I just finished catching up on the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster, and, amidst my horror and sympathy, wanted to jot down how I did it. It seems like a useful microcosm of news media in late 2004.
A friend we're staying with alerted us to the event out loud, as she checks CNN.com first thing in the morning. I peered over her shoulder, and grew frustrated with the coverage right away - it was too distant, no local voices, and had that stupid restriction on their video.
So I put down the dishes I was doing, picked up my laptop, and went to Google News, which was by far the richer experience. That's where I got to stories in regional media.
At the same time, in the next browser tab, I fired up the blogosphere via Blogdex which lists the most linked stories in blogland. This led me right to a blog entry with links to many blog accounts which offered the personal voices I wanted. This also led me to an astonishing photo archive of the event, already Webbed up.
I also checked with some friends in online fora, including several who are in the Indian Ocean region. Thankfully none are hurt,although Thomas lost some stuff and has his work cut out for him. Individuals are posting and forwarding items to me as well.
At no time have I checked radio, tv, or print news, and miss them not a whit.
PS: that media sf Flash animation which everyone's been pointing me towards seems even further off, in this light.
Added a few minutes later: the Wikipedia entry is very good, too, and growing.
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