SHORTLY after 6am yesterday came a glimpse of what the beginning of the apocalypse will look like.

Forget the threat of looming asteroid strike or life-threatening nuclear war, this was far more terrifying as social media sites Facebook and Instagram, along with online dating app Tinder, crashed due to a technical hitch which affected users worldwide.

The result? Carnage. Within minutes millions leapt to express their alarm and distress at the unfolding scenario - on Twitter, natch, which wasn't affected by the outage.

Keeping an ear cocked for the clatter of hooves which signalled the impending arrival of a quartet of horsemen, one could only imagine the growing scenes of chaos on global transportation as people were forced to look up from smartphones and into the eyes of fellow commuters.

How would we know what everyone else was eating for breakfast? Is it even possible to start the day without the usual barrage of inspirational quotes? How would people channel those passive aggressive, navel-gazing musings on life? Brag about fictional endeavours? Share photographs of their names misspelled on Starbucks takeaway cups?

More importantly, how would we get by without being fed a steady stream of cat videos? There was grave concerns of a possible return to the dark days when a weekly fix on You've Been Framed was your lot, a few moments of sublime feline magic sandwiched between trampoline mishaps and upended Christmas trees.

As most struggled to make sense of the world, some displayed incredible resourcefulness and rather brilliant wry wit. "While Facebook was down, I nailed a picture of my breakfast to a tree outside our house. Seven people have knocked to say they liked it," wrote Alistair Coleman on Twitter.

Productivity in the workplace looked in danger of shooting up tenfold. There were even rumours of holiday snaps being brazenly shown without use of an Instagram filter. At that point it seemed a Cobra meeting would have to be called.

Many, though, already feared the worst. "Locking the doors just in case. I've seen The Road, I know how this starts," tweeted Davy Shanks.

Yet, just when it seemed like the pillars of society would crumble entirely, it was all fixed. The great Facebook/Instagram/Tinder crash of 2015 was over. Survivors hugged and high-fived - virtually of course, that's what emojis are for.

But not everyone was entirely downbeat about events. Los Angeles-based bestselling author and screenwriter Kelly Oxford tweeted: "Facebook, Instagram and Tinder are down. Twitter, let us go, we will finally be free." It's a lovely thought, isn't it?