LetsMoveToTheMoon

God, Technology, and Things That Make Us Want to Move to the Moon

Looking Back at the Media’s Response to the Mumbai Attacks

November 29, 2008

I believe that the terrorist attacks on Mumbai are technically over by now. I say this in that way because the attacks went on for such a painfully long amount of time. Reports say that nearly 200 people died and over 300 people sustained injuries. The last few days have surely been horrendous for the people of India. In response, I want to focus on the events of the last few days in the only way that I am connected to them: the media’s response.

I took interest in the media’s interaction with this tragedy. I was not surprised with the amount of information that quickly spread about this event. As is evidenced even in a small way by my previous post, tons of online sources reported the entire process of the attacks. Pictures, live streaming video, Twitter updates, and mainstream news updates were just some of the ways that this information was sent out. Two aspects of this were significant (that is, aside from the huge amount of information to the general public, which is not that important in the grander picture, particularly when life and death is involved).

First, these tools (particularly Twitter, from what I saw) forwarded the cause of relief information. Requests for assistance flooded streams of text. Most noticeable to me were the constant requests for blood donors to the Mumbai hospitals to save the lives of the many who had been injured. In this way, this new method of rapid communication was extremely helpful.

Secondly, this information did not go unnoticed by the terrorists, and subsequently the government. The terrorists made use of this information DURING their attacks. Terrorists were reported as watching TV in order to learn the plans of police and armed forces before their counter-attacks. Once the TV streams were cut, terrorists reportedly resorted to the Internet, perhaps even taking into account Twitter updates. I believe this has been suggested as a result of the Indian government asking that tweeting about the event be stopped. It appeared as though this rapid spread of news was actually aiding the terrorists in their plot, although I imagine that the government acted to put a stop to this as quickly as possible.

In summary, I am pleased with the media’s response to this tragedy thus far. It is disappointing that these new methods of sharing information may have assisted the terrorists in their horrible plot, but I am encouraged that these tools were used positively, as well. I only hope that this positive response will happen in the future (truly, I hope that this kind of thing never happens again, but I cannot be so naive as to expect that). What are your thoughts?

See also:

• ‘Terrorists planned to kill 5000 people’ (Rediff) – minute-by-minute updates
• Mumbai Under Attack (Boston.com)