David Kirkpatrick - The Tsunami and the Net: Global Awareness, Global Response - FORTUNE

David Kirkpatrick - The Tsunami and the Net: Global Awareness, Global Response - FORTUNE: "The terrible Asian tsunami, and its aftermath, has been rightly called the first truly global tragedy. One reason is that citizens of so many different countries were killed, injured or left destitute. The other reason is that the Internet's globe-spanning power made it possible for news accounts, pictures, and videos of the devastating natural disaster to be quickly transmitted around the world. Barely a day after many of us in the U.S. opened Christmas presents, we were jarred out of our complacency to see and hear about tremendous suffering halfway around the globe"