Paris--Journal/Blog Entry #9

    The recent Paris terrorist attacks has shocked the World.  It's the worse terrorist attack since 9/11.  While everyone is praying for Paris, the internet is keeping us updating with the first hand information of what is happening in Paris.  Friends and families also uses the internet to communicate with their loves one to find out if he/she is ok.  Police officers and rescuers are able to react quicker to those who need help since emergency phone line could got jam by too many calls.  Although some time the internet could turn into a bad thing and became terrorist's recruiting and communication tool, we can't deny that the internet serves more pro than its con.

    To give you a better illustration of how the internet helps people in the crisis, I have to bring you back to 2008.  In 2008, Sichuan, China, had an magnitude of 8.0M earthquake. There were more than 60 thousand victims dead in the crisis.  I followed all along the way of how the internet react to this disaster.  It was a horrific event and I cannot forget how the internet helped us unit against it.

   In 2008, I was already a two year internet user and the internet had been very practical amount all the major cities in China. And I was already in the U.S. at that time. Not long after the earthquake happened, a news just popped up on my computer said Sichuan just had an earthquake! According to an article I have read, the fastest news were published just 10 minutes after the earthquake. Just 4-5 hours after the earthquake, there were 30 millions searches about Sichuan earthquake on the search engine. Imagining that it might takes a minuses for everyone to know what just happened in Sichuan.

   Yet, what's more surprise is what happened after. Many Sichuan people was able to reach out their family by using internet.  Many people posted photos and videos on the internet to show people how bad was the earthquake.  Many family that couldn't reach out their loves one posted missing post on the interest.  Those missing post were gathered on the website and people spread them to anyone they know.  Police posted self rescue information on the internet. Many people donated money, supplies, even blood for Sichuan.  Moreover，some of my internet friends even drove to Sichuan to ship supplies and became a volunteer.  There were 3000 people were saved because of a post on the internet expressed the village needed medical and food supplies.

   Now imagine if we didn't have internet at that time. It might takes days for us to know. We couldn't reach to our loves one to make sure they are safe.  We would have no way to find our loves one when they missing. There will be less people to donated because they probably just don't know how bad it was.  The self-rescue information might have save a lot people. The 3000 people could have died in that village. After all, the Internet still save more people them it kills. So, I believe the Internet is actually a good thing.

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