The world of journalism and Twitter is buzzing following Sky News’s new policy on Twitter and the BBC’s new guidance on breaking news. Both organisations have told their journalists not to break news on Twitter first. In a post on the BBC’s Editors blog, social media editor Chris Hamilton acknowledged the value of Twitter but concluded: We’ve been clear that our first priority remains ensuring that important information reaches BBC

The role of Twitter in breaking and spreading news of the killing of Osama bin Laden is fascinating. The raid on bin Laden was being tweeted in real-time by Sohaib Athar (@ReallyVirtual) of Abbottabad, Pakistan, even though he had no idea at the time of what was happening. The list of messages on Twitter show how the raid unfolded at the time. In the US, the first reports of the death

The spread of incorrect reports about the shooting of US Rep. Gabrielle Giffords on Twitter has once again raised questions about the rapid spread of false information on Twitter. Lost Remote has a good round-up of how reputable news organisations such as Reuters, NPR and the BBC wrongly tweeted that the congresswoman had died. The challenge of ensuring accuracy when covering breaking news online is nothing new.  We faced the

Following on from the attacks in Mumbai, Mindy McAdams has put together a short timeline of key events that have affected the development of online news. Among these are 9/11 attacks and the July 2005 bombings in London. Her list got me thinking about two key events in 1997 that had a big impact on the evolution of the web as an accepted platform for news. I was with the