The impact of social media on storm chasing

[Jeff Wright]

Weather Channel had some good citizen-journalist footage today:

Over 180 Lake Erie Waterspouts, Record-Breaking Day - Videos from The Weather Channel

According to the International Centre for Waterspout Research, Saturday was a record-breaking day on Lake Erie with over 180 waterspout reports. Take a look at some of the impressive visuals from this waterspout outbreak. - Videos from The Weather Channel | weather.com

weather.com

 

[Rick Schmidt]

180 waterspouts? Or 180 REPORTS of waterspouts?

 

[Warren Faidley]

180 waterspouts? Or 180 REPORTS of waterspouts?

I believe (not confirmed) they were counting any type of lowering / funnel as a "waterspout." Correct me if I am wrong, but I don't believe it's an actual "waterspout" unless the circulation reaches the surface of the water.

 

[Bill Hark]

Like anything, I think social has had both negative and positive effects on chasing. The negatives are fairly obvious. I agree those earlier on this thread including the effects of "chasing for clicks" and those emulating bad behavior. I also lament the demise of a number of chaser websites and the loss of historic chase reports. I'd rather see chase images/video with a detailed report on the forecast, set up and decision process. Of course, that's more time consuming. I myself quit writing up reports and putting them on my website, though I still post images on Facebook and Twitter )X). I try to post here too though admittedly not as much as I should. Won't touch TikTok. There's so much useful info in written chase reports that is lost. I miss the old printed and mailed StormTrack. As for Twitter (X), I do find it very useful for quick real time updates especially as storms form. I'll add that there is a certain amount of "comparison is the thief of joy." One can be very happy with a chase until one sees what other's intercepted. That occurred years ago. it's just more acute with social media. I stil enjoy seeing others chase photos and video. I like storms. There's no turning back. We just have to deal with it and make the best of what's available. In the end, storms will always be fun to chase.

 

[Peter MacDonald]

The storm chasing community's reliance on Twitter is inherently self-destructive, and alternative modes of real time communication need to be established as Elon Musk implodes the platform. I went to reactivate my account recently and there are so many glitches on the official app. Never mind the bizarre political rants and disinformation campaigns that always seem to be magically promoted to the top of your feed. Twitter itself is facing a five-alarm fire, and I would be surprised to see it still around in any meaningful form by 2025. The main problem at the moment is that there are no viable alternatives. It has gotten to the point where I have distanced myself from "the community", and I have over the last few months contemplated leaving it entirely and pursuing a healthier hobby.

I appreciate the nostalgia in this thread about going back to pre-social media times, with print magazines and posting on forums like these, and I've also gone the direction of no longer using many apps. I've deleted Instagram, deactivated Twitter, never bothered with TikTok, don't post on YouTube. I do not care about fame, money, or views like a lot of people do. I have met a lot of people through this hobby, including one of the chasers interviewed in the article posted above. I will say it is a shame to see people warping this hobby into something it really shouldn't be. Storm chasing should be about having fun, enjoying the miracles that God creates, and collecting meaningful data to advance scientific research. It shouldn't be a competition to see how many tornadoes you have seen, how close you have gotten to being killed, or how much money you made on that Twitter post or YouTube video.

We are starting to see what happens when an entire generation grows up on social media and the internet, and as it turns out it's extremely damaging. I am right on the cusp of Gen Z and Millennial, so I think I can get a pass saying this without being called an angry boomer. Things are not looking very good right now. This isn't unique to any one particular hobby, but it is impacting storm chasing pretty hard. Outside of my weather enthusiast friends and political extremists I haven't talked to since high school, I really do not know anyone who even uses Twitter anymore. I think that itself says something.

 

[Dan Robinson]

Sadly, I'm close to giving up on a return to forums, blogs and web sites. When I try urging a movement back to it, I just end up by myself watching the rest of the weather world go on without me. The dopamine addiction of likes and shares is just too strong to pull most away from social media or even convince many to reconsider giving five to six figures of content value away to those platforms. That's a subject for another thread, many don't realize they could have bought a car or even a house with all they've given away, and I see indications that even if many did realize it, it wouldn't change anything. That's how powerful the collective addiction we're dealing with really is. What hope is there, given that? I don't know what the answer is, we've certainly tried just about everything on here over the years.

I bailed from Facebook in 2014 and haven't been back (aside from a private account I use to search for reuploaded videos). Twitter is still useful for realtime weather information and even reporting severe weather, as many of the NWS WFOs are active on it and the state wx hashtags have a good reach among local media. I have more than 50 words/phrases muted (Settings > Privacy and Safety > Mute and Block > Muted Words) which keeps my feed mostly weather and storm centered without any of the usual garbage. I realize some users aren't seeing the ability to switch between the algorithmic "For You" and the traditional chronological "Following" feed setting, but so far my feed hasn't been forcing me to the former.

