Information whizzing through broadband. Who's sorting the details?

The last place an American soldier should feel threatened is on his or her own home post. Gunfire from a semi-automatic handgun ripped into that sense of security this afternoon at Fort Hood, Texas. The Army says a psychiatrist preparing to be shipped out to Afghanistan fired two handguns into a crowd of soldiers also processing to go overseas. A first responder to the shooting scene shot the gunman at least four times. The gunman returned fire and shot her. They both survived.

As soon as the shots rang out word began to spread in every way imaginable, through texting, cell phones, Twitter, Facebook, web sites and television. As professional journalists began wading through the details, working sources and arriving on the scene they started flashing updates on web pages alongside streams of Twitter updates from anyone with a connection to Fort Hood.

For those of you who haven't jumped on to the Twitter bandwagon yet or if you're a student looking for a communications research project study Fort Hood. Twitter just started a new sorting device called lists. Mainstream media like the NY Times, The Today Show and the Dallas Morning News started culling Fort Hood relating posts into sorted lists for readers looking for broad reaching fresh information about Fort Hood. The Huffington Post did the same.

It was a flurry of accounts from people on post, but also a collection of Tweets and Retweets from journalists working the story.  Word spread quickly on Twitter about the local hospital needing blood donors to treat the injured coming to the emergency room. The message came down a short time later after an overwhelming response. The hospital thanked people by sending its own Tweet.

Through all that broadband data flying from mobile devices and laptops there was also television and cable carrying news conferences live as a first hand source. Television still carries the day in creating a place for large scaled dissemination of video, emotion and instant live information. But, the power of the personal instant mobile nature of Twitter and social networking like Facebook is quickly growing.

We posted updates on CNYCentral.com and also on our Twitter page. I used Twitter to search for any possible connections between people at Fort Drum and Fort Hood. I ended up messaging a Syracuse graduate in the Defense Department. By days end Facebook had set up a prayer page for Fort Hood victims.

We will learn more in the coming days or hours about the shooter and what went wrong inside his mind. Fort Hood has already taught us a lot about communication of tragic quickly developing events in a new media world.

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