Re: <nettime> Twitter revolutionaries, unmade in the USA

[Jaime Magiera <jaime@sensoryresearch.net>]

On Oct 10, 2009, at 3:04 PM, Evan Buswell wrote:

> I think what Morlock is referring to is digital obfuscation:
> they could have used more/better proxies or the Onion Router, or
> something of that nature. But I'd rather not blame them. In any
> case, anyone doing this in the future should use some sort of proxy
> set-up.


Hello,

Yeah, I see what he meant now. I wouldn't call it incompetence
though, or say that it's reason not to use twitter (or other social
media service) at all. Bruce was correct in pointing out that a live
public feed of protestors' steps via Twitter is a bad idea. You're
advertising what your planned steps are to anyone who has access to
that feed. One could argue that a protected feed is better. One could
also argue that a one-way feed that only contains announcements on
the activities of the authorities would be good. But still, there are
turkeys (informants) in every protest movement. So, at some point
these all break down.

In terms of the social media aspect: There's a cost-value analysis to
consider. Is it better to have an organizing tool that is ubiquitous,
but has a security flaw, than none at all? I'm sure that at least
during the time that the command center was functional, they were
providing needed support to the protestors.

Jaime Magiera

Sensory Research, Inc.
http://www.sensoryresearch.net








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