In a perfect world, the NWS WFOs would have Stormtrack up alongside (or instead of) Twitter/X and the realtime reports and photos would come from here. It seems like many have a desire for that kind of thing, how to make it happen is beyond my abilities.

 

[Sean Ramsey]

The path I'm on has lead me back to this forum and has me moving away from social media more and more each day. I still have an active Facebook page where I post my photos (it allows my to post to Instagram at the same time so I post there as well but only because of this particular feature) for business reasons, but I deleted my twitter account with 6K followers over a year ago. I did start another account recently, but it was to have access to real time info from SPC and other weather authorities, which honestly helps while chasing.

Most of the reason for returning here is because I'm on a journey to get back to my roots of why I loved to chase storms in the first place. I no longer have the urge to share what I see or capture out in the field so posting anything chase related makes social media unnecessary for me. I find myself just wanting to go out and experience a good storm, and tornadoes aren't even close to necessary anymore. I joined this place in 2010 after going forever not even realizing there were a lot of other people like me who enjoyed storms like I did. I stopped visiting because I didn't feel like I had a lot to contribute due to my interest mainly being in how storms looked which didn't quite line up with the scientific side of things. But, these days I don't care because I don't feel the pressure to keep up with everyone else's experiences or expertise like in the old days, which is nice because it allows me to come back and enjoy everything at my own pace.

Social media is the exact opposite, where clout/fame/money is the carrot on the stick and today's algorithms are relentless in the content they serve up, and there's plenty of it to serve these days. I see Stormtrack as the backroads to the interstate that social media is, and it's a nice change of pace and a sort of refuge from the deluge of personalities and their end goals.

 

[Warren Faidley]

I still participate on most of the social media platforms, but my preferences are highly altered to filter out many, many keywords, including idiot chaser names, a host of political terms and almost all advertising. I've also altered what I see on the opening pages by using ad blocking filters to completely avoid entertainment and misleading / fake news headlines. I also avoid most of the live YouTube stunt chasers as they irritate the hell out of me. The exception is Ryan Hall, who provides decent coverage during big events and it's fun to watch events unfold in Dixie Alley. I rarely use social media during my own chases, unless I can relay information or someone provides disaster information where my EMT skills can be utilized.

The biggest problem with social media is calling people out for fake, dangerous or other types of chasing buffoonery. Don't even attempt to do it. The rabid fan bases will rip you to shreds. The good thing about ST is that you can still call someone out and have a decent and constructive conservation.

 

[Ben Holcomb]

Social Media is a cancer to society and society seems terminal with cancer. Hard to believe it's been 4 years since I dropped twitter and probably closer to 6 years since I dropped fartbook.

I agree with Brett that the internet used to be better in 2003 than now. While I don't know of anyone being cancelled off socials for chasing storms, I would not be surprised for that to change in the future. I think the major wake up for me was watching the hysteria over a cold that was billed as the most dangerous bug of all time. Anyone who suggested something other than going to a hospital and being murdered by their "treatments" was billed as looney toons. Especially if you mentioned cheap alternatives, questioned a vaccine pushed by pharmaceutical companies, or realized masks didn't work, you were immediately cancelled. This will eventually happen to chasing too.

In which case, those that are cancelled may really lose all of their followers, videos, photos, etc like they never existed. This is why I've been putting my efforts into my website. The website makes me $0 and in fact costs me monthly to host it. Yes, my host could cancel me but my website is physically sitting on a machine at my house and can be published to any server on the web (including the one its sitting on) and I own the domain name. It's also archived on places like archive.org and I have contigency plans if I were to die to ensure the site remains online for awhile much like Eric Nguyen's site. Eric died before FB was really a thing, and Twitter didnt really exist either. Look at how chasing and sharing of video and photos has changed since then. How many chasers have put video up on youtube or tiktok or facebook or wherever and lost the original copy? I know it happens more than some where would like to think. I know most of y'all don't practice proper backup techniques.

Social media has turned chasing into an entertainment-based entity.

And this is the bottom line of the problem. I remember in 2011 when they were shooting the Discovery series in Murdo SD and I had a guest in from Finland. He was watching Reed and Joel re-take a scene multiple times at the hotel we were at. He turned to me and said "real TV not so real is it?" What people portray with a camera is not reality. It's really easy to set a camera just so to capture what you want and to leave out important details. That's also social media in a nutshell.

It's easy to portray the good times and hide your bad times. Reed rarely talked about his busts publicly, but always posted video of his triumphs. Then others see your life highlight reel and compare themselves to it. This tends to keep people focused on comparing to others and having a "great life" like others using Fear of Missing out (FOMO). It also fosters the herd mentality. The herd mentality is how we ended up with people on this forum feeling so self-righteous that they threatened to report people to "authorities" (lol) for chasing during 2020 "quarantine".

They talk about the increased sense of "community," but oftentimes that only applies to the ones who can get out and chase everything... Some seem to get off put when someone who has been around for that many years, but only gets to chase a handful of times a year, offers advice on things.

