It is interesting to observe the trend of using Social Media during national and international crises, both natural and political.

The influence of social media is widely amplified even during times of crisis. Be it the Iran election in 2009, the earthquake in Haiti or the political revolution in Egypt, social media has played a vital role in spreading news of the events. Twitter was brimming with nonstop tweets during these catastrophes.

Everyone was updated on the happenings to the people they knew in Japan via Facebook and Twitter. The situation had become such that people in Japan who were not on Facebook before, created an account as they felt that it was the most reliable way to communicate after the earthquake.

Can Social Media be used for other kinds of natural disasters and crimes?

In 2009, two girls were trapped in a storm water drain and they promptly used Facebook to ask for help rather than calling emergency services from their mobile phones. The authorities were concerned about their counterproductive action.

However, according to a new research, social media can be used for a more formal role in emergency responses. In fact, approximately half of the respondents said they would use social media in the occurrence of a calamity to let relatives and friends know they were safe.

Just minutes after the three blasts were reported in Mumbai, with the aid of internet tools such as Twitter and Google docs, Mumbaikars quickly put together a crowd-sourced spreadsheet indexing the names and numbers of people offering aid from food to lifts, accommodation or even particular blood types. Since open-source systems are often misused by troublemakers, the spreadsheet was also constantly edited by vigilant users who took out any posts that seemed fake or misleading. A similar co-ordination of efforts to channel information was seen on Facebook.

Users passed around the suggestion not to use phone lines unless absolutely needed. Instead, communicate via Blackberry Messenger, Skype, Twitter and SMS intensified as people tried to find out if their dear ones were alright.

Whilst the earthquake in Japan had disrupted electricity, the Internet remained firmly intact. In fact, the American Embassy in Tokyo made use of this by encouraging Americans in Japan to contact their loved ones via text message and social media (i.e. Facebook and Twitter).

Social Media has become a platform for critical information, a means to find loved ones and a method to raise urgent funds for relief efforts. According to Tweet-o-Meter, there were over 1,200 tweets per minute, within hours of the earthquake, coming from Tokyo.

More officials should use social media to keep the lines of communication open when lives are on the line. The effectiveness of social media can be used by officials for passing information to high incidence calamity prone areas, such as hurricanes in Florida, to promote safety.

Online and mobile media is also a well established tool for public communication among citizens and civic authorities. In recent times, it has immensely contributed during the time of floods in Queensland, as both, a source of chief source of official communication and as an extension of interpersonal and word-of-mouth communication.

Some additional highlights of the use of social media during the crisis in Japan include Google Person Finder which is a Google database site that can be used to look up or report missing people. YouTube Video Person Finder is similar to the Google person finder whereas Quakebook was a charity book created solely from Tweets about the earthquake. All of this was created exclusively for the Japan earthquake.

Conclusion:
Instant communication using social media such as Twitter and Facebook helps citizens maintain a constant dialogue with governments; this dialogue can be especially valuable during times of crisis, but requires a careful recalibration of communication strategies on both sides in order to maximize efficiency and avoid the spreading of rumors.