Re: 7/7 (@Ken Moorhouse)
"those going about their daily business - or trying to - were completely deprived of information. This, in itself, could have led to large-scale panic leading to a more severe problem. "
Those who were solely reliant on unreliable mobile networks were, perhaps, deprived of information. There's a lesson there, perhaps.
Another lesson: perhaps Olly Murs caused more panic than 7/7-style communication failures, more quickly, on 24 Nov 2017. He probably won't be the last Twit either.
Olly Murs certainly wasn't the first Twit either, as anyone who's ever tried to make or receive an urgent (e.g. medical needs) mobile call (voice, SMS, or data) while stuck in a unexpected motorway queue, while everyone else in the queue is on their mobiles blathering on about Celebrity Love Archers or whatever.
24x7 rolling news and the instant spread of misinformation has a lot to answer for:
http://www.radiotimes.com/news/radio/2017-12-12/why-the-oxford-street-fiasco-shows-the-importance-of-good-journalism/
"Station and bus staff were as much in the dark as we were."
Communications networks fail, especially at times of crisis. That's an inconvenient fact.
Another fact is that "to fail to plan is to plan to fail". But planning for resilience costs time+money which may not have immediately visible benefits. Maybe there's a lesson there too: "just in time" may be OK for some processes, but maybe "just in case" still has its place too (e.g. in emergency precautions).
Biting the hand that feeds IT
