I’d like to extend my warmest wishes to the families that were affected by this tragedy. I’m okay, I live approximately 280 miles from Blacksburg, VA; but this massacre affects all of us.
Media Coverage:
- Campus rampage is deadliest in U.S. history
- HE LINED STUDENTS AGAINST A WALL, THEN EXECUTIONS BEGAN…
- Witness: Gunman ‘didn’t say a single word’
- VIRGINIA TECH SHOOTING: Deadliest Campus Shootings in United States History
- Va Tech Massacre: Cops Still Trying to Tie Shootings Together
- AP: Questions Raised on Va. Tech Security
Social News:
- Wikipedia: Virginia Tech Massacre
- Digg: Massacre at Virginia Tech: 25 Confirmed Dead
- Netscape: Police: 32 Dead After Virginia Tech University Shooting
- Newsvine: Gunman Kills 32 in Virginia Tech Rampage
- Reddit: BREAKING: Gunman kills 20 at Virginia Tech
- Shoutwire: Breaking News: 32 People Killed in Shootings at Virginia…
- Tailrank: At least 20 dead in campus shootings
An interesting twist to this — is the social networking/media effect this has. In 1999, when Columbine happened, blogs were just starting up and it blogs weren’t a real effective form of communication. Today, things are different — bloggers are the citizen journalists. Whether that is with their personal accounts, their cellphone cameras or cell phone audio. People can instantly communicate. Let’s just say that some students had a BlackBerry or Sidekick, they could potentially IM their friends with something like “call the police — gunman on campus” This would be using social-technology for a purpose. Though, nothing is confirming or denying if any students used their phones for this.
Now, the blame is shed into the social networks themselves. Everyone always wants to know why Myspace or Facebook didn’t see this happening? The ironic part is that everyone wants privacy, and those networks do a considerable job protecting it. The question then becomes what boundaries (and responsibilities) do social networks have in addressing social issues? Should social networks apply Bayesian filtering for anything that resembles homicidal or suicidal tendencies? How do you quantify that? These are all questions that will be coming up as time progresses in the story. Personally, I don’t want a computer bot looking at my messages deciding if I’m going to go on a rampage … because I know it is prone to error. The last thing we need is search warrants being granted because Myspace says you’re going to kill someone.
