I started searching for an article that related to social media, and one of the first articles I saw was this one by the Washington Post. Vester Lee Flanagan committed a crime (shot three people) but he wasn't immediately named a suspect. A few hours after the crime, however, Vester lead the police straight to him. He started Tweeting allegations about the victims. The first few tweets caught the eye of the police, and Vester was named a suspect. After a few Tweets, Vester posted a video that he recorded while shooting the victims on Facebook and Twitter. Both Facebook and Twitter deleted the posts and videos, and removed his account from their servers. It blows my mind that someone would do this in the first place, and especially that they would turn themselves in on social media by admitting guilt. Social media may have many benefits and drawbacks, but I'm not sure if I would consider this a good or a bad use of social media. It is bad because through social media, the criminal got his name out there and everybody heard about him, which is what he wanted. On the other hand, the police found him because he used social media, and they might never have found out who committed the crime if there wasn't social media present.
Hi Nick.
ReplyDeleteI saw an article this morning breaking the news, and was astonished when I learned that somebody had shot a news reporter during a live broadcast. I didn't know the shooter had also filmed the video and posted it along with other tweets on social media. I do see your point about social media in this case being both good and bad, but I think I would have to consider this a bad use of social media. The suspect in this case would most likely have been caught regardless of him posting incriminating evidence, but by him posting it, he will have got the attention he wanted. I will watch for this story in the news during the next couple of days and am very curious to see the other facts to the story. Do you think the video should have been allowed to stay up until the suspect was caught?
Wow! This article was so interesting. That's not something you see everyday, or expect to see when you are just scrolling through your timeline on a social media website. I also have the same question that Colby does, you would think that if the website saw these videos they would notify the police themselves or keep it on to make sure he was caught for his crimes.
ReplyDeleteThis sort of article can be mind blowing! I have seen this sort of thing in my own experiences and wondered how the cops didn't catch the people. For instance I see all the time on Facebook pictures of under age drinking and it's the person clearly holding a beer can or something of that sort. I have even see people with illegal drugs in their pictures. I am always thinking to myself aren't you afraid you are going to get caught, and how are the police not seeing this.
ReplyDeleteThis sort of article can be mind blowing! I have seen this sort of thing in my own experiences and wondered how the cops didn't catch the people. For instance I see all the time on Facebook pictures of under age drinking and it's the person clearly holding a beer can or something of that sort. I have even see people with illegal drugs in their pictures. I am always thinking to myself aren't you afraid you are going to get caught, and how are the police not seeing this.
ReplyDeleteLindsie,
DeleteI agree with what you said about people posting illegal activities on social media. I know I would never post anything like that on Facebook, but other people seem to do it all the time.