Phi Beta Iota Editorial Comment: Yesterday we pointed out the idiocy of Virginia police chiefs attacking a lone blogger for using her God-given powers of observation and her First Amendment rights of articulation to expose shoddy police work and Gestapo police reactions.
Today we find an article that is focused on the importance of such blogging as a new form of social communication. Attacking one blogger, whether by abuse of local authority as has been the case in Virginia, or by a massive denial of service attack as is more common out of Russia and other part where brilliant young people have too few opportunities for challenging employment, is an attack on society at larger.
Tip of the hat to AP and the other news services for continuing to be relevant to our lives.
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By BARBARA ORTUTAY, AP Technology Writer Barbara Ortutay, Ap Technology Writer – Sun Aug 9, 2:27 am ET
NEW YORK – The outage that knocked Twitter offline for hours was traced to an attack on a lone blogger in the former Soviet republic of Georgia — but the collateral damage that left millions around the world tweetless showed just how much havoc an isolated cyberdispute can cause.
“It told us how quickly many people really took Twitter into their hearts,” Robert Thompson, director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University, said Friday.
Tens of millions of people have come to rely on social media to express their innermost thoughts and to keep up with world news and celebrity gossip.
