Weak Signals to Strong Movements

Dina Mehta shares the tsunamihelp story for the Global Knowledge Review.

Today, I believe that no crisis on this scale or magnitude will ever be handled again without sms, blogs, and wikis. That social tools will become a natural extension of rapid adaptation to chaotic conditions. I'm still trying to figure out how it all happened. What was it that put my colleagues and me on the global stage answering news requests? It was all viral and we were on a completely "out of control" ride and yet somehow it all worked.

These are my reflections...

Do read on. The story is more than weak signals channeled through social tools in ways mainstream media cannot. People, driven by the heart, had already established practice to apply from other experiences. This latent network activated to become a strong movement in a startlingly short amount of time.

While all the participants deserve praise, I'd like to commend the volunteer effort Constantin Basturea put into wiki for tsunamihelp.