#swineflu or #swinefail?

Posted by Peter Luyckx on
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009 at 7:27 pm

And today, NPR reposted an opinion piece by Evgeny Morozov from Foreignpolicy.com on Twitter’s Power to Misinform. 

                […] In the context of a global pandemic — where media networks are doing their best to spice up an already serious threat — having millions of people wrap up all their fears into 140 characters and blurt them out in the public might have some dangerous consequences, networked panic being one of them.

For anyone who’s been following #swineflu on Twitter, it can feel indeed as if there’s mass hysteria around the swine flu outbreak. But panic? I haven’t seen much evidence of this claim, and Morozov doesn’t provide any evidence. Instead, he ends with wildly overblown hysteria of his own:

I think it’s only a matter of time before that the next generation of cyber-terrorists — those who are smart about social media, are familiar with modern information flows, and are knowledgeable about human networks — take advantage of the escalating fears over the next epidemic and pollute the networked public sphere with scares that would essentially paralyze the global economy. Often, such tactics would bring much more destruction than the much-feared cyberwar and attacks on physical — rather than human — networks.

To the credit of NPR listeners, Rebecca Petzel (rapetzel) provides a more thoughtful view. Here’s her comment:

My twitter feed has been very intelligent, well-informed- and directed me almost immediately to the center for disease control. [@cdcemergency]

By just highlighting the ignorance found when searching swine flu you’re insinuating that 1,000′s of the least informed people in the world are all talking together. In fact those tweets were not in a closed circuit- and chances are someone in those ‘misinformed’ tweeters circle would correct their mistake.

So Is Twitter helping provide a public service by raising awareness or is it just spreading misinformation? It’s the wrong question. #swinefail may be more hysterical than #swineflu.

True, some tweets are incorrect and when these tweets get re-tweeted, Twitter can seem like a gigantic rumor mill (though, as is mentioned above, inaccurate information is quickly corrected by other twitterers). And some twitterers, making jokes about the #aporkalypse and #hamageddon, have a beastly—some would say inappropriate—sense of humor. But that’s not the point.

Any information platform (be it newspapers, television channels, web sites, blogs, or social media) will contain credible information and information that’s inaccurate, sometimes even deliberately wrong.

The real question is: Can Twitter help spread valuable information? And the answer is a resounding yes. Twitter is an incredibly fast platform for spreading information. Raising awareness has never been easier. That’s really valuable for public health officials.

In addition, Twitter is a godsend in the following ways:

• Federal agencies can keep the public directly informed in real time. There are no longer any gatekeepers they need to pass. (Follow #cdcemergency for updates on #swineflu)
• Mainstream media can use Twitter to provide constant updates and corrections to stories.    
• Twitterers share and point to good sources of information, so it’s easy to find the best sources of information.

I think Twitter will prove to be a very valuable tool for public health officials, though two questions remain for which the answer at this point is unclear.

Is Twitter too good at spreading information?

If the #swineflu outbreak ends up being much less virulent than feared, critics will argue twitterers cried wolf (or swine, in this case). Will the general public tune out future tweets on outbreaks if that’s the case? Perhaps, but mainstream media surely isn’t standing on the sidelines of reporting this story (and for good reason).

Does awareness translate into action?

As I wrote in a blog post for MSN Health & Fitness earlier this month, awareness doesn’t necessarily translate into action. A study by the Rutger’s Food Policy Institute found that many Americans are aware of food recalls but fail to check their homes for recalled food products (#recall #fail).

So everyone is aware of #swineflu, but does this mean we’re washing our hands more often? Are people staying home from work? Are you?