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September 2, 2005
Katrina, London Bombing and Tsunami--This Round To the Old Media
I did not sleep very well last night. I was haunted by the faces of the victims of Hurricane Katrina, which slammed into the US Gulf Coast on Sunday. I kept seeing an African American woman holding two babies, screaming into the camera, "Help us, we are dying." The images on television and major web sites (cnn.com) convey a strong impression of a city (New Orleans) utterly in chaos, with looters carrying off stolen merchandise from smashed store windows and self-appointed vigilantes enforcing their own version of justice with personal firearms. As the NY Times reports this morning, "the scenes on television looked as if they could have been filmed in a former Soviet republic or Haiti." Or as NBC's Martin Savidge said, "This is not Iraq or Somalia. This is home."
One stunning admission last night came from the director of the US Federal Emergency Management Administration, when he acknowledged that the Federal Government "had no idea" that 20,000 people were stranded at the New Orleans Superdome without water, food or even working toilets. How is it possible in this day of advanced communications in the wealthiest nation in the world that we can condemn our fellow citizens to such a squalid existence?
There is no co-creation of the narrative as in London or during the tsunami, where the best content came from participants in the unfolding tragedy. Why? Because the tourists at Phuket were armed with digital video recording devices that could capture the oncoming wave and resulting devastation while the victims of the subway bombing who could snap photos on their cell phones.
Web devotees will point to statistics such as Technorati reporting that seven of the top ten search terms on Tuesday were hurricane-related. Or they will cite Wikipedia, the user generated encyclopedia, as being the authoritative source on the latest developments. But as BBC News reports, "It was not a news story entirely dominated by citizen-led news and images as the London terrorist attacks had been."
The fact is that we are now seeing the tangible evidence of the digital divide. The poor do not have the means to communicate their situation. You can bet that if David Weinberger or another star blogger were trapped in the Superdome, he or she would have been posting continuously until relief arrived. And those posts would have reached to the highest levels of the media on the very first day of the crisis.
The lack of peer-to-peer information sharing from the victims of this tragedy to the outside world, has eliminated a great source of pressure on the federal government that only such horizontal communications can foster. Instead of a flurry of first hand accounts the coverage has relied on the old paradigm of traditional media going down to Louisiana and Mississippi cover the story.
The US Government's efforts to communicate during the past four days have been quite ineffective. I have been following the Whitehouse.gov web site, which posts both print and digitized video of statements from President Bush, Department of Homeland Security czar Chertoff and Press Secretary McClellan. I also looked at the web site of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), whose director Michael Brown has been on site directing the relief efforts. The White House site has the feel of a corporation in crisis, where the CEO has not been to disaster site and where the emphasis is on statistics (# of ready to eat meals delivered) and show (Clinton and Bush I surround President Bush as in tsunami). The FEMA site has no visuals of Brown in action, nor any of his compatriots. Coverage has devolved to the Governor of Louisiana and to the Mayor of New Orleans. A key lesson for me--show us what the mid-level US Government employees of such agencies as FEMA or the Centers for Disease Control are doing to improve the situation. Post statistics on charts with goals and achievement of target to date.
Enough of the detached commentary on this tragedy. Here is one small contribution to the people of the Gulf Coast. Edelman will match dollar for dollar any money donated to the United Way by its employees. United Way is taking donations by check made out to United Way of America with Hurricane Katrina Fund in the memo line, sent to United Way of America, PO Box 630568 Baltimore, MD 21263-0568 or via credit card by calling 18002724630. I will be the first to participate by mailing a check this morning for $1000.
A final personal note on this September morning. I am now celebrating my first anniversary of blogging. I have enjoyed it thoroughly. Highlights of my year include my commentary on Armstrong Williams, my blogs on my trips to China, India, London, Greece and Turkey, the journey of personal discovery whereby I discovered the Russian heritage of my father's family through the good offices of the Hamburg Emigration Museum and my new friendships with my second family in the blog community--Weinberger, Tenowitz, Rose, Jay Rosen, Linda Stone et.al.who are now constant companions.
Posted by Edelman at September 2, 2005 8:55 AM
Comments
As always, it is a treat to read your commentary on the world. (Although treat might be the wrong word, since it is such a major disaster you are writing about.)
As I have read the reports and watched the news, what surprised me was my lack of shock. A friend who spent a semester, fall 2000, in New Orleans came back and said that everyone lived knowing the big one would come and destroy the city. It was an accepted part of living in New Orleans and I've had that in the back of my head ever since.
Also, sadly, I'm not shocked by the looting, slow reactions by government, and general depression. Instead I feel like I am watching the final chapters of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged walk out of the book and into the five o'clock news. Or the mob scenes from the latest version of War of the Worlds.
