Mumbai Attacks – 2
It’s now 27 hours since the first gunshot was heard. The last day and a bit have stretched everyone – physically and mentally
The Police – completely out of their league. 25 armed to the teeth fighters trained in high class military skills working on a battle plan that would have made even Erwin Rommel proud.
The official said they had recovered bags of dry fruits from the terrorists killed at the Trident, enough to last them a few days, besides AK-47 and AK-56 assault rifles, hand grenades and several hundred rounds of ammunition. – The Hindustan Times
The Government – what seemed initially to be some gang war has all the possible scenarios rolled into one – invasion by a platoon of guerillas, seizure of public installations, taking of hostages and of course wanton widespread killing
Before I could reach there, the terrorists who had attacked one of the hospitals, the Cama Hospital, had left and those who attacked the railway station had also left. – Expressindia
The Traditional News Media – Never has our much acclaimed media faced a situation like this. Previous events like the 1993 blasts, the 2006 train blasts, 26 July rainwash in Mumbai were easier to manage – fewer channels so less competition hence more opportunity to reach to high vantage points and sources.
But this time, as one can see on TV, in front of anyone walking out of the Taj or Trident – whether he or she be a cop, a politician, a survivor, a commando – there are more microphones, dictaphones and mobile telephones thrust in front of every face. No sensitivity towards giving the survivor some space, nudging and poking to get the right vantage points, the needless and often pointless badgering for inane technicalities (How many commandos do you have? Is there panic amongst the hostages? Are you happy to be free? etc)
It is really sad that in the last 24 hrs not a single channel has covered the situation at hospitals, doctors contribution, their experience. DDeeps on Twitter
The Social Web: What did rise to the occasion was the world wide web and all its sharing and collaboration services – Twitter, Blogs, Google Maps, Wikis, the works. Updates by the second. People across the globe knew which terrorist was operating from where, there were photographs from the spot that hit screens across the world much before CNN-IBN stream hit CNN International. I twittered
To stay away from dumb analysis and reporting on TV news channels, move over to social media – http://tinyurl.com/5hf6gx
I am building an aggregation of key comments, remarks, statements and the like on the Mumbai Attacks here. (Using simple Google Notebooks) Feel free to enhance and suggest improves
