The Speed of Outrage: Tom Scott at Thinking Digital 2015. The Smartest Mob: A Chapter from Existence. The Smartest Mob A stand-alone excerpt from David Brin’s novel EXISTENCE by David Brin Copyright 2012 Tor Books Washington was like a geezer -- overweight and sagging -- but with attitude.
Most of its gutty heft lay below the beltway, in waistlands that had been downwind on Awfulday. Downwind, but not out. When droves of upperclass child-bearers fled the invisible plumes enveloping Fairfax and Alexandria, those briefly-empty ghost towns quickly refilled with immigrants -- the latest mass of teemers, yearning to be free and willing to endure a little radiation, in exchange for a pleasant five-bedroom that could be subdivided into nearly as many apartments. Passing overhead, Tor could track signs of suburban renewal from her first class seat aboard the Spirit of Chula Vista. So much for the notion that dirty bombs automatically make a place unfit for breeders, she thought. Wasn’t this America? The latest immigrants, those who filled Washington’s waistland vacuum, weren't ignorant. Citogenesis. How the Boston Marathon tragedy revealed the best side of social media.
I won't doubt that social media helps law enforcement/first responders disseminate news at a much faster rate, or giving people the chance to find shelter for the night as things get sorted out.
What kind of disgusts me was the fact that (according to my coworkers), people were posting pictures of the scene up on outlets like instagram in a way that's not so much, "tell everyone to get away from the scene, scene is not safe" and more "zomg guyz shit's goin' down! - oh by the way, it's really messed up - BUT IT'S GOIN' DOWN YO! " Someone I know on Facebook was recirculating a picture of a victim being escorted off the course by wheelchair, accompanied by a sappy paragraph. It made me uneasy as a person who is not normally squeamish about blood. It's disturbing to live in a society where sharing images like that, under the ploy of gathering more sympathy and raising awareness, is common place.
Oversight: Thank you for volunteering, citizen. Global Freedom Movement. Illustration of how Liquid Democracy Works via Wikipedia Liquid democracy is a group-decision-making method that works as a sort of “direct democracy for people who know they’re not experts on a subject, but know of people that they trust who who know more about a subject than themselves”.
Questions are settled by asking everyone… but many people’s answer will be “whatever X says”. It works by enabling people to solicit recommendations on how to vote from people they trust. So, people who know nothing about foreign policy can get vote recommendations on a subject from people who agree with the basic thrust of similar values and who either have a personal connection with pundits or experts on a given subject who also agree with the attitude, or who are experts in their own right.
In fact, one of the original influences on Liquid Democracy was the desire to replace the chain of command in a military situation with something more efficient and flexible. What Does Liquid Democracy Mean? Queen's Brian May releases a hit song to save the badgers. The final episode of Black Mirror gives you Big Brother for the social media age.
Spot-on.
I must admit I was surprised by Annalee's dismissal of White Bear, but I think it must be a cultural thing - of the three, in terms of the issues explored, I think White Bear was definitely the most UK-centric. And as someone who has grown up in the UK witnessing endless tabloid-led witch hunts, it rang chillingly true. Sure it was ramped up to 11, but um... satire? The problem I had with White Bear was that it was clearly a commonly replayed thing - they ran it often, it had lots of people attending, it had a permanent and well organised facility... So why were people still coming? Brooker assumes the public to have a greater attention span than they really do, and to care more than they do. All valid points, absolutely, and in purely practical nitty-gritty terms it doesn't really make sense.