This was quite evident at the Chaser Summit this year. If you have a big social media presence and stream live and have your SN dot out there on storms, you are "popular". You don't follow that formula? Doesn't matter what you have seen, people have no idea who you are. I also had no idea who most were there. I guess that makes me a curmudgeon boomer, but whatever.

We are starting to see what happens when an entire generation grows up on social media and the internet, and as it turns out it's extremely damaging.

Too many people don't realize that twitter != real life. For many years the narrative was controlled by our own government. See the twitter files that Bari Weiss and Matt Taibbi dropped. That appeases the statists or power hungry people who feel they have some sort of control over others lives and decisions. The best way to break free of all of that is to just distance yourself from the cancer.

 

[Warren Faidley]

This was quite evident at the Chaser Summit this year. If you have a big social media presence and stream live and have your SN dot out there on storms, you are "popular". You don't follow that formula? Doesn't matter what you have seen, people have no idea who you are. I also had no idea who most were there. I guess that makes me a curmudgeon boomer, but whatever.

This is an interesting observation and would make an excellent, separate topic. One reason I would never attend this specific event is because some view it as a "fan-boy" summit. It's the same people speaking every year and some of the speakers have likely done more harm to the chasing community than good.

It was great when guys like Doswell was actively involved in chasing and speaking because he was not afraid to shake up the chasing community when idiots acted up. He was one of the few respected chasers who had the guts and clout to do it justice. He called me out several times during my "younger" years for idiotic behavior and it made me a better chaser.

 

[Ben Holcomb]

This is an interesting observation and would make an excellent, separate topic. One reason I would never attend this specific event is because some view it as a "fan-boy" summit. It's the same people speaking every year and some of the speakers have likely done more harm to the chasing community than good.

Let me tell you, I had the same perception. I was in Hawaii last year while it was going on near my house, but I was told it was different. I attended this year and it was as good of an event as when Samaras was still alive. It's a shame the former owners of the ChaserCon name would not allow the new folks in charge to keep the name. Kind of shows where the issue was.

With that said, I also realized sitting there this year with Jon Davies that we veterans (do I finally qualify as that? I guess so) also need to step up and be part of the change we wish to see. It feels like we're in a pivotal moment again in chasing with a large influx of newer chasers. Especially next year after a big movie release this summer. Erik told us he sold about 500 tickets to the event this year. Imagine being able to put on a presentation to reach out to those new folks?

I've been considering a presentation for next year. My specialty is tech, so it will probably be related to that - Likely the topic of websites. Warren, as someone who first saw you on the weather channel back in the early 90s, it would probably be an honor for some (myself included) to see a presentation from you as well. I know Jon has also talked about doing one. Be the change you want to see

 

[Jonathan Scrogham]

This topic makes me more grateful to have Stormtrack. It’s not a bunch of people clamoring to get likes, but chasers and weather enthusiasts who are deeply passionate. I don’t have a problem with chasers using social media, I’m personally jealous of some of the chasers who can turn their hobby into a career with social media, and I think social media is great in the fact that people can chase for a living. I believe the real problem I have is with people who don’t care that much about weather and more about getting views and money from said views, encouraging others to do the same dangerous acts.

 

[Dan Robinson]

Web sites are relatively cheap these days. I’m mostly out of the web design field and into other areas of IT now, but when I set up my last client site, a basic hosting plan was less than 10 dollars a month on a lot of providers. A domain is another 12 bucks a year. Wordpress and a bunch of plugins for it (for photo galleries and such) are free.

I may start a thread on setting up web sites if any are interested.

 

[Andy Wehrle]

I think the major wake up for me was watching the hysteria over a cold that was billed as the most dangerous bug of all time.

Ben,

Given the additional context in your post after this sentence, I can only assume you are referring to COVID-19. It induced extreme blood pressure spikes leading to kidney failure in my fiancée (now wife) at age 34 after we contracted it in August 2020. She is still on dialysis and awaiting a transplant nearly four years later and it has severely upended our life plans. I also tested positive for it at the same time and it indeed was little more than a "cold" for me. However, it also put one of my friends (then 36) in a coma for over a month and nearly killed him.

I respect your body of work as a chaser but it appears we likely have strongly divergent (hopefully in the upper levels!) opinions on quite a few important issues. I had some pretty choice words for your evidently flippant attitude toward the pandemic and the mitigation measures advocated by lifelong infectious-disease experts, but I will keep them to myself. Happy chasing.

 

[Warren Faidley]

I still regret not accepting speaking invitations from Tim when he ran the conference. The problem was it always fell on a weekend when I had a once a year historical fencing competition that I could not miss. I seriously doubt anyone would want me there, given my history of calling out fakery and bad behavior in the modern chasing world. It's safe to say I'm black-balled in certain circles and I would care less. I would not accept regardless, as my schedule is filled with priority events like the National Hurricane Conference and professional photography lectures. I don't care about being relevant in the "hardcore" chasing world anymore, I'm more about photography, safety education and chasing with friends.