Twitter delivers news of bin Laden's death first

Once again, Twitter carried vital information to Americans ahead of traditional news outlets.

Keith Urbahn, once chief of staff for former Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld, is credited with breaking the story about the death of Osama bin Laden.

(Credit: Twitter)

 

The news that American special forces had killed Osama bin Laden, perhaps the most wanted man in the world, first began to trickle out when the White House communications director posted on Twitter that President Obama planned to address the nation at 10:30 p.m. eastern time, The New York Times reported Sunday evening.

Twitter, Facebook, and other social networks were also where people went to speculate--much of it erroneous--about what the president would discuss during his address to the nation.

According to the Times, the first scoop didn't come from that paper, the Washington Post, ABC News or any other news organization. Keith Urbahn, once chief of staff for former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld, was credited for the Twitter scoop when he posted this note: "So I'm told by a reputable person they have killed Osama Bin Laden. Hot damn."

Chalk another one up again for citizen journalism and micro blogging. Twitter already had loads of scoops to its credit, such as being home to some of the first reports and photographs of the heroic crash landing of a U.S. Airways commercial jet on New York's Hudson River.

Nonprofessional journalists using Twitter were first to report about the fatal shooting at Fort Hood in November 2009.     Read More