14 DAY TRIAL // Jason Buelterman, Tybee Insland's Mayor, posted a clip on the famous online video sharing service YouTube in a desperate attempt to show the local beach erosion and get some help from the authorities. It seems that the mayor aimed to attract Georgia's Congressional Delegation because they represent the only chance to save the island from a damaging erosion. According to WSAV.com, it all started when the storms started to make more and more damage, reducing the size of the beach and getting the water closer to the shores.
"At high tide, the water would be all the way up to those umbrellas. We are losing more and more beach area and the last storm did more damage. Andrea really ate away a lot of our beach. In fact we just had a survey done to prove that," the mayor said according to the same source. "I did that to help lobby money from the federal government. The city, state and county have all put aside money that's needed," he added.
Jason Buelterman is somehow successful in his attempt to capture the authorities' attention because Senator Saxby Chambliss will visit the affected region this week.
This is another clear sign that YouTube is more and more used to a different goal than the one mentioned by Google: publishing videos and sharing them with other Internet users. YouTube often serves as an efficient way to share your story because a lot of members uploaded clips to inform viewers about certain things. Take the example of a woman fighting against leukemia who posted a video on YouTube to give information about the disease and require the users' help. He managed to find a matching donor in Denmark that finally rescued her life. Several police officers also published a lot of surveillance videos on YouTube to require the viewers' help and identify the suspects.