Stealing thunder and filling the silence: Twitter as a primary channel of police crisis communication.

Twitter can be used successfully by police departments as a channel for stealing thunder and establishing the department as a credible news source. A case study analysis of how a police department used Twitter during a mall shooting was conducted. Results reveal the potential benefits and limitations of using Twitter to steal thunder and a new technique, filling the silence, is proposed for maintaining an audience once an organization has stolen thunder. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]