Twitter breaks news of Tornado in Boulder

on May 22, 2008, a large tornado struck Windsor, Colo., just 50 miles from my home in Boulder. I was first alerted to my local severe weather via Twitter - by a friend who lives in California! I then used a combination of Twitter and mainstream news sites to track events. I instantly shared what I was learning as I learned it via Twitter, sending updates to more than 700 of my friends, colleagues, and other interested people - many of whom I don’t even know, but they’ve chosen to get updates from me.

From a citizen media perspective, that’s pretty powerful. Not only can anyone’s news matter - it can matter fast!