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Handhelds Hardware

Smart Mobs, Swarms, and Flash Crowds 123

Posted by michael from the flight-of-the-bumblebee dept.
PizzaFace writes "Personal communication devices always allowed people to communicate easily and to coordinate their plans at the spur of the moment. As PCDs became widespread, they allowed their owners to converge rapidly in large groups, for purposes social or political. Now something else is happening. Ubiquitous PCDs give each owner multiple simultaneous opportunities for communication or convergence. People surf their PCD network from one conversation to another, and physically surf the most promising of the gatherings to which the network invites them. Their web of social contacts is as broad as the globe and as shallow as a cell phone's keystroke. What happens when people become nodes on a network? Joel Garreau reports provocatively in the Washington Post. His sample is skewed by Washington's summer influx of interns, who come from around the country to work for little or no pay in part because they're chasing 'peak experiences,' and who have lots of disposable time and energy, no local roots or tethers, and an unusually large network of like-wired acquaintances." I think the conventional (and most descriptive) term for this behavior is flash crowd.
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Smart Mobs, Swarms, and Flash Crowds

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  • The unfortunate result of these sorts of devices is that is takes out of practice the social skills of those who use them.

    Like the stereotypical pale-skinned nerd masterbating over Linux in his mother's basement, people who tend to use these new PDA technologies are seriously missing out on the more traditional forms of human contact.

    A wink, a nod and a smile can convey so much more than "asl?"

    • Re:Eye and face contact (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Wisp ( 1763 )
      I think that article made a more complex point

      - That these technologies are strongly informing
      the subcultures that really adopt them and that
      at least one part of that effect is strengthening
      different modalities of being social.

      You could say the same about chat for instance
      except these are groups of people that are out
      socializing in the classical sense with special
      new characteristics.

    • Re:Eye and face contact (Score:4, Insightful)

      by gilroy ( 155262 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @09:09AM (#3985788) Homepage Journal
      Blockquoth the poster:
      people who tend to use these new PDA technologies are seriously missing out on the more traditional forms of human contact.
      A priori, this is not necessarily a bad thing... Things aren't good just because they're new. They aren't good just because they're old. And sometimes, "time honored" is just another way of saying "previously the only option".

  • The revolution will not be televised.. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Idimmu Xul ( 204345 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @08:43AM (#3985621) Homepage Journal
    but aslong as you have SMS itll be ok!
  • *deliberately misunderstands, joking* How does one do anything quickly with a Primary Domain Controller, and since when is it fun?

  • Found my calling! (Pun optional) (Score:3, Funny)

    by jsonmez ( 544764 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @08:46AM (#3985638)
    That's it that confirms it. I am going to be a phone mercenary. Me and my swarm can get there and leave before the police arrive, and we know when they are coming and where they are. Don't like your boss? Need your wife removed? Someone steal your stapler for the last time? Message me.

  • Flash Crowd (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dmarien ( 523922 ) <{dmarien} {at} {dmarien.com}> on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @08:46AM (#3985645) Homepage
    "Twenty years later the term passed into common use on the Internet to describe exponential spikes in website or server usage when one passes a certain threshold of popular interest "

    Flash Crowd == Slashdot Effect.

    • Re:Flash Crowd (Score:4, Interesting)

      by capt.Hij ( 318203 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @09:00AM (#3985743) Homepage Journal
      Former Philippine president Joseph Estrada, accused of massive corruption, was driven out of power two years ago by smart mobs who swarmed to demonstrations, alerted by their cell phones, gathering in no time. "It's like pizza delivery," Alex Magno, a political science professor at the University of the Philippines, told The Post at the time. "You can get a rally in 30 minutes -- delivered to you."

      Actually the flash crowd is much more effective. It seems that they actually do things other than look at web pages. For all of the calls for action that I hear here on slashdot it doesn't seem that much actually happens. Seems we have something to learn!

      • Flash-in-the-pan crowd ;) ?
      • You need a denser concentration geographically than Slashdot has to get that kind of effect. Besides, the Slashdot effect is more diffuse in time due to the time lag after posting and the time lage before the post fades into limbo.

      • Apparently it is more rewarding to *complain* then to do anything.

        Until the discomforts of lost rights outweigh the existing middle class comforts this crowd will just make a few witty post before congratulating themselves and going back to sleep.
    • Why "exponential"? So if my site logs do not conform to an exponential curve I cannot consider it /. effect? "Exponential" means something - it does not just mean "high acceleration" as the author of that quote seems to think.
      • Exponential" means something - it does not just mean "high acceleration" as the author of that quote seems to think.
        But most people don't know what an exponent is. Heck, they've probably never had a _teacher_ that understood exponential growth.

