BBC dot.life blog: Twitter and the China earthquake

BBC Technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones muses on Robert Scoble’s claim that Twitter broke the news of the earthquake in China quicker than United States Geological Survey, which provides early warnings of seismic events.

“Let’s see, as this story unfolds, whether this is the moment when Twitter comes of age as a platform which can bring faster coverage of a major news event than traditional media, while allowing participants and onlookers to share their experiences,” suggests Mr Cellan-Jones.

Tags: BBC, BBC Technology, China, earthquake, Robert Scoble, Rory Cellan-Jones

BBC moblog reports from international mobile conference

The BBC has been experimenting with filing video reports from mobile phones as part of its coverage of Mobile World Congress 2008, in Barcelona this week.

Technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones explained the approach in a video post the BBC’s dot.life technology blog before the event:

Then while in Barcelona he moblogged several interviews, including one with Isabella Rossellini about making movies available for viewing on mobile phones, using the footage to augment a text story by embedding a flash player in the head of the story for a nice piece of additional story telling.

The MoJo approach is finding increasing favour with large news organisations. Reuters put mobiles in the hands of delegates at last month’s World Economic Forum in Davos.

How long will it take to trickle down into the regional press though? My guess would be 18-24 months before we see the first serious use.

Tags: Barcelona, BBC, Davos, dot.life technology blog, Isabella Rossellini, mobile phones, reuters, Rory Cellan-Jones, World Congress, World Economic Forum

BBC: Web 2.0 tools help Heathrow crash reporting

BBC Technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones outlines how the tools she used to report Thursday’s crash have changed from 10 years ago.

Now the first destination is Google with search queries rather than calls to the video libraries and checking the BBC archive.

Tags: BBC, BBC Technology, google, Rory Cellan-Jones, search queries