Amazing. Just been on Twitter watching the tributes to Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, who died today. His death marks the end of the genius that did indeed touch and transform the everyday lives of millions.

As the comments continue to flood in, Twitter is alive. In fact there are over 10,000 tweets per second talking about Steve Jobs. It is on a scale that is hard to imagine. And it makes you think about other major events in history.

I was living in London when Lady Diana, Princess of Wales, died. I remember seeing the queues of people waiting outside St James’s Palace to sign the book of condolence. I remember the emptiness of the packed tube carriage. I remember the quiet of Central London as people waited for her body to pass.

What would it have been like if Twitter had been with us? Would the coming together of a nation’s grief have happened in quite the same way? Or would we have broadcast our feelings without really ever talking to our neighbours?

Has Twitter changed the way we handle death forever?

I’ve just been reading about riots in Egypt during January 2011. After a video clip of protestors avoiding a watercannon was posted to YouTube, social media ‘buzz’ rocketed. The response of the Egyptian Government was to shut down the internet. To silence Facebook. To deafen Twitter.

But of course the damage was done and the news broadcasters had captured the story. It is a really interesting response to the question of how to control social media. And I think the answer is pretty clear: you can’t stop the engines that power social media chatter, you can only influence the direction of travel.