Brian Bennett's List: Boston Marathon Bombing

• On the day of the blasts, digital media played a critical role in reporting the tragedy as facts became available: What happened? How many were injured? Who witnessed it? Was there any other threat? Who was responsible? It also helped in the equally important task of debunking false information.
• The next morning, a scan of Newseum's collection of front pages from around the country yielded a dramatic array of banner headlines, haunting images, local angles, quotes from multiple witnesses and law enforcement officials, all converging in the type of pithy narrative that requires more than 140 characters to effectively convey.
• When news of this magnitude breaks, newspapers can't prioritize any one method of coverage over the others; they need to do it all and they need to do it well. With few exceptions, newspaper coverage of the tragedy in Boston has been exceptional on all platforms, if only because the tragedy struck an event that already had a large number of journalists in place.

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• While evidence is being analyzed for clues, investigators work to recreate the entire scene, using witness interviews, recovered video and photo images, and cell phone logs. The FBI received thousands of tips within 24 hours, many of which were reviewed, analyzed and vetted immediately.

• Tonight a full scale digital manhunt is under way, record setting web traffic jammed FBI.gov, after they released photos and surveillance videos of two suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings.
• Two men in their 20s, caught on tape.
• Officials say they've made the images public now because they need help in connecting the faces of the potential suspects to actual names.

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• A small but vocal chorus of young people, many of them female, are filling social-media sites with claims that the Boston Marathon bombing suspects have been unjustly accused, even "set up."
• In defense of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19 (identified as Jahar on his Twitter account), sympathizers have taken to Twitter using such hashtags as JaharisInnocent; fightforJahar; freejahar; and FreeTheLion. More than 6,600 visitors on Facebook have "liked" The Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Free Jahar movement.

• Reports were posted on social networking websites on Friday, saying that black-and-white pamphlets with several photographs depicting Tsarnaev and a slogan reading "Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is innocent. Pray for Dzhokhar" had appeared in the center of Bishkek.
• The photos from the pamphlets were subsequently published by several privately owned media outlets.

• He praised the social network for "pouring in updates" when the April 19 search for Boston Marathon terrorist Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was fluid and vital for anyone like him who was stuck on a commuter train.
• But what was timely at 2:40 p.m. that Tuesday was the 1:08 p.m. posting of a hacked Associated Press tweet that reported President Obama being injured by two explosions at the White House. That briefly caused chaos at the financial markets with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling 145 points before recovering.
• Kalehoff wrote that Twitter "seized the moment" with the Tsarnaev outcome through "immediacy," "community," and "accessibility."

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• After the bombings at the Boston marathon last week, thousands of would-be sleuths flocked to the internet. They scoured pictures and video and posted images of suspicious characters with backpacks, who seemed to fit official descriptions of the most wanted.
• But they failed badly: members of the social media site Reddit falsely accused a missing college student, Sunil Tripathi, of the crimes.
• Nevertheless, the day in which online crowds are harnessed to track down criminals is fast approaching.
• Several new tools are being tested that comb through the din of the masses to separate valuable tips from false leads. And in a recent simulated manhunt spanning the globe, the software, combined with loose groups of online participants, got its man.

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• accepting online donations from the public at www.onefundboston.org.

• In addition to its financial support, the bank will promote The One Fund Boston and encourage broader public donations through social media, materials in Citizens Bank branches across New England, ATM messages and banner ads on citizensbank.com. These efforts will direct customers and members of the general public to The One Boston Fund’s online portal.

• Lifeway Foods, Inc., (NASDAQ: LWAY), a leading supplier of kefir cultured dairy products, today announced its sponsorship of the Charity Miles running, walking and biking app in support of The One Fund Boston fundraising initiative benefiting victims of the Boston Marathon bombing tragedy. During the free two-week campaign, Lifeway will sponsor each individual's Charity Miles plus an additional 25¢ per mile for The One Fund Boston, with a goal of raising $10,000.
• Charity Miles is a free iPhone/Android app that enables people to earn money for charity when they walk, run or bike.
• Participants can also raise awareness for their causes by sharing their achievements on social media using a built-in widget.

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• Music artists have joined athletes as they took to Twitter to offer prayers and support for victims of Boston Marathon explosion.