SubscribeEarthquake Relief Efforts on China’s Web
Regarding tsunami of late 2004, Richard MacManus of Read/Write Web has summarized three ways that people used the Web in response to the disaster:
1) as a constantly updated source of news about the disaster;
2) as a way for ordinary people to respond emotionally;
3) and probably most importantly, to organize aid efforts.
In this post, we try to collect the ways how Chinese Internet users take the web to provide news updates and offer relief efforts.
Source of news. At the beginning of the earthquake, we can only rely on main stream media and web portals to get news about the quake. But when more and more rescuers and volunteers reached the epicenter to offer help, much more user generated content can be found online, which enable us to know more about the aftermath.
You can easily find many photos and text reports by users in Sichuan Province in various BBS, such as Tianya, Xici.net and Baidu Tieba. Especially, since Baidu Tieba is a keyword-based BBS, that’s Baidu Tieba has a board for each keyword, so you can use the name of the county in epicenter to enter a dedicated discuss board on that county, such as Wenchuan and Beichuan, to get information.
Besides general BBS, people also discuss and exchange info in SNS, such as Douban, and in IM groups, both QQ and Baidu Hi has dedicated groups for earthquake; they use blogs, and microblogging tools, such as Twitter, Fanfou to share information; and they upload videos. Besides video uploaded by users, PPLive, a p2p video streaming site, partners with various TV channel to bring live TV reports about earthquake online.
Pray and bless. People in China express their prayers and blessings to victims of earthquake in BBS, widgets and IM. Almost all main web portals have message board for users to express their prayers and blessings; Feedsky has a blessing widget ready to be add to blogs.
MSN China initiated an MSN Messenger campaign called Rainbow, you can add “(R)” before your MSN Messenger screen-name, which will display a rainbow icon, to express your blessings. (via Danwei). Actually, it is not only a blessing, for each signature, MSN China and Guangzhou Toyota will donate 0.1 yuan separately to a fund for rebuilding the school destroyed by the quake.
In additional to news source and blessing, it is more important to use web to provide aid and relief efforts.
People Finder: Though Baidu Tieba and QQ both have a message board dedicated for users to find people and seek help, it is more convenient to use people finder tool of Sina and Netease. Google China just launched a useful tool which enables users to search people information in various BBS, so you need not to check each main BBS to find people.
Online donation: Almost all sites call for donations. Users of Taobao.com and QQ can use Alipay and Tenpay to donate online. When I write this post, QQ users have donated over 10 million yuan. Some other third-party online payment solution providers also support online donations, such as 99Bill and Yeepay.
Taobao launch a campaign, call for sellers of Taobao to join and sell goods, then donate at least 50% of their proceeds.
Alimama encourage its users, most are webmaster of their website, to replace ads on their websites into an images ad to call for donation. By May 15, over 500k donation ads have been online on Alimama’s affiliated website.
If you want to donate, check this post to find the best way for you.
Organize aids: Web is also effective in spreading information and organizing aids efforts among users. Alibaba encourages its users, almost all of them are manufacturers or service providers, to donate not only cash, but also various goods needed in disaster zone. Blogbus let users to register their information for blood donation when needed. On many BBS, you can also easily find posts which people are planning various kinds of aid initiatives.
NGO is a very important force for disaster aid. NGO Aid blog keeps updating latest news of aids efforts by NGO across China. 1kg, a grassroot NPO in China which is dedicated to build a volunteer network to help kids in remote area to have better education, (CNReviews.com has a good profile about 1kg), has set up a special site to offer relief and aids efforts, including collecting information about schools in epicenter, organizing relief activities, and helping to provide necessary resource to rebuild schools.
Collaborative translation: Immediately after the earthquake, users of Yeeyan.com, the collaborative translation community, started to translate related earthquake guides from FEMA, they’ve finished Earthquake Search Strategy and Tactics, and Earthquake Safety Checklist, and are working on Epidemics After Natural Disasters. After the translation, many users distributed the guide through various BBS and website.
If there is anything you think I should include, please leave a comment and I will keep updating the post.
(photo from New York Times)
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[…] China Web2.0 Review wrote an interesting post today on China Earthquake Relief Efforts on China’s WebHere’s a quick excerpt Regarding tsunami of late 2004, Richard MacManus of Read/Write Web has summarized three ways that people used the Web in response to the disaster: 1) as a constantly updated source of news about the disaster; 2) as a way for ordinary people to respond emotionally; 3) and probably most importantly, to organize aid efforts. We try to collect the ways how Chinese Internet users take the web to provide news updates and offer relief efforts. At the beginning of the earthquake, we can only rely […]
[…] 33. 1kg.org (h/t Web 2.0 Review) […]
[…] Support for relief efforts from English-language bloggers has been equally swift and thorough. Overall support for Red Cross China has been so strong that accessing the Red Cross website for the past several days has been difficult due to the high volumes of traffic it has been receiving. […]
[…] China Earthquake Relief Efforts on China’s Web (tags: earthquake Sichuan China) […]
our hearts go out to those suffered in the earthquake, and we’ll keep praying for them.
Imagethief Blogroll…
My blogroll has finally got a bit unwieldy for the sidebar, and I’ve been getting complaints from people…
In the 512 earthquake, a friend was fortunate enough to survive, walking out of the ruins alive and with a story. It was a story that surfaces in every disaster, a story so common, yet it touches us all while we go about our lives.
When the rescuers found her, she was already dead, crushed by the collapsed building. They could see her through the debris, on her knees with hands flat on the ground, holding up her body. It was almost as if she was bowing ceremoniously, but her body was misshapen, crushed by the building. Rescuers reached a hand in to check that she was dead, shouting and using a stick to lightly knock on the bricks, waiting for a reply or some sign of life from her that never came. When the group turned their attention towards the next pile of debris, the team leader suddenly rushed back, shouting, “Over here, hurry!” He once again stopped in front of her body, trying his best to reach a hand in to feel the ground sheltered by her torso, shouting, “There’s someone here, a child, still alive!”
The rescuers worked to move the debris carefully, finding her child sheltered beneath her torso. A baby, about four months old, wrapped in a red blanket with yellow flowers stitched on. Sheltered by his mother’s body, he was unscathed. They carried him out from the debris, sound asleep, his sleeping face warming the hearts of everyone at the scene in the face of death.
A doctor rushed over, undoing the blanket to check for signs of injury on the baby. He found a handphone stuffed under the blanket, and instinctively glanced at the screen. There was a message on the screen, “My darling, if you live through this, please remember that I love you.” Despite having seen death countless times, tears rolled down the doctor’s face. The handphone was passed around, evoking tears from everyone at the scene.
The young mother must have tried calling for help using the handphone, but in disasters of this scale, telecommunications often fail. She spent her last moments leaving a message for her beloved child.
[…] Here is an overview for how the internet can help in times of natural disaster. You can find more information at China Web 2.0 Review, and Read Write Web. […]