On April 10, 2008, James Karl Buck, a graduate student from the University of California-Berkeley, was arrested in Mahalla, Egypt along with his translator, Mohammed Maree. They were there covering an anti-government protest and were mistakenly accused to be a part of it. Buck was able to alert his friends and colleagues and get out of jail by sending a one word message on the micro-blogging site Twitter: "Arrested."
Within seconds, Buck's friends were made aware that he was in trouble, eventually leading to his college hiring a lawyer on his behalf. Not only did Twitter help him get out of jail, Buck used Twitter to stay updated on the events in Egypt. You can read more on this story
here.
Twitter along with Facebook are great ways to keep in touch with family and friends when you are abroad. They can stay up-to-date with your activities and they would be made aware if you were in trouble just like in Buck's case. Facebook, in particular, is very popular among travelers. I was able to experience this firsthand last year when I traveled through South America. I was almost always guaranteed to see someone using Facebook on the public computer in each hostel that I stayed at.
Do you use Twitter or Facebook when you travel?
Comments (8)
very interesting =)
That is a sweet story......
wow, amazing how technology can do. :)
Very interesting
I would say that I use Twitter more than Facebook,
However Xanga may help a little if you family knew you were using it.
I use Twitter all the time.
haha saved by twitter
i tweet even more when travelling than when at home. and i link Twitter in with Facebook to update my status so everyone knows where i am and what i'm doing.
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