Twitter Listens, Reacts to Kentucky Riots [PICS]

A perfect storm of celebration, violence and voyeurism hit Twitter late Monday night after the University of Kentucky won the March Madness crown.

Following the Wildcats' win over Kansas for the NCAA title, large-scale riots broke out in the Kentucky college town of Lexington. Word quickly spread on Twitter that the Lexington police dispatch scanner was accessible via the steaming app TuneIn. Soon after, the hashtag #LexingtonPoliceScanner began an hours-long residency in the worldwide trending charts as a mesmerized Twitterverse followed the riots in real time.

The riots were serious; houses reportedly burned, cars were destroyed and at least one man was reportedly shot as the mayhem raged into the morning. But the way the riots played out online became a true through-the-looking-glass moment for the digital age -- the piecemeal story relayed through the scanner audio-stream provided one layer of amazement and the accompanying Twitter buzz another.

As #LexingtonPoliceScanner became a phenomenon, the conversation there tended toward the humorous and incredulous. People provided their own color commentary of the riots based off what they heard on the police radio. Officers were quoted verbatim. A husky-voiced female dispatcher incited lust among many a tweeter. Bed times were missed, delayed and missed again.

People asked about and explained the police codes associated with certain crimes, and the names of individual officers and revelers bounced around the network. At one point, the madness in Lexington was responsible for three of Twitter's worldwide trending topics: #LexingtonPoliceScanner, "Code 1" and "Commander Coleman."

As the Twitter user @Huskerbubble phrased it from behind a backlit screen: "This is so messed up, but Twitter gold."