BLOG, how blogs can be better than traditional media

Saturday, Proviso Probe had an entry about the collision between an ambulance and a motorist.

I didn't expect the entry to be noteworthy. It was just something that happened in the community.

"Public Safety" informed me of the OptiCom system for traffic signal preemption. The system switches the lights so emergency vehicles can get the green lights/right of way.

"Firefighter for a long time" made some useful observations too.

Opticoms are great, they make traveling lights and sirens safer for everyone. The problem lies when an approaching motorist sees the light changes green and if they don’t look up in time to see it went back to red. No one expects the light to change to red 10 seconds after it goes green. Traffic light cycles like normal (yellow-red) but nobody expects it as quick as it comes.

S/he went on to write:

Anyone operating an emergency vehicle should have to go through mandatory training. Even if you have a green light you should be slowing and covering the brake. Green light does not mean the intersection is clear. Some departments mandate even if you have the green light to come almost to a complete stop at intersections before proceeding. I am not going to try and guess what happened or why without an investigation or report.

S/he also drew attention to the website FireFighterCloseCalls.com.

This story illustrates the power of blogging. The most informed people reading a blog almost always know more about at least part of the story than the people writing the blog. This is also true in newspapers, radio and television. However, blogs allow for the audience to make contributions. So, if a blog has a knowledgeable audience it can be a much more powerful source of information than a traditional media outlet.