For me, {en:Glastonbury Festival|Glastonbury} has been a good gauge of how much {en:Twitter} has grown.
I remember searching a couple years ago for Glastonbury on Twitter during the Weds and Thurs. There were probably 5-10 tweets an hour at most.
Performing a search now and there are many a second:
And Twitter and it’s like have certainly had an impact on Glastonbury too.
Gone are the days where the Q Daily could stick a rumour regarding the outside world in their daily newspaper and you couldn’t confirm or deny it without ringing someone on the outside (that’s assuming you could get a signal). A few years back the outside world was cut off world. Now-a-days Twitter, {en:Facebook} and access to the mobile web in general means that even if you’re not keeping up with the outside world with your phone, your mate probably is. There’s no escaping the news now (I can’t decide on whether this is a good thing or not..).
I remember thinking last year that when Jackson died, in previous years that news would have been considered yet another rumour that goes around the festival. However, a quick look at the mobile phone now and it’s confirmed.