After a long day in which police went door to door searching homes for Dzhokar Tsarnaev, I listened to officials in the Boston area tell the public that they were opening the subway, roads and allowing people back out on the street. Minutes later I watched in horror as shots rang out in Watertown and the hunt for Dzhokar Tsarnaev continued. On my TV, I watched as helpless news anchors talked about what they knew, realizing that none of them had the power of Twitter at their disposal.
News Truly Is at the Speed of Light
With my laptop on, I started searching on Twitter and within minutes I saw reports from people in Watertown filling up my tweet stream. Were these reports true or false? It was tough to say, but I think I knew about 15-20 minutes before national news that Dzhokar Tsarnaev was holed up in a boat on Franklin Street:
With the internet, people started using Google maps to post satellite pictures of the house and the boat in the backyard. Gone are the days in which onsite reporting of the type we had last night matters. Anderson Cooper might as well have been in Europe because the news on CNN was out of date to what was happening in real time on the web. CNN and NBC desperately tried to get confirmation from officials that the suspect had been found but they lagged woefully behind what everyone already knew on Twitter.
Granted I had not confirmation that the tweets that I were seeing were true, but I started seeing reports about flash bangs going off and a good while later the TV anchors talked about the same thing. I also knew about the thermal imaging from the helicopter and how it was used to find the suspect and saw that many of the tweets were coming directly from what people were hearing via the online police scanners. Much of the tweets I saw were right on the money, but I had to ask myself: Was this good?
What About People's Safety?
I wasn't the only person worried about what was taking place in Watertown and how people on Twitter were communicating that to the rest of the world. @gwynnek made a good point: People were tweeting what they heard from police scanners and there was no way to tell how giving that information out might aid the suspect or those who might have been working with him:
What unfolded quickly on Twitter amazed me as I watched the hunt and capture of one of the Boston Marathon suspects take place on live television. But that's where the darker side of social media crept in. In order to spread the news, be the first one "in the know," people continued to tweet direct quotes from local police scanners and it soon became apparent that hundreds of thousands of people were listening to the online scanners:
And no matter how many times local TV stations urged the public to not report what was being broadcast on the police scanners, people tweeted more and more of what they heard.
I'll ask it again: Was that a good thing? Did being cool and sharing out what the police were saying on the radio do more harm than good? I can only imagine what police, the FBI and Homeland Security must think about this latest fad with the public wanting to participate in the real time chase and capture of a suspect. What we know is very little: It is alleged that two brothers worked together and set off the bombs at the Boston Marathon, but there are many questions still unanswered. Did the brothers have help? Could other sleeper cells be listening in to the news and twitter chatter last night to learn from the event?
We Are Helping Our Enemies
I love social media, I truly do. I've been on Twitter since April 2008 and have seen many wonderful uses of Twitter, but I have to say that last night was a much darker side. Anyone who wishes to harm our country simply needs to listen in on last night's chatter and learn about the online police scanners, learn of the position of the police from the public and could have easily mislead the public by spreading false rumors through social channels. The genie is out of the bottle. I get that. I know that there is no turning back and I also understand that many using Twitter do not have the maturity to understand the power of the tool that they are using and how they could be assisting criminals.
We live in a world in which we are the judge and jury all at the same time. We can participate in a live event and spread our thoughts out to the world while it's unfolding. I saw many tweets similar to the one below in which angry people wanted the suspect's head. But we don't know all the facts, many people were wounded and people lost their lives. We're angry, we want revenge, but we also need to take a step back--unless we want to go back to the era of the Roman Colosseum. Does anyone wonder why the Hunger Games was so popular? Truly we're not too far from those books.
Whose Fault Is it?
I remember watching the OJ Simpson chase and how my friends and I were all glued to the TV. Now it's a totally different world. With Twitter, we can be snarky, a jokester, spread the word and make other comments all in real time with anyone in the world. Maybe it's already happening, but I'm waiting for the next crisis to have the suspect tweeting back to the world.
