Twitter can get you out of jail

Twitter can get you out of jail - sort of

by Romeo Wahed Apr 16th 2008

If you have a decent social network but still haven't jumped onto the Twitter bandwagon yet, here's another reason to get on: when you find yourself arrested in a foreign country that may not offer you contact with the outside world, send a tweet out before you get taken down. Like James Karl Buck, who tweeted himself out of jail in Egypt.

After getting arrested for taking photos of a demonstration, Buck tweeted the word "ARRESTED." His friends, obviously knowing what that meant, talked to the right people, because the next day Buck walked out with an attorney paid for by U.C. Berkeley while having the U.S. embassy on the phone with him.

This story of a Twitter emergency use highlights two things: 1) using Twitter on a cellphone can be a great way to let a lot of people know fast that something is wrong, and 2) it's probably only as effective as the social network in your Twitter-sphere. Which is really just a guess, but an emergency tweet is unlikely to carry the same amount of weight with people that you don't know.

Although probably no one should rely on Twitter as an emergency service, it's nice to know that it's there in case we need to let everyone know we're in trouble. Thanks Twitter.

[via Techmeme]

Tags: emergency, jail, tweet, twitter

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Quikboy said 9:37PM on 4-16-2008

Is Egypt that bad? I mean, you can't contact the US Embassy or your own family in the jail they send you? I thought Egypt was pretty decent in terms of being in Africa.

And if he was arrested, would they have taken up his cellphone?

aanidaani said 9:57PM on 4-16-2008

I love social (network) satire.

ogman said 7:25AM on 4-17-2008

People who use Twitter belong in jail.

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