Flow of Information

I woke up Monday morning and checked my email, twitter, and facebook as per usual. This morning however, I noticed a couple of odd comments on a friend's page. It seems others were wishing him to get better. I had just spoken to him the Saturday before so I found this terribly odd. Being the worrier I am, I kicked it in to high gear and put out a search. Contacted some mutual friends via phone and facebook. Much to my surprise, I found out more information, more quickly via facebook than by the old fashioned phone calls. An hour after finding out, I knew what hospital he was in and was able to call and speak to him. Of course this shocked him to no end and I'm sure now he thinks I'm a bit of a stalker but at least I could stop worrying. :)
What I'm most amazed at is how information travels now. Word of mouth is always going to be word of mouth but we have so many more options these days, especially with social networking. It's a quick burst of information that reaches a large audience in a minimal amount of time to any interested parties. It's a hell of a lot more efficient than calling everyone in someone's phonebook. No wonder marketing companies are chomping at the bit to get their clients to jump on the web 2.0 bandwagon. The internet used to be all about posting information. Now it's more about pulling and pushing that information around in a useful manner. Makes you wonder what's next.
So what's the moral of the story? I'm making sure I designate someone to post on my facebook and twitter pages if I'm ever in an accident.