On January 1st, Haiti celebrated their independence day. Less than two weeks later, the country is in dire straits. On Tuesday, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit the small country, approximately 10 miles west of the capital, Point-au-Prince. While Twitter hashtags notoriously point the way to frivolous conversation, #Haiti is currently one of the top trending topics of conversation. Popular music artist and Haitian native Wyclef Jean is asking followers to retweet the following message:

So far, it has been reported that a hospital has collapsed in the wake of the disaster, and the New York Times has reported that the US Agency for International Development is currently in the process of deploying disaster response teams to the scene. The area, including the Dominican Republic, is also reportedly on a tsunami watch.

Please stay tuned to Twitter by following and contributing to the #Haiti hashtag. The Twitter community rallied for the Iranian citizens, and the same can be done for the people of Haiti in their time of need.

Also follow @YELEHAITI for more information. http://yele.org

Let it be known that I enjoy Pete Cashmore as much as the next warm blooded female. I admire his business acumen even more so than his singular revival of the three-piece suit in a startup office. However, I’d noticed that for awhile, Mashable has published an endless stream of what appear to be PR press releases disguised as articles. Regardless, imagine my reaction when I discovered last week that Mashable, the leading social media blog, is reportedly set to become yet another corporate acquision. Read the rest of this entry »