During the major flood in Metro Manila due to Typhoon Ondoy (International name Ketsana). The Philippine news organizations were very slow to post photos and videos of the devastation.
I found out about how bad the typhoon was from conversations with my friends through Yahoo Messenger. As I logged on to Facebook, I was getting continuous updates on friend's wall on details of the flood.
I asked him to take some photos because he said that it never floods where he lives. At first I didn't believe him since I know it never floods where he lives. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw his iPhone photos of the flood.
His photos were posted in a blog and it happened to be one of the first few photos showing the devastation.
As the flooding went on, more photos and videos came out from Facebook and Youtube. Still, there were still very little photos from major news organizations.
Friends on Facebook posted updates and information on the situation in their respective areas and some people posted videos using their cellphone camera or digital camera like this one.
It ended up that Facebook became a more reliable and faster source of information than the Philippine news organizations.
Photos and videos like the above also helped show the world how bad the situation was. This prompted a lot of people to quickly donate what they can and Facebook also was a great resource for finding out where to donate as people posted links and information for relief organizations like the Philippine National Red Cross.
This shows the power of the Internet and social networks in connecting people. It also shows how the revolution of the cellphone camera and digital camera made everyone an instant photojournalist.
I found out about how bad the typhoon was from conversations with my friends through Yahoo Messenger. As I logged on to Facebook, I was getting continuous updates on friend's wall on details of the flood.
I asked him to take some photos because he said that it never floods where he lives. At first I didn't believe him since I know it never floods where he lives. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw his iPhone photos of the flood.
His photos were posted in a blog and it happened to be one of the first few photos showing the devastation.As the flooding went on, more photos and videos came out from Facebook and Youtube. Still, there were still very little photos from major news organizations.
Friends on Facebook posted updates and information on the situation in their respective areas and some people posted videos using their cellphone camera or digital camera like this one.
It ended up that Facebook became a more reliable and faster source of information than the Philippine news organizations.
Photos and videos like the above also helped show the world how bad the situation was. This prompted a lot of people to quickly donate what they can and Facebook also was a great resource for finding out where to donate as people posted links and information for relief organizations like the Philippine National Red Cross.
This shows the power of the Internet and social networks in connecting people. It also shows how the revolution of the cellphone camera and digital camera made everyone an instant photojournalist.
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