Striking the Balance: Disaster Blogging, Disaster Communications, Disaster Relief.

Things have, for the most part, settled down with the present disaster relief efforts in the world. Perhaps because of the circles that I get pulled into, and those that I traverse willingly, my perspective is rather different from those in these circles in ways that alarm me. In ways that scare me. In ways that, in fact, disgust me at times.

It's time to vent a little. It's time to talk about the elephant in the middle of the room. It's time to talk about the difference between hype and help.

A lot of the time I feel like a domesticated tiger who is having his tail repeatedly pulled by passerby. My focus - guided by my background as a Hospital Corpsman - is always on the victims during disasters, in the context of getting help to them - and even finding them immediately after the disaster. I've advocated emergency systems to be in place so that SMS messages can be sent by people trapped, by people unable to receive help, and by people who are probably feeling very alone at the time. Be it an elderly person trapped on a roof in New Orleans, a child trapped in the rubble of a school in Pakistan, or someone surrounded by saltwater with no water to drink after a tsunami... these are the most important people in a disaster. Not the ones who are found - not the ones that one can write about - but the ones which have to be found to be written about. Perhaps because of this, I don't really think disaster blogs are a big deal in comparison. In fact, I have even found disaster blogs and the related politics involved tends to be yet another obstacle.

Disaster Blog Experiences

There are some good people behind 'disaster-blogs', and I will not demean these people - but I will point out that disaster blogging is really only a small part of disaster relief. We're talking about human lives, and while it's good to voluntary coordinate and inform, the real issue is on the ground - not in cyberspace. What I find most alarming is that, like described in the Tibetan Book of the Dead, there are a lot of Hungry Ghosts - people doing things just to do things. That is not my problem, really, until the priorities of the Hungry Ghosts negatively impact the potential good things that can get to the ground.

The Tsunami and SEA EAT

When I first got involved with emergency communications, it was a fluke - I was sitting less than 20 feet from where I am sitting now, in my old room, when I had remembered some of the things I had read in relation to Hurricane Ivan. It was December, 2004, and myself and a then fellow WorldChanging.com writer put the word out that we needed an expert on SMS. Within 3 days, Dan Lane came on board and slew the dragon within a matter of hours - the Alert Retrieval Cache (ARC) was created. And yet... because of the politics associated within the project (I was accused of stealing credit by the third project member when I always said that this was something I had seen in numerous papers). Things got nasty when people who thought that they had come up with a new idea instead found out that it was an old idea - and perhaps they felt robbed of credit. Not my problem. I didn't ask for credit. In fact, neither did Dan - more so than myself.

Dan and I were two geeks trying to do something nice, which is something we talked about at the MobileActive Convergence. The rest I can only speculate on, but I can say that there was a delay in posting of the project on the SEA EAT blog, and people cited the matter of responsibility and so forth as an excuse not to mention that there was a working system that could be used.

One person went around posting the number all over the internet, which we had to jump on quickly because of abuse and 'spam'... and the BBC was informed, without Dan and I knowing, and suddenly we were being interviewed. In retrospect, I actually wish I had not done that interview.

The information on the ARC was finally made available on the SEA EAT weblog, after a Skype conversation with one person where we hashed out that the SEA EAT Wiki would not be the place where the ARC information resided. I didn't want it on this site, but it had to be somewhere. Looking back, I am struck about how reactionary the thinking was on the parts of others based on all the skewed information that they were getting, I saw it as the usual 'peace instead of justice' sort of diplomacy which disgusts me .¹ If the price to be paid to get the information to the public was just moving the project data to this site - then so be it. It happened. Late. Too late to be useful, really. I resigned from the SEA EAT weblog in disgust.² Making a name for one's self off of the shoulders of those suffering is somewhat... disturbing to me. Fortunately, those that do this are a small minority in my perspective, but in my perspective they still exist.

The creation of the ARC, though, and the BBC interview - these things defined when I would be emailed in the future, and by whom. And like a punch drunk boxer, I would always want to get back in the ring.

Someone mentioned interest from the Thai government, but I couldn't make the idea any simpler - a SMS->Email/web gateway is a no-brainer to the right people, and to the wrong people you might as well grow another head and pretend you're Zaphod Beeblebrox.

