There are times when Social Media tools and services don’t feel only like a way to keep in touch with my friends, get invited to events, advertisement for products and all the mainstream blah blah delivered directly to my feed or wall. One of these times I am talking about was in Genova and Liguria over the last week.
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The flooding, mudslides and devastation were all broadcast on television in Italy and throughout the World (I even got calls from friends abroad asking how they can donate to help Le Cinque Terre) while in Genova they were without power and without telephone land lines. So what did they do in Genova? They tweeted!
This was one of the most repeated phrases this week in Genova:
Aprite le wifi, salite nei piani alti nelle zone pericolose, usate solo il tag #allertameteoLG solo per servizio
Open up your wifi, go to the top floors and use the hashtag #allertamenteoLG only for service
Genova is already a digital city and has a project called FreeWiFiGenova where the city offers free hotspots in Genova and also along the coast but it is a sign of the times that one of the most useful things that anyone could do was to let people connect to the internet in an emergency.
And another sign of change and consideration for others is that another repeated shout out was the call for people to repeat the tweets in any languages they knew so that foreigners could also follow the emergency announcements.
Facebook could do no less. The most organized and largest group is Angeli col fango sulle magliette. They are a group of young Genovese who opened their page on November 4th and today have over 20,000 followers. They opened with the mission to take back their city through an organized manner providing the correct information to volunteer and provide help where needed. They then did what their group says… they went and got their shirts dirty. This page has by far the most updated, credible and complete information of any I have seen about Genova. Good job guys!
Social Media has a very important place in Emergency situations. Italy and its governing bodies are definitely behind but we will soon see cities, regions and countries organizing their efforts to use Social Media to inform and protect the general public. Not just Grassroot groups like the Angels with mud on their shirts rising up and taking charge.
Just for your information here are some other situations where most of the information and organization was lead solely by social media use: Queensland Flooding, Japan Earthquake & Tsunami, instability in Egypt, Libya and other parts of the Middle East, New Zealand’s Earthquake, Joplin Tornadoes and Hurricane Irene.
