As I come to terms with the personal impact of the events in Blacksburg, I’d like to address the technological importance and social impact the Web had for everyone touched by this tragedy. While I struggled to comprehend the unfolding story, another part of me observed the way I received and shared information, as well as how I mourned with others; I did more grieving and reflecting online than I did at any vigil, memorial service, or bar visit. After that realization, I had to examine the role of the Web in greater detail.

In the span of a few days I relied on the Web for many things:

• Reading multiple network news sites nonstop for several days
• Following the informational evolution on the events using Wikipedia
• IMing friends and colleagues on and off campus to find out what was going on and, later, if everyone was okay (I actually communicated with one friend via IM while she was in a locked-down classroom.)
• Reading VT campus emails
• Viewing the Akamai stream for a local Roanoke television station
• Watching press conferences live online
• Googling numerous topics and people to learn more
• Using MySpace and Facebook to check on friends and let others know how I am doing
• Joining Facebook groups discussing the event and sharing condolences (largest of which is currently up to 47,000 people)
• Viewing a list of classes in Norris Hall generated from VT registrar’s automated schedule planner (Based on first-hand knowledge, VT students later added shading to that schedule indicating the attacked classes. They also compiled an almost complete list of the deceased on Facebook and launched several online memorials.)
• Changing my IM display images to the black-ribbon VT logo
• Putting the Nikki Giovanni podcast on my MySpace profile
• Signing an online petition supporting VT administrators (joining more than 35,000 people at the moment)

I used Web tools as the tragedy unfolded. I used them to contact friends and colleagues in Blacksburg. I used them to grieve with my various communities. And I am amazed that they so easily emerged as necessary coping mechanisms without my noticing. Now, I know the news media mined the social networking angle to death, but there were so many other ways the Web was involved. The Web did more than provide lazy journalists with easy sound bites. It fundamentally changed the way I was informed and how I grieved.

And there is an undeniable ripple effect. In the span of a week, I talked to more people from my youth, from high school, from undergrad, and from Tech itself than I have in the last decade. Not only did they use social networking or IM to contact me, but by their comments it was clear they had used those same resources to keep up with me. How else does a girl from my sophomore year of high school even know I am a VT grad student? When time has passed and we have come to terms with the human tragedy, I think this event will serve as a valuable demonstration of what happens when Web 2.0 meets a social crisis. It is undeniable that the way society deals with such tragedy is going to be drastically different from this point forward.

Mind & Media Strategist Jason Sonnenfelt is completing his Ph.D. in public affairs and administration at Virginia Tech. He—along with Mind & Media founder and CEO Aldo Bello, Director of Technology Alan Eisenberg, Director of Interactive Media Chris Ammon, and Video Specialist Jason Hunter—is a proud Hokie. –Eds.