In this day and age of technological advancements, it’s amazing how a simple tweet or a comment can create a massive chain reaction across individuals, cities and entire countries.  And while there’s a bevy of status updates and comments that can spread negativity, there’s many out there looking to use social media for good.  Here’s some recent examples of online communities taking action.

Twitter

In the Philippines, the Department of Public Works and Highways, the one that takes care of roadworks and road repairs, is asking Filipinos to use Twitter to report potholes in their area so they can be taken cared of immediately.  All a user has to do is to tweet a photo and the location of the pothole including the official Twitter handle for the Presidential Communications Development and Strategic Planning Office (@PCDSPO) and the hashtag #lubak2normal.  The tweets will then be plotted on Google Map along with the status of the request.  So far, they’ve logged over 300 reports and some of them are already fixed or getting fixed.

This isn’t the first time Twitter was used to help fix roads.  In 2009, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom used Twitter to ask citizens to tweet road issues so they can be fixed immediately.

Facebook

The Scarborough police used Facebook to identify “a man who allegedly used a camera on his shoe to look up women’s skirts, another man who allegedly assaulted a Walmart employee and a third man suspected of using credit cards stolen during a car burglary.”  The authorities asked the help of Facebook users to identify the men on the photos and they were overwhelmed with how many people were quick aid them that they identified and located the suspects within the day.

“There’s a good chance they would have gone unsolved without help from the public,” said crime analyst Jaime Higgins, who maintains the page. “If we have any cases we don’t immediately have something to go on, we’ll pull a still photo of a surveillance video and look for tips.”

Reddit

Though some people may know Reddit as a source for entertainment, they’re actually more of a social network news site.  But aside from that, they’ve helped people raise funds for surgeries, weddings and more.  The Reddit community can even help raise awareness for some of the most relevant issues plaguing society today.  So it wasn’t a surprise when they opened their doors to philanthropy.  If you haven’t heard, you can now donate to Reddit to help a cause, make your own cause and have Reddit help you raise funds.

As I’ve said earlier, social media is so powerful that you can either use it for good or bad.  The above examples show us how Facebook, Twitter and Reddit are being used to help people but below, you’ll see how people can be irresponsible and use it for pranks.

Reddit and 4Chan

Reddit and 4Chan, a trolling gag site, teamed up and succeeded in sending rapper Pitbull to the frozen wastelands of Kodiak, Alaska, by pranking Walmart and Listerine’s contest.  The contest promised that Pitbull would appear at whichever Walmart branch got the most likes on Facebook, which apparently looked like a special challenge to David Thorpe and Jon Hendren, who hijacked the poll.  The results sent 71k Likes to the Kodiak Walmart, though the city has a population of just over 6,000.

You may expect that with a name like Pitbull the rapper would be pretty angry, but he was a good sport and even invited the pranksters to join him.

Perhaps looking for another celebrity outing, the pranking duo is after singer Taylor Swift.  Textbook supplier Chegg and pizza company Papa John’s came up with the Taylor Swift on Campus contest, which allows college students to vote on which college Swift will visit.  Right now, because of REddit and 4Chan users, the top school is the Horace Mann School for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing in Allston, Mass.  Yes, you read that right, a school for the deaf.  So that’s not exactly the best place to have a live concert but that’s exactly their point.  The question now is, would the school allow Swift to perform?  And would Swift actually perform?

9gag

The world was shocked when news broke about the brutal shooting in the premier of the Dark Knight Rises in Aurora, Colorado and there were some who quickly pointed to 9gag as the cause of the tragedy.  They used Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other social sites to spread the word that 9gag was to blame.  Some thought it was a great idea to put blame on 9gag claiming they saw users a couple of weeks before the shooting happened, egging the shooter and giving him tips on how to shoot and kill people.  Of course that didn’t really happen.  9gag investigated the claims and found out that no posts like those were ever on 9gag.