From my research I have found that social media did not actually cause the London riots. If we look at it from a common sense point of view, it is obvious though that sites like Twitter and Facebook may have helped in spreading offenders locations, enabling them to meet up in mass groups.
According to the CNN website (cited below) the use of Blackberry phones and the instant message chat application which is free for users on the phone were used to aid in organizing gatherings of some of the rioters.
So I will not be so bold as to say that social media caused the London riots but it certainly helped to 'fan the fire'.
In contrast to this, I also came across as article which discussed in depth about teenage violence in the United Kingdom. The author (Wood, 2010) mentioned that the rate of teenage violence has not increased since 2008 when her study was conducted.
So this makes me think that even though social media was also around in 2008 and many teenagers were potentially using it as they do now, the medium itself has not caused violence amongst teenagers.
What the issue here is, is that social media networking sites and instant messaging applications, such as the Blackberry one mentioned earlier certainly have the potential to spiral and spread mass communications to others in an instant but, the same goes with a handgun or a knife.
In concluding, it may even be fair to say that when such acts of violence as the London riots occur, perhaps there needs to be a protocol in place for the correct authorities to be able to 'switch off' the offending site so to prevent the violence from escalating even further and in doing so, perhaps prevent the loss of lives along the way.
References:
1) viewed 20 August 2011, <http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/08/12/overheard-on-cnn-com-social-media-didnt-cause-uk-riots-people-didhttp://news.blogs.cnn.com>.
2) Wood, R 2010, 'UK: the reality behind the 'knife crime' debate', Race Class, vol. 52, no. 97, viewed 27 August 2011, via Sage database.
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