社交媒體成民間救災利器

????相片中的這個人叫安迪?萬迪拉克，他在紐約布魯克林的公園坡開了一家名叫Two Boots Pizza的披薩店。桑迪颶風襲擊紐約的那天，他讓在店里表演的樂師把全家人都帶到他那里躲避這場天災。樂師向安迪描述了颶風過后的慘狀，于是安迪決心“做飯報國”。他用Facebook和Twitter向披薩店的老主顧們請求幫助。到了那周周末，他每天已經可以向災民提供大約1,500碗湯了。

????對于任何救災活動來說，這種高尚的志愿行為都是非常重要的。不過“桑迪”颶風卻讓我們看到，社交網絡技術如何能讓安迪的小小善舉迅速取得一呼百應的效果。比如有一個叫“占領桑迪”的活動就吸引了不少人的關注，它是由“占領華爾街運動”衍生而來的?！罢碱I桑迪”是一個松散的志愿者組織，志愿者們利用網絡和移動設備，呼吁為災民提供食物和生活用品。除了“占領桑迪”之外，還有許多個人也自發地在網絡陣地上樹起大旗，成為組織救災的急先鋒。比如我最近就在Facebook上關注了幾個與救災有關的群組，包括“大家幫助大家”（“Nobodys Helping Everybody”，168個關注）、“回報桑迪颶風災民”（"Giving Back to those Affected by Sandy" ，3,975個關注）、以及“羅卡韋救災”（“Rockaway Relief”，9,311個關注）等。

????洪水退去的幾個小時后，社交網絡技術無疑保障了人們快速有效的溝通。甚至連紐約市消防部門都在Twitter上發布哪里有緊急需求。無家可歸的人們在社交公寓租賃網站Airbnb上尋找棲身之所，許多紐約的Airbnb用戶自愿免費為災民提供住處。我妹妹聽一個朋友說，附近有一個避難所缺少物資，于是她在Facebook上更新了狀態，說她打算到那看看。結果才過了一個小時，她就收到了20包大衣和衛生用品，還有兩份意大利面，于是她大包小包地趕到了那里。

????不過社交媒體也有自身的缺點。隨著Facebook和圖片分享網站Instagram等社交網絡的普及，幾乎每個有智能手機的人都能當紀錄片導演。因此“桑迪”颶風可能也成了有史以來被拍了最多救災紀錄片的一場災難。颶風過后，有一條船擱淺到了重災區羅卡韋的一條街道中間，這張照片被轉載了無數次。幾乎每天，都有我的某位Facebook好友會把這張照片轉載一次。但更透明不等于更精確，有時甚至恰恰相反。有時一張打動人的圖片可能會成為一個網絡符號，不管它的精確性如何；有時候一些不太打動人的圖片卻被人忽視了。而且，對于一件并非實時發生的事，網絡往往不會追蹤報道它的后續情況。災情瞬息萬變，一張周五早上的圖片，到了周五下午可能就會大變樣了。

????Here's to Andy Wandilak, the owner of Two Boots Pizza in Park Slope Brooklyn. On the day Hurricane Sandy decimated entire neighborhoods of New York, he offered to feed and shelter the family of a musician who plays at his restaurant. The guy's descriptions of the storm's aftermath were tragic. So Andy started cooking. He used Facebook and Twitter to ask the restaurant's patrons for support. By the weekend, he was serving up roughly 1,500 cups of soup daily.

????This kind of superhuman volunteering has always been central to any relief effort, but Hurricane Sandy has showcased how social technologies can cause Andy's small initiative to scale quickly. Ad hoc relief efforts like Occupy Sandy have attracted attention for this already. An outgrowth of the Occupy Wall Street Movement, Occupy Sandy is a loosely organized group of activists-turned-volunteers who have been using the web and mobile devices to bring food, supplies and help to people in need. But beyond Occupy, there are many individuals who have stuck a flag in the digital sand and declared themselves the captains of relief efforts. Facebook groups I have recently "liked" include "Nobodys Helping Everybody" (168 likes), "Rockaway Relief" (9,311 likes), and "Giving Back to those Affected by Sandy" (3,975 likes).

????In the hours after the floods subsided last month, there's no question these social technologies enabled fast efficient communication. The New York City Fire Department turned to Twitter to help identify emergency needs. Displaced people turned to Airbnb to find beds, which New York Airbnb hosts volunteered to share free of charge. Heck, my sister, having heard from a friend that a nearby shelter was underserved, updated her Facebook (FB) status that she planned to make a trip down and an hour later, she had 20 bags of coats and toiletries and two lasagnas to bring.

????But social media has downsides, too. Now that Facebook and Instagram have made documentarians of everyone with a smartphone, Hurricane Sandy may have spawned the most documented disaster relief effort of all time. There's one boat in the middle of the street somewhere in the Rockaways that shows up on my Facebook feed nearly every single day, snapped by a different friend of a friend. But more transparency doesn't equal more accuracy; in fact, just the opposite. A captivating image can become an Internet meme regardless of its veracity, while less compelling images are overlooked. And the Internet is not yet great at giving context to any event that doesn't happen in realtime. In a fast-moving relief effort, a Wednesday morning image could have changed drastically by Friday afternoon.