Just a short post this week.
It’s almost second nature at this point, when we hear of a news story breaking, to run the nearest media outlet to get the latest updates.
Indeed when Michael Jackson died in June the torrent of users who rushed online caused several big name websites, including Google, CNN and Twitter to crash… although to be fair it isn’t hard to crash Twitter
But what happens when a news story breaks in Ireland? Where do you go to get the latest? These were the questions I was asking myself last Friday (August 21st) after the Malahide Rail Bridge collapsed.
So, with 25% of the Iarnrod Eireann fleet stranded north of Malahide, I thought I’d collect a few links and examine the new media/social web response to the #railfail
Audio/Video
RTÉ and TV3 had a good selection of audio/video reports concerning the viaduct collapse taken from their various news broadcasts each day (a few of which appeared on YouTube); these were in in addition to RTÉ’s dreadfully under-publicised rolling online news station, News Now which proved to be a great source of information in the hours after the collapse.
However one of the most interesting, not to mention dangerous, videos of the collapse was amateur footage which appeared on YouTube
Images
Flickr user catb has created an interesting photo essay of the damage and repairs to the viaduct. Within the Flickr community catb has been encouraged and is regularly documenting the viaduct repairs long after the mainstream media have moved away from the story.
Text
Much of the blogosphere responses to the collapse came from established media outlets (Dublin’s 98, Labour Party, Sunday Tribune) with Twitter responding with a relatively large number of tweets hours after the collapse and a small but steady number in the following days.
I find it interesting that over a week after the collapse the social web has continued to document and record the story. Twitter users offer each other advice while also, allegedly, breaking new aspects to the story while YouTube and Flickr users document the rebuilding of the viaduct long after the mainstream media focus has changed.