Katrina

When Katrina devastated the gulf coast of the United States, I got a few emails on the ARC. Andy Carvin and I discussed TCP/IP propagation, which could have been possible with all the military vehicles and probably was - but since the Department of Homeland Security was running things, there was no real way to coordinate with what was, in effect, a military operation.

The politics and, perhaps secondarily in some cases, actual suffering - this created a need to look into what could be done better, and some interesting discussions started. But nothing concrete has come back - understandably. Hurricanes are making a mess of the region. And at the time, I really just wanted to be left alone after the death of my father.³

The Earthquake in Pakistan

In the latest evolution, with Angelo emailing me, I initially worked with QuakeHelp to get SMS ideas flowing around cyberspace again. I emailed around, got on the MobileActive list and lo! Nathaniel Freitas got involved. Dan and I probably contributed in some small way⁴, but the end product of the SMS usage on the ground was not really to our credit and I can honestly say that I didn't want to get involved when I saw some of the same names cropping up.

These things should be local efforts, I think. And they did get it working, and it has been a local effort - one to be applauded (QuakeHelp blog probably has the details) and one to be repeated for other disasters, though with more of a prophylactic focus, I think.

Blogging Versus Disaster Relief

Blogging can be good for getting information in and out of areas, but it really doesn't help the victims within the first 72 hours. That's a hard and fast rule, and it also serves to get the blog established on the internet. But it's a small part of disaster relief. And in truth, until it ties to the victim, I don't see it as having anything much to do with disaster communications.

Imagine yourself under a building, without hope and voice communication. How does that weblog help you? If you make it through the actual disaster, it can help get you relief - if you make it out from under the building.

Emergency Communications vs. Disaster Relief

The establishment of emergency communications SMS is necessary for getting to victims - people forget that during the tsunami relief efforts, one country (I forget which) actually did an SMS broadcast to everyone from that country who was in that region of the world. It can be done. I don't think it has been done since. That's a shame. Questions need to be asked - loudly.

The first aspect of Disaster Relief is communication with the ground. Communication with the victims should be intuitive. But in and of itself, it means nothing...

Disaster Relief

Disaster Relief itself is a complex business. Proper communication with people in affected areas is a big issue, to determine needs and logistics of supplies. Secondarily, getting additional supplies is needed.

But so often, it seems, I see the cart before the horse. I think... with the last disaster, QuakeHelp really helped out in this regard and I would like to see such things continue to happen. Coordination is a hard thing to do, and I give Angelo of the QuakeHelp weblog high praise on this. An outstanding human being.

People have to know what to do, who to call/SMS - and they don't. I've advocated a SMS equivalent to 911 - SMS (767) which could be used for that around the world. In one part of the world, too, they are tracking cell phones for traffic, but in another part of the world they don't think of that.

And even now, with the BBC discussing this on television - politics at the national level is still an issue between India and Pakistan. Perhaps there is hope for progress there as well.

Perhaps most importantly - nobody was worried about credit. And that's the way it should be when even one human life is at stake. And I think... that the right people are getting involved, despite others.

Meanwhile, I'll keep working toward a community-based standing system for such things...which is less technological than an awareness issue.

¹ Slavery and lack of women's rights also happened in peace time, and were reinforced by that very same mindset - just two examples.
² Seeing the same names, especially the name I had the conversation over Skype about moving the ARC information, still disturbs me. I cannot ask that people apologize for their nature; I was done no wrong - I was just delayed in doing what could have been better. I never will ask for apologies, but I also do not forget. Remembering the nature of people is a useful thing. Seeing the same names pop up in similar endeavours reinforces this as well. The idea of this entry is not to demean people, but to get people going in what I believe the right direction is - thus no names of those with whom I have had a negative experience are mentioned. The focus is on what was or was not done, not the people.
³ Come to think of it, nobody was too awfully concerned about what I was going through - just what I could do for them. Hmm.
⁴ Dan was swamped with work (probably still is), and I'm still dealing with legalities involving my father's Will and so on... some things have to be done quickly.