Throughout this blog, the significant pros and cons of the current social media revolution have been heavily discussed. As talked about last post, social media has unfortunately created a landscape that encourages bullying as people are able to harass and objectify others from the comfort of their own bedroom. The social media world as we know it is undoubtedly one that is constantly in the spotlight due to its controversial nature.
Crowdsourcing however is a topic that is on the front page for all the right reasons. The term ‘crowdsourcing’- defined loosely- refers to obtaining information, ideas, or services from large groups of people who are part of the online space, especially social media users.
This includes people sharing information online regarding emergency situations such as natural disasters. In a time before social media, the only way to get an urgent message of warning out to communities of people was for emergency services to be made aware by someone that there was an emergency situation. The emergency services would then have to discover the legitimacy of the reported situation and the scale of it. They would then have to report the information to news outlets who would then send the message out through a range of mediums such as a television broadcast and through local radio stations.
The social media revolution has completely flipped the emergency response procedure on its head. Not only can emergency services report important news through social media themselves, but the everyday person can play a significant role in helping save lives through access to social media. In a world where interconnectedness and speed of communication has never been quicker, people can post videos or photos to social media of an unfolding emergency situation instantly. The online digital communities, who may not even be affected by the situation, can play a huge role in getting the message across to those who may be in trouble, as everyone has the ability to ‘share’ or- in the case of Twitter- ‘retweet’ information that needs to be spread or go ‘viral’.
The 2011 Queensland floods was at the centre of social media virality and crowdsourcing. As the floods swallowed their way through Brisbane, Ipswich and other parts of Queensland from the 10th-16th of January 2011, digital communities across the state and other parts of the country came to the rescue. Social media platform Twitter was the main player. Thanks to its viral hashtagging feature, the use of the hashtag “#qldfloods” becoming the central coordination for communication. In a report by the ‘ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation’ (ARC, 2012), it was found that a total of 35,000 tweets using the #qldfloods hashtag were sent out. The most staggering stat was that 50-60% of these tweets using the hashtag were ‘retweets’, meaning more than half of the information being shared across Twitter of the floods were by everyday users sharing important updates from emergency services and users posting significantly important videos or photos.
More than half of the tweets were people just doing their bit to help.
However, the effectiveness of crowdsourcing isn’t always as successful when it comes to third world countries. This was evident during the Nepal earthquakes in 2015, where almost 9,000 people were killed and 22,000 left injured. In this case, there was little procedural information offered by the government as to how social media could be used by the people of Nepal to help save lives. A corresponding factor is that very little civilians use Twitter in Nepal, which meant that important information could not be virally shared to other people as effectively as in Australia during the Queensland floods. It was a heavy price to pay for the people of Nepal.
However, as a result of the earthquakes, crowdsourcing came to life in Nepal. Due to the millions that were left homeless, ‘Quakemap.org’ was brought to life by a group of tech-savvy men and women. The website enabled people to post their location, and send important messages regarding shelter situations and also information regarding medical treatment. The map offered a visual platform for the government and even the Nepalese military to offer more efficient and effective help to the millions in need of them.
For Nepal, this same software should be used in the event that earthquakes strike again in the future. Rather than just dealing with the aftermath of the natural disaster, the technology could be crowdsourced during emergency services where people can post where an earthquake has hit and where people should try and flee to. This could save thousands of lives for not only Nepal but other countries, who should also adopt such crowdsourcing technology in an age where social media is the most effective platform for instant communication to millions of people.
