Twitter - News at the Speed of Light

News is driven by speed. The media outlet thatThe Internet and social media have transitioned
breaks the story first leads their competitors, andpower to the actual newsmakers, and away from
consumers reward those media outlets that getthe media outlets. Does this mean that modern
the timeliest news to them first.day media outlets will soon become outdated? No
It's true. When you see the scrolling banner at the- but it does mean that the speed of breaking
bottom of the TV that says "Breaking News",news has just accelerated rapidly to almost near
what do you do? You stop and watch and listen.time information. Twitter not only allows an
When listening to the radio and you hear theindividual to share news rapidly, it also is a simple
announcer interrupt the song with a "news flash" -way to share that information rapidly amongst a
you immediately pay attention. The most recentlarge amount of followers. Now, rather than
news is the most relevant, and media outletsrelying on a reporter in the field racing to the
have worked for decades to be the "first" to getscene, the news media outlet has an army of
the news to you before their competition.millions of "news reporters" who can share
Guess what? Web 2.0 and the Internet havebreaking news with them instantly via Twitter as
turned this news model upside down. Now, insteadit happens.
of the news teams racing to the scene of anTwitter also provides the immediate relevancy of
airliner accident to be the first with live video, andnews that the search engines have been looking
the first to interview the eyewitnesses, the firstfor. When you search up the terms for "Hudson
to break the news is no longer the media outlet.river airliner crash" on your favorite search engine
The first person to break the news is theafter hearing about the accident, you don't want
eyewitness, or even the person who was in theto find search results that share articles that are
accident. How? With Twitter. Twitter now breaksseveral years old. The older search algorithms
news at the speed of light. Did you know thatwould often do this, as the "old news" had been
when the Continental airliner crashed into theindexed in the search engines and was deemed
Hudson River this year, that one of themost relevant to your search. The search engines
passengers that survived the crash landinghave recognized the lightning speed of news via
Twittered his friends, and even sent photos?Twitter, and are already rewarding Twitter posts
Instead of the news media outlet interviewing thewith immediate relevancy on the search engines.
survivor and breaking the news - the survivorNews at the speed of light, online, and with your
was breaking the news himself via Twitter, with atraditional media outlets. Twitter has provided
real time update that he sent to his followers thatanother breakthrough in providing breaking news
they could then forward on.as fast as possible.