To Tweet or Not to Tweet? Social Media and the New Reality of Breaking News

by Sarah Arvizo

Image: www.WhitneyHouston.com

I first heard the news of Whitney Houston’s passing in a text, reading “Whitney Houston dead.” As any devoted fan of “The Bodyguard” (*sob*) or crooner of “I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” naturally, I refused to believe it and immediately switched the channel to the regular news stations – why wouldn’t they be reporting on this, right? In this case, my first inclination was to go to E! News, as this was an entertainment-related matter. When I saw that there was no update flashing across the bottom of the screen as their news is usually presented, I proceeded to check ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX… and none of these channels were reporting on it, despite the fact that all were in the middle of a news program. I thought, “Hey, maybe it isn’t true.”

My very next act, however, was to go straight to Facebook – alas, I opened my news feed to an outbreak of status updates about her rumored death, and got my confirmation in a post by The Hollywood Reporter. Moving on to Twitter, my entire home page was full of posts about Whitney – many from celebrities – and every single trending topic was about her at the time that I logged on. I monitored both accounts simultaneously, and sat in awe at the flood of posts that permeated my news feeds within minutes of logging on.

Twitter released the following image, which depicts user activity at the time the news broke.

A recent Mashable article cites a Twitter user (the niece of Whitney’s makeup artist, to be exact) as having spread the news 42 minutes before the press – if that’s not breaking news, I don’t know what is.

This led me to think an unusual thought – can something like grief be measured through social media? Well, if what I saw on my social media accounts is any inclination, I think the answer would be a big, resounding “YES.” The news of her death shocked the world and rocked the virtual one. They say that news travels fast, right? More than 2.5 million people tweeted about her from the time of the first tweet, to two hours after – myself included.

With the advent of smart phones, iPads and the like, it’s no secret that we’re hardly pulling out the newspaper or waiting for the 6 o’clock broadcast to get our news. The first thing I do in the morning, as embarrassing as it might be (you all do it, too!), is check my Facebook and Twitter accounts. Want to know what’s going on in the world before everyone else (or, these days, along with everyone else)? You better get yourself some social media accounts!

We’re a digitally forward society that relies on social media for news and to communicate our thoughts, and I think it’s safe to say that the news of Whitney Houston’s passing was a prime example of not only the ease with which we have access to news, but it also sheds a big, bright light on the increasingly important role of social media in our lives. If any news, good or bad, can be spread this quickly, then it’s definitely not going anywhere.

RIP Whitney.

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