It seems that social media websites completely blew up during the past week in spite of Hurricane Sandy. My Twitter timeline was overflowing with the amount of Hurricane Sandy tweets and retweets. It was extremely handy to use the site because it kept me updated without having to read lengthy articles. One site that did a efficient job of keeping their audience updated throughout the Frankenstorm was NPR. NPR very minimally uses their Twitter handle. Only when prominent and timely stories are surfacing is when NPR will update their account. Hurricane Sandy was definitely no exception to the site. When Hurricane Sandy started becoming more and more newsworthy, their Twitter kicked it into high gear. They started tweeting more frequently to ensure that their 131,000 followers were being informed.
The content of their tweets is what really mattered to their folioing base during such a newsworthy time. They would use their allowed 140 characters to briefly update followers with what was going on during the hurricane, and link it to a story explaining what the tweet said, only more in depth. They would retweet a Spanish news source, allowing their Spanish speaking followers a way to find the updates on the Frankenstorm in their native language. NPR really complied to what their followers needed and provided them with reassurance that despite the storm, NPR would keep them updated throughout the entire ordeal. After the storm subsided, NPR really hasn’t tweeted much aside from a few tweets here and there about the election. This is a news source that takes a different approach to using social media. Instead of flooding their followers timeline, they tweet on occasion, when it is important and necessary. Seeing NPR in their timeline shows their followers that some thing big is happening and needs their attention.