I believe that tweeting out police scanner information during a crisis in which people's lives are at stake is flat out wrong. I'd suggest that the online scanners be taken down during such an emergency. Flip that switch off. We don't truly know how we might be aiding criminals by sharing out information or helping our overseas enemies plan their next attack on us. In the end, as with many things in life, it comes down to personal responsibility. Each person needs to take responsibility for his or her own actions. And unfortunately, from people's behaviors on Twitter last night, we're in for one hell of a bumpy ride.
What It Takes to Succeed
I admit that I became swept up in national pride. I wanted to run Broad Street, wear my red socks, and help raise money for a charity. Within 12 hours of my posting an "Anyone know how I can get into the Broad Street Run?" message on Facebook, I had my bib to get into the race and a spot on a bus that took me down to Philadelphia and back.
What I saw in yesterday's race gave me hope. I saw thousands of people wearing red socks in memory of those injured and who died in Boston along with people wearing shirts representing major charities. I also saw people out in throngs in North Philadelphia standing on the corner giving high fives to the runners as we went by. One black woman, in her 60s, stood on the corner breathing oxygen from tubes under her nose. She wore Mickey Mouse hands and gave high fives to people as they passed. I saw many such things that choked me up as I ran, but the biggest heart wrenching moment for me had to be running past one of Temple University's medical buildings.
I heard runners ahead of me on the left starting to clap and cheer, but I couldn't see what they were cheering for so I ran faster and then saw a nurse standing next to a boy in a wheel chair. He was bundled up in light blue hospital blankets and had tubes all round his nose and mouth. He did not seem to be able to speak, but he watched and, in his way, cheered us on. Tears came to my eyes and I just kept running knowing that I still had 7 or 8 miles yet to go.
I could tell many stories about Broad Street, but want I most wanted to share with you are some data and to share with you my "secret" to success. Below are my times for the last four years I've done the Broad Street Run:
2010 Time: 1:50:37
2011 Time: 1:41:02
2012 Time: 1:37:10
2013 Time: 1:35:19
That's four years of me running, training, getting injured, coming back and trying again. Those times represent hundreds of hours of running, pushing myself harder to be stronger, faster and a more efficient runner. But for me, running is a symbol for living life. Running takes practice and hard work. Running is also not always a straightforward progression. If you were to look at the data above, you might simply see how I have become faster over the last few years. And, yes, I am extremely happy that I can continue to become a faster runner.
What the data do not show though is the real story: I have also run races in which my times were worse than the year before. I have run half-marathons and two marathons. Several of those half-marathons were extremely difficult races and I did much worse than my previous year. But I don't give up. I work harder, practice more and try again.
To me running is a great way to look at much at what I do in life: I run, write novels and work extremely hard in all I do. I am driven to succeed. Not for money or power (though it's nice to pay bills!), but to become a better person.
If you are at a spot in your life in which you are facing a problem (or a whole host of problems), they can be overcome. You can succeed, too. How? It's simple, but not the answer that you might want.
Hard work, determination and practice are the tools I have used to succeed. And if you're about to hit the back button and shake your head in frustration, think on this: I am 42 years old. I only started running back when I was 37. I went from only having run 2 miles once in my life to now having run two marathons (and a whole bunch of other long distance races). Does this make me special or better? No, it doesn't. The success I have achieved has come from working hard and surrounding myself with good people (loved ones and solid, trusting friends).
And when I fall, as I have with running and in life, I get up. You can get up, too. What it takes to succeed is simply believing that you can and then taking that first small step. No matter if your goal is to run, write, lose weight, or whatever it all starts with believing in yourself. The next step is trying and failing then getting up and trying again. For me, I have friends who can support my successes in running and be supportive when I'm injured. We are not alone and if a sick boy in a hospital can ask his nurse to bring him outside so that he can cheer on runners at a race or an older woman with Mickey Mouse hands also breathing from an oxygen tank can give free high fives at a race when it might be easier to sit at home on a sofa, then I can see my dream and follow it. I ran yesterday and did achieve a personal record for a 10 mile race, but I could have easily not have achieved that record. In the end, it's all about hard work and perseverance. Might not be much of a surprise, but that's what it takes to succeed. No magic pill or special secret. It's what we have inside. It always has been.
Ron Vitale is the author of the young adult fantasy novel "Cinderella's Secret Diary: Lost" and a runner since 2008.