TARA Trek: Citizen Journalism Anew: Tsunami Citizen Journalism Mentions

These are a few references to my tsunami blogging and a few other mentions on my writing in general that are publicly available. I apologize if this comes across as patting my own back, but I'm I'm trying to get some bylined articles in the press as well and using this post as a "references" page.

Shel Israel's first reference to my writing post-tsunami :

Evelyn Rodriguez is superb writer with a keen eye and a sense of irony. She was slammed by the tsunami at Phuket Beach, had her knee gashed open so she could see the bone, had to hobble the streets of Bankok on crutches to get a temp passport and had the SJ Mercury report on her return as if it were an adventure vacation of some sort. She talks about how losing her clothes, getting too little sleep and having no shampoo become trivial whle seeing the trauma and personal losses of others. I've been reading dozens of personal experience reports, but hers is the most moving, the most informative and the wisest.

From Stowe Boyd, President/COO of Corante :

Evelyn Rodriguez proves again why she is one of the strongest voices out there in her recap of Blogher:

From Amy Gahran, " Amateurs Deserve Respect: Evelyn Rodriguez Nails It":

The unspoken tenet of officialdom is that if you haven’t been “vetted,” you have no right to express your views or present your information...

On Oct. 24, writer Evelyn Rodriguez tackled the cult of officialdom head on – and I think she nailed it...

[U]nofficial voices in the public conversation matter, too. Even if they’re haphazard, or not slick. They’re getting easier to find, and more prominent. Sometimes they agree with or amplify officialdom. Sometimes they say the emperor has no clothes. Sometimes they raise entirely new topics. And very often, they pose compelling questions.

Evelyn said all this far more eloquently than I, with lots of good links and examples. Be sure to check out her article.

From Jeff Jarvis' MSNBC airtime links (follow-up from program via his blog ):

Evelyn Rodriguez posted very personal and heartfelt moments from Phuket at Crossroads Dispatches. A commenter now tells me she just arrived back home. She tells of sitting next to people whose lives are thrown apart: a boy who has lost his family, a man who lost his wife, another man who found his wife after their children back home told the father he'd just seen the mother on TV looking for him.

In another post, Jeff Jarvis references my writing:

I'll beg your pardon again for viewing this through my own prism, but as I think back over the three years since I survived 9/11, I ~~sometimes~~ often get frustrated that I didn't change my life and the world in some big way. But then again, Evelyn now makes me realize that perhaps I did: The event got me to blog and blogging allowed me to adapt and incorporate the change that day brought in the context I knew -- media and news and populism. It helped me reset some priorities. It allowed me to join with or at least witness the people in this space who really are using it to change the world. Evelyn figured that out on her plane ride home. It took me three years and help from her to figure it out.

At the recent Recovery 2.0 meeting, Jeff Jarvis continues:

I finally got to meet Evelyn Rodriguez, the marketing blogger who happened to survive the tsunami and shared her experience so compellingly on her blog.

From venture capitalist Fred Wilson on "Why Blogs are Special ":

But in that "loose ends" post Evelyn casually mentioned that she was going to be taking a few weeks off on the beach in Thailand. That post was made on December 13th.

Well you know what happens next. Her blog is a dramtic story of the tsunami, how she was affected (she was on a boat!), and the aftermath, getting home, etc.

She's done about 20 posts since the first one where she describes getting caught by the tsunami. Most of them are about the tsunami experience, but recently she's getting back to her normal beat.

This is what makes blogs special. They are real stories about real people doing real things. Told by the people who did them. How can you beat that?

Om Malik of Business 2.0 in his Broadband blog :

Meanwhile, I would love to give a big shout-out to Evelyn who has done a yeo(wo)man's work in bringing to us the first hand reports from the affected regions.

Om Malik wrote a Business 2.0 piece as well: " The Rise of a New News Network : Weblogs, once online diaries, have morphed into reporters' notebooks":

As the network anchors drummed their manicured fingers, waiting for correspondents to parachute into position, the sketchy wire reports were supplanted by real-life, as-it-was-happening stories by bloggers who penned moving first-person accounts. You had to wait for the official death toll to be announced on CNN, but you could smell the stench of death on Evelyn Rodriguez's weblog.

Hugh McLeod, popular advertising/marketing blogger wrote :

Evelyn writes again from post-Tsunami Thailand
I didn't mention it in the last post as I was a bit loopy on painkillers...but I really did think I was going to die in that tidal wave flood. And we kept hearing rumors of another bigger wave coming and that we would need to get to the highest hill (at this point several people including myself couldn't walk).
Wow. By bloggingg standards, this is huge stuff. We're more used to a steady diet of "Upgraded to Movable Type v3.14 yesterday" or whatever.

Recent mention in Hugh McLeod's "Global Microbrand Rant ":

People like Jennifer Rice, Johnnie Moore and Evelyn Rodriguez come to mind.

Guardian UK's round-up of tsunami first-hand reports here included snippets from my writing.

