You all know how to find social media sources - just go to Twitter, Tumbler or Facebook and there are plenty. Equally plentiful are the hashtags that make finding those posts even more accessible.
BUT...
How reliable are these sources? Can a hashtag mean different things, or be co-opted by other groups? Here are some ways to try to figure out if what you're looking at is really someone with knowledge of the event (or people involved, or country) or is someone who is using information they've gathered elsewhere (or made up).
If you're researching events in other countries, remember that language may be an issue - and Google's translator feature doesn't always do the best job!
Facebook has a policy of using your real name and will delete accounts for people using pseudonyms. Obviously, during an uprising, it’s unlikely that people will want to use their real names (fear of reprisals) so that can be a problem! Sometimes, people from other countries will allow their names to be used so that an information page will be acceptable to Facebook. Think about this: if the page has someone else's name, does that mean that the information is more valid, or are "they" allowing someone to take the blame for erroneous content?
Twitter users (and now Facebook and Instagram users) often give their tweets hashtags. Because they are socially created, they can mean different things to different people, or can be co-opted by others.