By Megan Tripp, Staff Writer, Emerson College
I treated Monday afternoon like I would any weekend; drinking coffee, half heartedly doing homework, and watching Buffy The Vampire Slayer. But when my cousin texted me from California to ask if I was safe and sound, I knew that this was no ordinary afternoon.
Naturally, my first instinct was not to turn off Buffy and turn on the news, but to go online. A few quick Google searches and a scan of my Facebook news feed informed me of the bombings that occurred at the finish line of the Boston Marathon.
For the rest of the day I had my phone in my hand, and Facebook, my email, and Google open on my computer. I kept searching “Boston Marathon Explosions” over and over again, and checking and posting on Facebook to make sure that my friends and family in the area were safe and knew I was okay after phone lines went down.
So what does it say about our generation that our laptops and smartphones are our life rafts in these kinds of situations? When our parents faced tragedies like the assassinations of Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy, or the bombing of Pearl Harbor, they certainly didn’t turn to Google for information.
Some will be critical and say that it shows just how addicted to the Internet we, as a young culture, are. Some will say that we are subject to less reliable information because the internet, as opposed to other media outlets, lends itself to that kind of thing.
But I don’t think either is true. While I do think the Internet has become a little too ingrained in our culture, I think in times of disaster it is an invaluable tool. It’s true that we are an impatient culture, especially the youth - we want information as quickly as possible and the Internet usually provides it for us. But this does not mean that it is less reliable than other sources of news. Rumors and misinformation were spreading everywhere, not just the Internet, on Monday and Tuesday. The news of body count, the placement of the bombs, the amount of possible devices hidden around, and the closing of the T was all different depending on where you looked for information. And that is not a mistake encountered solely online. When I did turn on the news and flipped through different local and national channels, information was all over the place. And in fact, from my experience, the information I received on the Boston Globe website and tweets was more up to date and consistent than the TV news channels I had on. The TV news channels kept repeating the same information over and over again while the Boston Globe website seemed to be updated every ten minutes or so.
I think the Internet, and social media in particular, gets a bad reputation for being unreliable because of the few instances where bad information was spread all over. For example, yesterday a picture was circulating around tumblr of a little girl running with a number on her chest and a caption that read “rest in peace to the little angel that lost her life at the Boston Marathon yesterday, running for the Sandy Hook kids.” I reblogged it without knowing any better and found out later that the child who was killed by Monday’s tragedy was actually a little boy. I don’t know who the adorable little girl in the picture is, but as far as I know she is happy and healthy and had nothing to do with the marathon incident. It’s this kind of misinformation that turns some people off to viewing the Internet as a reliable source for news.
Misinformation comes through news outlets like TV and the radio just as often as it does on the Internet, it just has more contributors and a wider audience. Therefore, there are more people up in arms when they find out they were misinformed, and more people (regular people, Internet users on social media sites) to blame for it.
Older generations look down on the younger generations’ use of social media and the Internet for information, primarily because it is not seen as reliable. If anyone can put something up and make a claim, then clearly lies can be spread masqueraded as fact. While this may be true in some instances, like in the tumblr post I mentioned above, generally the Internet provides fast and reliable information to those who need it. Our generation may be addicted to social media, but that is another argument.
Overall, the Internet provides us with more information faster and that’s what our generation, and society as a whole, wants. We want to be informed, we want answers, and we want them now. TV and radio simply can’t keep up with our demand for information anymore. What that says about the future of news media outlets, I don’t know. I do know that Google kept me informed, and Facebook kept my family informed that I was alive and safe. And that’s what ultimately mattered to me on Monday.
Megan Tripp is a junior WLP major who drinks way too much coffee and watches and re-watches Gilmore Girls way too often. She likes shiny things and looks forward to making a career out of making things up and writing them down.
I treated Monday afternoon like I would any weekend; drinking coffee, half heartedly doing homework, and watching Buffy The Vampire Slayer. But when my cousin texted me from California to ask if I was safe and sound, I knew that this was no ordinary afternoon.
Naturally, my first instinct was not to turn off Buffy and turn on the news, but to go online. A few quick Google searches and a scan of my Facebook news feed informed me of the bombings that occurred at the finish line of the Boston Marathon.
For the rest of the day I had my phone in my hand, and Facebook, my email, and Google open on my computer. I kept searching “Boston Marathon Explosions” over and over again, and checking and posting on Facebook to make sure that my friends and family in the area were safe and knew I was okay after phone lines went down.
So what does it say about our generation that our laptops and smartphones are our life rafts in these kinds of situations? When our parents faced tragedies like the assassinations of Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy, or the bombing of Pearl Harbor, they certainly didn’t turn to Google for information.
Some will be critical and say that it shows just how addicted to the Internet we, as a young culture, are. Some will say that we are subject to less reliable information because the internet, as opposed to other media outlets, lends itself to that kind of thing.
But I don’t think either is true. While I do think the Internet has become a little too ingrained in our culture, I think in times of disaster it is an invaluable tool. It’s true that we are an impatient culture, especially the youth - we want information as quickly as possible and the Internet usually provides it for us. But this does not mean that it is less reliable than other sources of news. Rumors and misinformation were spreading everywhere, not just the Internet, on Monday and Tuesday. The news of body count, the placement of the bombs, the amount of possible devices hidden around, and the closing of the T was all different depending on where you looked for information. And that is not a mistake encountered solely online. When I did turn on the news and flipped through different local and national channels, information was all over the place. And in fact, from my experience, the information I received on the Boston Globe website and tweets was more up to date and consistent than the TV news channels I had on. The TV news channels kept repeating the same information over and over again while the Boston Globe website seemed to be updated every ten minutes or so.
I think the Internet, and social media in particular, gets a bad reputation for being unreliable because of the few instances where bad information was spread all over. For example, yesterday a picture was circulating around tumblr of a little girl running with a number on her chest and a caption that read “rest in peace to the little angel that lost her life at the Boston Marathon yesterday, running for the Sandy Hook kids.” I reblogged it without knowing any better and found out later that the child who was killed by Monday’s tragedy was actually a little boy. I don’t know who the adorable little girl in the picture is, but as far as I know she is happy and healthy and had nothing to do with the marathon incident. It’s this kind of misinformation that turns some people off to viewing the Internet as a reliable source for news.
Misinformation comes through news outlets like TV and the radio just as often as it does on the Internet, it just has more contributors and a wider audience. Therefore, there are more people up in arms when they find out they were misinformed, and more people (regular people, Internet users on social media sites) to blame for it.
Older generations look down on the younger generations’ use of social media and the Internet for information, primarily because it is not seen as reliable. If anyone can put something up and make a claim, then clearly lies can be spread masqueraded as fact. While this may be true in some instances, like in the tumblr post I mentioned above, generally the Internet provides fast and reliable information to those who need it. Our generation may be addicted to social media, but that is another argument.
Overall, the Internet provides us with more information faster and that’s what our generation, and society as a whole, wants. We want to be informed, we want answers, and we want them now. TV and radio simply can’t keep up with our demand for information anymore. What that says about the future of news media outlets, I don’t know. I do know that Google kept me informed, and Facebook kept my family informed that I was alive and safe. And that’s what ultimately mattered to me on Monday.
Megan Tripp is a junior WLP major who drinks way too much coffee and watches and re-watches Gilmore Girls way too often. She likes shiny things and looks forward to making a career out of making things up and writing them down.