=A http://maps.google.com/maps?q=osama+bin+laden+&hl=en&... BONUS: Click "Search Nearby" and enter "PMA Kakul" -- you will see that the Pakistan Military Academy was just a short trip up the road from his house! PMA on Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan_Military_Academy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan_Military_Academy
- JosephK 16y agoThose are some fairly amusing location reviews by Google users.
- jeffclark 16y agoPlease do yourself a favor and click on the "reviews" link.
- jonah 16y agoThis is incorrect info, the actual compound is here: http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/05/video-inside-bin-ladens-drone-proof-compound/all/1 http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/05/video-inside-bin-lad... http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&t=h&msid=210339682031096163658.0004a24df7b712757fdd1&ll=34.169308,73.242832&spn=0.002068,0.002484&z=19&iwloc=0004a24df7b882270ef3c http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&#...
- jessedhillon 16y agoThanks for the update.
- ghiculescu 16y agohttp://twitter.com/ReallyVirtual/status/65015803543695360 http://twitter.com/ReallyVirtual/status/65015803543695360 Poor guy. I feel sorry for him, the sudden fame must be an unpleasant shock.
- brm 16y agoI'm probably going to be downvoted for this but... Increasing the speed at which our news is delivered is not even necessarily a good thing. Please wake me when someone invents something that makes it more accurate and unbiased.
- natnat 16y agoI think decentralizing the story so that it comes from a bunch of noninstitutional observers is a pretty good way to get rid of bias. I think it also helps make news more accurate, in the sense that, in the very short term, the accuracy of a story is inversely proportional to the time since it occurred, because people need time to piece information together, and Twitter and such make distributing all of the relevant facts happen that much faster.
- fluidcruft 16y ago> people need time to piece information together Isn't that what reporters do? > Twitter and such make distributing all of the relevant facts happen that much faster Twitter certainly makes distributing all of the relevant facts happen that much faster. It also makes distributing misinformation faster.
- lizzard 16y agoPiecing information is what people do, whether they're reporters or not. Many reporters do great work, but we all need to develop the skills of detecting misinformation, rather than depending on a professional class to do it for us.
- coderdude 16y agoSo the article about Osama Bin Laden being killed -- which has nearly 800 up-votes -- is being flagged off the front page, but the article about a guy who tweets about him being killed is having no problem staying #1. Then again, so many people had their comments down-voted into light gray in the original Osama article that I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of flaggings came from people that wanted to stem their own decline in karma. That would make for an interesting dataset.
- JoachimSchipper 16y agoMaybe, but deleting seems easier. Also note that the NYT story is older, which reduces its ranking. But yes, I agree - this is not the main story.
- coderdude 16y agoThe article about Sony and PSN data stayed #1 for over a day if I recall correctly. I don't think that an article with 770 up-votes (that's an incredible number, for any article) would be #15 after 11 hours unless it had been repeatedly flagged. It's probably for the best though. Many of the comments for that article are inflammatory and that could also be the reason why it was flagged.
- anthonycerra 16y agoI think you're comparing apples to oranges. An article from the mainstream media about bin Laden's killing is nothing out of the ordinary. This link, however, is likely the first time in history that something so covert and meticulously planned has been exposed in real-time by someone experiencing it himself. We get the opportunity to see it from his perspective without the media's filters - just raw data. This is incredibly fascinating to me.
- fluidcruft 16y agoYeah, seems like we kill him every other day.
- 16y ago
- harryf 16y agoWag the Dog anyone?
- zeteo 16y agoThe Google Maps location that is ventured around (starting with Telegraph: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/pakistan/8487772/Osama-bin-Laden-dead-killed-yards-from-Pakistans-Sandhurst.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/pakistan/8487... ) is not the actual location of the compound. There are aerial photos of the compound in the briefing obtained by ABC news: http://abcnews.go.com/images/Politics/Graphics%20for%20background%20briefing.pdf http://abcnews.go.com/images/Politics/Graphics%20for%20backg... Based on these photos and looking around the area, I've found the actual location of the compound, which exactly matches the photos from the briefing: http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&ll=34.169479,73.244208&spn=0.006045,0.009645&t=h&z=17&iwloc=0004a24df7b882270ef3c&msid=210339682031096163658.0004a24df7b712757fdd1 http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&#... It's still in the area, but a bit further from the Pakistan Military Academy and in the SW direction from it (not NW, as the Telegraph map claims).
- joeguilmette 16y agoits interesting that this is in such an urban area. if it happened in some remote cave it is unlikely that we'd know much about his living conditions - beyond what the government chose to let us know. since it is in a city environment such as this neighbors, post-mortems on the building and things like that will likely give us a much better idea about what was going on there. makes you wish the troops had GoPros, doesn't it?
- count 16y agoThey've got way better than GoPros. You just wont see the video until election time, when it's 'leaked'.
- ajays 16y agoI'm not sure your location is the correct one. In the ground photos, you can see high-tension wires running near the compound; your don't appear to have any. And the compound is in the middle of a residential area (there's video from @ReallyVirtual on YouTube), with houses on all directions; yours is pretty isolated.
- templaedhel 16y agoI was under the understanding from the briefings that he was killed via action on the ground by US soldiers, with intelligence from drones. This does not corroralate with that account, it makes it seem like there was an airstrike from a drone. How do these fit together in the timeline of the raid?
- YooLi 16y agoThe tweets clearly say he heard helicopters. That's how the US soldiers get on the ground and leave. Nothing in the tweets sounds like a drone attack.
- napierzaza 16y agoThis is of course how non-tech things can leak in HN. The tertiary technical angle. Are we amazed that people in Pakistan have Twitter?
- MaysonL 16y agoInteresting eye-witness account on Al-Jazeera: http://english.aljazeera.net/video/asia/2011/05/201152161017456791.html http://english.aljazeera.net/video/asia/2011/05/201152161017...
- vl 16y agoI fail to see how this is newsworthy. Why bunch of mainstream media broadcasted this story, why is it on HN? There is just no news in this story, guy saw a helicopter and tweeted, that's it.