After watching that movie with friends, one commented, "That's not how people act in a disaster. People come together, they aren't torn apart." That was based on her experiences in the Israeli Defense Force. I agreed with her, "People do come together, look at September 11, look at the tsunami." But maybe people only come together when they are totally blindsided--not when there has been a failure to organize or prepare.
Those are some of the things I am wrestling with as I keep reading the news. Thanks for matching our contributions to the United Way. I hope many companies follow your lead.
Posted by: Leah at September 2, 2005 12:05 PM
Hi Rich,
Great point about the digital divide. But the question is, what do we do about it? The divide is in just about every city, from Boston to New York to Detroit to LA. How do we fix it so when something else happens we're prepared?
Even better, I'm fascinated with the idea of blogs as sources of extremely localized information. Many news organizations are too broadly focused to cover the smaller community issues. This is a perfect spot for bloggers to step in (in places like http://www.h2otown.info/ in Watertown, Mass. they have) and create online meeting places for neighborhoods. If that existed in New Orleans, people would know where to go to find information about their homes.
I've actually been amazed at how MUCH information manages to get out, even as power and phone lines are down. Ernie the Attorney managed to update his blog by sending SMS messages to a friend who then posted. This even as phone and Internet service were down.
Posted by: Chuck Tanowitz at September 2, 2005 4:22 PM
I've been reading and listening to all the complaints and accusations about our government and especially from the Mayor of New Orleans. I put most of the blame on the Mayor and Governor of the state. They had at least 3 days warning that a category 5 hurricane was going to hit the city and all they did was announce that the people shoudl evacuate then they left. Why didn't they contact surrounding states and the federal government asking for school buses, city buses any type of transportation and evacuate those that didn't have the means on their own. The Mayor bashes our government but he knows best the means of his people so why didn't he ask for help prior to the disaster? Why didn't he mandate evacuation out of the city rather than to a stadium that can barely handle a sports crowd let alone thousands of refugees? Why didn't the mayor contact the governor days in advance and prepare appropriately instead of waiting for the disaster then accusing the United States government of racial actions and lack of response. The mayor should take blame for his lack of response and advance planning. He knew the levies were only built to handle category 3 storms. They saved 8 billion dollars by not preparing the levies for a category 4 or 5 storm, now what's it costing? Mayor Nagin is the main source of blame not the American government and not the American people.
Posted by: Mike at September 5, 2005 11:05 PM
Mike
One thing is sure
We need to evaluate our communications infrastructure in light of New Orleans disaster There must be a better way How was it possible that FEMA boss did not know that 20,000 people were in horrible straits in Superdome?
Thanks for writing
Posted by: Richard Edelman at September 6, 2005 9:13 AM
CT thanks as always for writing back
In the future perhaps bloggers can be mobilized as crisis communicators
You are right about potential neighborhood by neighborhood I like it
Posted by: Richard Edelman at September 6, 2005 9:15 AM
Leah,
I am so pleased by the reaction to the United Way match Our people are very united in this effort We will find a charity that needs our help on PR side too!
Thanks for writing
Posted by: Richard Edelman at September 6, 2005 9:16 AM
Hello, Chuck; Hello Richard --
Richard, good on you for donating $1000. At H2otown I am running a matching drive for evacuees who have been taken in by the community of Lake Providence, Louisiana. We've named Lake Providence the "sister city" of the H2otown online community, so now I also post news updates to H2otown readers about what's going on with their brothers & sisters there.
As far as neighborhood communication goes, I'm not sure we're there yet in terms of using local news weblogs as a source of information in disaster preparedness situations. For instance, how would I update the site, and how would people read it? One thing that might keep it going is that many local residents have accounts and can post to the site, so there isn't a single point of failure. Our server is thousands of miles away in a datacenter, so flooding my basement wouldn't take the site down.
I think in the future one thing that will (probably inadvertently) help with information dissemination in emergencies is better net access on cell phones, and better support in content management systems (including blogs) for outputting cellphone-friendly versions of the content (plaintext, no pictures, etc).
I suspect Mike, like so many people, has made up his mind. It worries me that so many people in America seem to have a mindset where facts or new information don't make a dent. That's a problem in disaster preparedness, too: If people don't let information in, how are you going to give them instructions they need to survive? See Laurie Garrett on this topic.
This "facts bounce off" scenario as Americans become more cynical about government, companies, and each other, is also a looming problem for PR, What happens when people won't take in new information anymore? Harry Frankfurt's little book is highly instructive on how we got to this point.
Posted by: Lisa Williams at September 7, 2005 10:52 AM
Lisa,
One idea
Every city ought to have a dark site ready for such a disaster One place where all media, residents and businesses can go for official information We developed this for the Mayor's office in NYC post 9/11 check out LowerManhattan.info
Posted by: Richard Edelman at September 7, 2005 5:15 PM
JG so inspirational so moving
my heart and head are with you
Posted by: Richard Edelman at September 14, 2005 12:12 PM