WebProNews

I've seen at least two stories today that remind us why social media can be a legitimate venue for good information. If you haven't been able to grasp the concept yet, perhaps this will help.

First of all, Twitter has been exploding with Tweets about a plane crash in the Hudson River, and best I can tell, Twitterers on the scene were first to report on this (photos and all). I checked various big name news sources for info about the plane crash after seeing a Tweet about it, and could not find any info. It's all there now of course.

The second example comes from a CNN piece, which discusses President Obama's "two-way" strategies of staying connected on the web with Americans (not that this is exactly news).

"Obama has invented an alternative media model," says CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider. "In the old model, the president talks to the people on television [and] the people talk back in polls. In the new model, communication is online, and two-way."

Some people still don't get why social media is important to news and real events. These things illustrate it pretty well.