[TheLML]

Or just dedicated apps. I have two different apps for warnings issued by German authorities. I can select regions that I want to be informed about and I'll get notifications on my phone for a few things. For example if there's a fire and they advise to keep windows closed, extreme weather warnings, and they also used to send out updates about changes to covid related restrictions.

[em-bee]

please don't force me to install an app in order to receive important notifications.

even with the best intentions this is not going to reach everyone.

what if the app is not compatible with my phone?

what if i am travelling? should i download an app for every country i visit?

just give me a website address where i can subscribe to notifications. and offer different ways to access the notifications (including twitter and their own mastodon server, but also telegram channels and others (does whatsapp or signal have something like telegrams channels?))

[DoughnutHole]

Emergency alerts are the sort of thing that you don't want to be opt-in, simply because most people aren't proactive. It's not great for grandma to drown because she didn't know she had to subscribe to tsunami warnings on a specific website. Apps are also not ideal if you have to opt in and download them.

Traditional emergency alerts would take over all live media in the area, ie interrupt TV and radio broadcasts. In high risk towns like in tornado country they have literal klaxons that blare the warning to anyone within earshot.

As much flak as it got, the UK emergency alert system is a pretty good solution - collaborate with cell networks and the developers of the major phone OS's to push a notification to anyone in the at-risk area. It'll never truly be universal, but 80% of phones were capable of receiving the last test, and of those 7% didn't receive it. Honestly that's a much better reach that we ever would have had with radio and TV alerts.

[em-bee]

well, yes of course, but if it is not opt-in then apps are out of the question anyways, because you can't have apps preinstalled on every phone. that just won't work.

there are different levels of alerts. obviously the really serious ones should be pushed as you say, but lesser ones, or serious ones but for people who are not in the region should be opt-in. there is no need for me to get tornado warnings from the area where my grandma lives, but i may want to subscribe anyways because i want to see her safe and maybe i am planning to visit. so it does make sense to publish alerts on channels that anyone can follow as they need.

[MandieD]

That's the nice thing about NINA in Germany - I can pick very specific geographic areas to get alerts for, like the town I live in, the city I work in, the rural area my in-laws live in. If you're willing to spend a few minutes, you can adjust what level of warnings you care to receive, and how they behave.

[ant6n]

I'm in Germany and I don't know anybody who uses such apps. I wonder what their reach is.

[dgellow]

You don’t have the NINA app? You have broadcast relatively often (multiple time a year) due to fires, active shooting, flood risk, etc. At least in Hamburg. It’s pretty useful.

https://www.bbk.bund.de/DE/Warnung-Vorsorge/Warn-App-NINA/wa...

[MandieD]

It also displays by default in usable English on an iPhone when the phone's interface language is set to US English (haven't tested UK English).

[piceas]

I use KATWARN because the local refinary, usually downwind of where I live, is required to announce if there is an incident (within 48 hours, probably).

[inpdx]

But then there are multiple apps. What if we put those apps into one, using the web to make it broadly accessible and searchable.

It was called Twitter.

Federation should solve this.

[quickthrower2]

In some bubbles yes. During the aussie bushfire I checked the government app, and using Twitter didn’t cross my mind. If anything Reddit has been much better for local information, but usually for the Monday quarterback stuff rather than timely info.

[dgellow]

Twitter isn’t used by that many people in the US. 2022 numbers seem to show >20% of the country population is active on the platform. Even LinkedIn(!) broadcast would reach more people.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/05/10-facts-...

[shkkmo]

Then we're conflating low valur alerts with high value ones and the value of the signal is lost.

Until twitter makes an actual emergency alert system, Twitter is not better than a dedicated alert app.

[irrational]

If people have and use Twitter. I never have, so I would never receive the messages.