Yesterday evening there has been a revolt in Amstelveen around a potential Project X party revival. There was another call-up on Facebook where over 650 people mentioned they were attending. The event should be held in the area Middenhoven, but at the last moment the municipality broadcasted an emergency command. The police had extra units deployed to the location in order to intercept the potential rioters, who arrived in small groups. The municipality had posted on Twitter not to come to Amstelveen and tried to keep it under the radar. Fortunately, the police could keep everything under control and all the individuals were send home so a bigger group could not be formed.
This time nothing happened, but we all know what can be the consequences when it does go wrong. Remarkable is that the municipality is trying to reach the individuals in the same way the event got started, through social media. The municipality is aware of the fact that this is the way to reach the persons and not through conventional media. But the question remains: How can the government and society solve and deal with this sort of results of using social media? Is social media in fact a dangerous weapon? I hope there will be a solution in the present, because this social media abuse should be restrained as soon as possible, while its key value is to connect friends, not to create chaos.
