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New Report - Haiti became the first real-world crisis laboratory

HAITI TECHNOLOGY - Digital media played a key role in rescue operations during the Haiti earthquake. A new report released January 12 2011 says... "Haiti became the first real-world crisis laboratory for several media platforms that had only recently emerged"


Report - Lessons From Haiti

Think about it for a minute...

Think about the role that social media ALONE played during the Haiti crisis... Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, Skype...

But that's only how messages got out into the rest of the world during the crisis...

Digital media applications used on the ground...

There are other things that happened on the ground in Haiti that you probably not aware of that really helped the relief workers to gather and distribute information and resources when Haiti's communication infrastructure collapsed.

Here are three in particular mentioned in an article published in the San Francisco Chronicle:

-- Crowd-sourcing: "Reports of trapped people and medical emergencies collected by text were plotted on an online map, then used by relief workers. In one example, the U.S. Marines brought water and sanitation devices to a camp after receiving reports that drinking water was in short supply."

-- Text messages: "Cell phone companies, relief groups and media created and used the code 4636 to send messages to tens of thousands about important public health issues."

-- Open-source mapping: "Using handheld GPS devices, volunteers created up-to-date maps to help guide humanitarian groups and the public trying to navigate affected areas."

If you like to read, you can download the full PDF report here.

These lessons learned from the use of the new digital media applications in the wake of Haiti's earthquake of can be applied to future disasters, the report says.

What do you think about it?

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All Comments (2)

Miejo says...

but buttttttttttt Hai tian must stand up and take care for gooooooooooo them selffffffffffff we have to be strong we look to weakkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk, we need to realise that it is our reponsability to built a strong HAITI, stop the charity ''s'il vous plait '' HELP YES! NOT CHARITY ''S'IL VOUS PLAIT- let be together
let see each other as brothers and sisters IT'S A MUST AND WE HAVE TO ACT FAST!
WE HAVE TO STOP BEING COBAYE

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Sergo Jean says...

I disagree, because they do not understand the Haitian peoples, our culture, our life.They created themself that crisis laboratory for his own purpose .Nou selman bezwen yon vre lide ki pat conn copie lecol pou dirije Haiti, le sa fet laboratoi sa ap tounen lakay met li.Yo met pale di sa yo vle, lide sa la, cap vinn met fin a bagay sa yo.A country must have rules for the peoples, Haiti needs good rules without the group of mafia, I hope that will do one

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