  During recent crises like COVID-19, microblogging platforms have become
popular channels for affected people seeking assistance such as medical
supplies and rescue operations from emergency responders and the public.
Despite this common practice, the affordances of microblogging services for
help-seeking during crises that needs immediate attention are not well
understood. To fill this gap, we analyzed 8K posts from COVID-19 patients or
caregivers requesting urgent medical assistance on Weibo, the largest
microblogging site in China. Our mixed-methods analyses suggest that existing
microblogging functions need to be improved in multiple aspects to sufficiently
facilitate help-seeking in emergencies, including capabilities of search and
tracking requests, ease of use, and privacy protection. We also find that
people tend to stick to certain well-established functions for publishing
requests, even after better alternatives emerge. These findings have
implications for designing microblogging tools to better support help
requesting and responding during crises.
