Alexander Wolfe of Information Week notes that the largest and most timely source of information coming out of Mumbai was from amateurs using social media like Twitter:
I’d add that Mumbai is likely to be viewed in hindsight as the first instance of the paradigmatic shift in crisis coverage: namely, journalists will henceforth no longer be the first to bring us information. Rather, they will be a conduit for the stream of images and video shot by a mix of amateurs and professionals on scene.
36 hours ago, a look at Twitter postings about Mumbai revealed some of the best on-the-ground information about what was going on. The news channels offered nothing but the usual endless chit-chat about President Bush and other irrelevant topics.
The Wired blog also has an interesting entry on the role of social media in the crises.
