Codified hashtags for weather warning on Twitter: An Italian case study

Codified hashtagging for Twitter is emerging as a practical way to coordinate messages during emergencies and quickly identify relevant information. This paper considers a case study in Italy on the use of codified hashtags concerning weather warning in Italy in three different regions. Its conclusions find that the use of codified hashtags may potentially improve the performance of systems for automatic information retrieval and processing during disasters.

Specifically, this publication explains that:

• during a disaster, people with a mobile phone can potentially send information from the field improving situation monitoring;
• during an event, people act as information seekers, using information from family and peers as a mean to integrate and sometimes validate those issued by official sources.
• the use of hashtags may help with the dissemination of information during emergencies.
• during emergencies, a consistent use of hashtags would help users to quickly access information about the event;
• in some cases, words and messages of lay people, are trusted even more that those produced by the official media.

PLOS Currents Disasters, July 2016. This article is published under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Generic licence.