Robert Scoble's (Microsoft blogger and author of Naked Conversations) original post:

Evelyn Rodriguez, one of 1010 bloggers I read, gives her personal account of being slammed by a tidal wave.

Another post from Robert Scoble:

Evelyn Rodriguez: God, There Must Be a Better Way to Build Blog Traffic .

If you hadn't heard, Evelyn (I met her at BloggerCon last year) rode out the Tsunami and survived.

We're glad she's still with us and still blogging.

Evelyn: I don't care if you ever blog the same again. You are doing a wonderful thing. Hope your leg heals well and I have a feeling that you'll be on stage at future BloggerCons. I imagine you'd have something new to say about the emotional life of weblogs. Among other things.

Evelyn's post reminded me of a blog post I made that I titled " It's Nice to Be Alive" and " A Seat Belt Saved My Life ."

Someday my name will show up on the Blog of Death. We all will. But until then, I'm gonna try to do what I can to improve this place.

Well, anyway, since this is the first post of 2005, Evelyn, it's nice to have you here. Thanks for the reminder of what life is all about.

From Daily Pegasus:

Anyone who doubted the reach and power of citizen journalism should have had their mouth shut with the remarkable "amateur" coverage of the tsunami. A brief, by no means comprehensive, survey:

Peg inspiration Evelyn Rodriguez was vacationing in Thailand when the disaster struck -- she was on a boat when the Tsunami hit. She's been blogging from a free internet station at the hospital. (Yeah, in the "third world." Haven't seen such things at Parkland.)

Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson's podcast includes mention & link to my blog:

The tsunami tragedy in Asia - the role of blogs as great examples of how they can help organizations, plus discussion on specific blogs and how they're helping relief efforts.

Shel Israel, author of Naked Conversations in " Post-Tsunami Observations":

I have a few random observations that hit me during this week of loss and devastation. They are more about people and technology than on the horror:

Blogging got better. Each day the quality and accuracy of information got better almost exponentially. Bloggers are new at this, but we are everywhere. The reports of people who were there, Evelyn Rodruiquez, were delayed for a few days. First they had to remain alive and get to safety.

Shel Israel, author of Naked Conversations on Business Week's Blogspotting post on Women Bloggers:

I agree with Niti. If I were to make a list of the top 100 bloggers in my opinion, Evelyn would be high on the list as would BL Ochman. But, then I cannot tell you how many women would be on my list, nor could a tell you how many African Americans or Jews would be on the list. For that matter, Icannot tell you how many of these people would be left-handed, or short or tall. What difference should gender make? Do all lists have to be gender inclusive? The idea I always thought was to not discriminate one way or another.

From Neville Hobson in WebProNews.com , " Blogs Can Keep the Awareness Alive":

This morning, I was reading Evelyn Rodriguez' latest posts in Crossroads Dispatches following her safe return home.

Evelyn was caught up (and injured) in the Asia earthquake and tsunamis disaster and blogged about what she saw and experienced.

One of Evelyn's posts in particular has provoked some thoughts.

In a post entitled A Tsunami Survivor's Perspective: The Press and Blogs , Evelyn writes:

"Bringing Story Closer. I didn't realize on Monday when I wrote from Phuket Hospital that scale of the tsunami and numbers of people affected as I only got very sparse news at the time. I didn't intend to blog so much about it except I felt a responsibility to bring the story home. Perhaps many people, especially Americans, could not relate to an event halfway around the world I thought. You might be moved for a few minutes, but eventually you sip your morning coffee and go back to work and the daily routine. In order to help with the relief effort, I thought it was important to bring the story closer to home by sharing the my own story (regular readers already know me and could relate to me) and those I'd met. I'm particularly motivated to help the local people whom have often lost families, their homes and their livelihoods - even though most of the folks I've mentioned thus far are foreigners."

What struck me in particular was Evelyn's comment "You might be moved for a few minutes, but eventually you sip your morning coffee and go back to work and the daily routine."

That's how it is with disasters. I think many people just get numbed by it all after a while. Look at what's happening in Iraq on a daily basis, for instance, or an equally-awful tragedy in Argentina a few days ago ( 175 killed in a nightclub fire). Such events have momentarily been eclipsed by the tsunami disaster...

So, to the thoughts Evelyn's posts provoked.

It's simply this: blogs can play a role in keeping awareness of this disaster on the front page and not on page 8. Not necessarily by posting lengthy commentaries every day but perhaps by more subtle devices such as graphics or links to aid agencies or media sites with detailed information. For instance, I have some graphics and links at the top-right of this blog which I will keep there for as long as they're helpful. I'll also continue to post commentary.

We can make a difference in a small way.

p.s. I was also interviewed by San Jose Mercury News and a few local TV stations.

TARA Trek: Citizen Journalism Anew

Tsunami Citizen Journalism Mentions

Comments

About

Recent Posts

Tip Jar

Spread the Word