The death of the world’s most wanted man was announced late Sunday evening, and confirmed by White House officials, news agencies, and individual sources in the form of tweets. With the real-time capability of the platform, and the urgent exchange of information, the news began unfolding right before the eyes of all Twitter users.
The first to indicate major news was about to be released was White House Communications Director, Dan Pfeiffer. His initial tweet announced President Obama would address the nation later that evening:
As this tweet was published and viewed by the Twitter universe, news agencies began to latch onto the lead and figure out what was going on. Shortly after, the news had been confirmed by former chief of staff under Donald Rumsfeld, Keith Urbahn.
It was only a matter of minutes before the internet began to respond to this information. Almost instantly, Twitter trending topics were reflecting relevant keywords of this announcement, and in the following half hour mainstream news sources were reporting on the story.
Within two hours of Pfeiffer’s initial tweet, President Obama was addressing the nation to confirm the news.
During Obama’s speech, the White House Twitter account was live-tweeting every word.
While mainstream sources dominated the majority of the news, individuals were also tweeting as this was taking place. One in particular was tweeting information without even realizing he was covering this news story.
It was officially reported by Twitter that over 4,000 tweets per second were exchanged within the network both at the beginning and the end of Obama’s speech. Although not a record for the microblogging site, it still remains as an impressive stream of tweets surrounding this news story.
Twitter users have continued the conversation with relevant hashtags and trending topics, showing the true value in the microblogging site. With the ability to exchange immediate information and release up-to-date announcements, there is no wonder why the world is hooked on tweets.
