NWS to enforce rule on use of social media

[John Farley]

Very lively discussion going on now on the Weather and Society list about a decision in the past few days to restrict NWS employees from using their individual Twitter, etc. accounts to disseminate warnings. On the one hand, many agree with the notion that there is a need for consistency in how warnings are disseminated and that individual NWS employees using their own accounts, as has been done in some recent outbreaks, can get in the way of this. OTOH, the NWS apparently does not yet have a way of using the social networking sites to disseminate warnings through its own systems, although they are working on it - and clearly sites like Twitter are a good place to reach a lot of people quickly. You have to be a member of the Weather and Society list to view it, but here is a link to an article on the NWS policy:

http://knowthenetwork.com/blog/2010/05/natl-weather-service-bans-social-media/

You can register for the Weather and Society list at this URL:

http://www.rap.ucar.edu/forums/phpBB2/ucp.php?mode=register&sid=2f3a4679d294326e228009029c7636f4

 

[rdale]

Little easier to access the chatter at http://digitalmeteorologist.com