      • "Exponential" means something - it does not just mean "high acceleration" as the author of that quote seems to think.
        True. But "Quantum" doesn't mean "large" or "giant" either, but that's what it means in popular usage these days. Look at the way writers use the term " a quantum leap".

        Milalwi
      • Don't worry. Exponential has just become on of those words with an informal meaning and a mathematical meaning.

    • Flash Crowd != Smart Mob. FC ~= Slashdot Effect (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Ungrounded Lightning ( 62228 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @10:38AM (#3986535) Journal
      Flash Crowd == Slashdot Effect.

      Yep. The "Slashdot Effect" is the subset of Slashdot user behavior that cooresponds to a virtual flash crowd: Everybody "teleports" to the site of the news event.

      But a "Smart Mob" is much different from a "Flash Crowd".

      With a "Flash Crowd" hi-tek communication only enables the initial gathering. Once the mob forms they have the same characteristics as a pre-tech mob: Interpersonal communication is minimal, and the "mob organism" exhibits the collective intelligence of an ant army, far lower than that of a committee.

      A "Smart Mob", on the other hand, has instant communication between separated members (and people not present). This enables large-scale organized behavior, cohesive action, regrouping, healing of "wounds", etc.

      A Smart Mob has the same relation to a Flash Crowd as the "Permanent Floating Riot Club" did in the Niven short story. Though usually less hostile and sociopathic. B-)

      Note that this is another example of human self-organizing behavior. Organizing people is never a problem - they do it spontaneously. Keeping them from organizing to do something undesirable, or doing something undesirable once organized, often is. (Which is why the US Constitution is primarily composed of rules limiting and channeling the government's power.)
    • The Flashdot Effect.

  • Becoming one organism (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Neuronerd ( 594981 ) <{ed.gnidreok} {ta} {darnok}> on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @08:48AM (#3985667) Homepage
    I guess my humanities friends that always told me that culture is about to turn us into a giant meta-organism are right after all. Interesting that it took plenty of technology to get there and surprisingly little "humanities" moderation.
    But then they say that a meta-organism has been what we were all along.

  • The insects are all that is left (Score:5, Insightful)

    by milo_Gwalthny ( 203233 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @08:49AM (#3985670)
    It has happened. We have become ants.
    • It takes an organization to counter an organization. It is only by combining our voices and our strengths that we can hope to successfully strive against other organizations that want what we collectively have. At the risk of sounding extremist, take a look at a situation that every /.er is familliar with. Microsoft wants the money we collectively earn (money == power). Individually we all gripe about it, but their money (from us) allows them (in extremely blunt terms) to purchase court resolutions in their favor. Now along comes Linux. Bob in Calif works on part of the kernel, Fred in Texas writes a device driver, etc. After a brief period of growth we have many people working together towards a common goal, a competetive marketplace for OS's. What our single voices could not accomplish before may very well become a reality due to the combining of the unique strengths of numerous individuals.

      It has happened. We have become ants.

      Speak for yourself, I am still an individual and a human being, and will remain so regardless of dictatorship from Washington DC or Geneva. I can not believe that the above comment was moderated up as Insightful.
      • Did you read the article? The main point wasn't organization, it was collective, emergent behaviour. For example, Prince William being mobbed by young ladies as he visits a pub, or the military abandoning command and control in favor of a statistical type of attack (ie. change the point totals assigned to target and it will probably attract more fire, depending on what decisions individuals make). This is exactly the opposite of organization in the way you mean it: the ability of the few to represent the diffuse will of many to defeat a much larger enemy through careful planning and intelligent execution.

        I don't think Microsoft will be beaten by our unthinking, uncoordinated action. If you want something else to prevail, I think you need someone to coordinate the action.

        As to "the dictatorship from Washington DC to Geneva", I really think you should read the article. It wasn't about that.

        As an aside, I was surprised it was modded as insightful also, I intended it as humorous.
    • This isn't a new phenomenon(sp?) People have liked big crowds for years. The bigger the crowd, the more people show up for it.

      Apologies to Gallagher...

  • Betting and tips (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Captain Kirk ( 148843 )
    You see this swarming at the track all the time. The thing that gets me is the way people at the track get their tips on the mobile phone and you can see the bookies odds simply collapse on the latest 'favorite.' Makes it clear that you are either 'im' or 'out' and if you are not 'in' don't bet!

  • ...because I've never seen the term PCD or "personal communication device" before. Of course I went straight to Google and punched it in to see what I could find, and found mostly press releases from various manufacturers and dealers in electronics. PCD isn't just a fancy acronym for "cellular phone", is it? Or does it imply some features on top of ordinary telephony, like a half-duplex "radio" feature, or the ability to send alphanumeric messages (like in that f**king stupid ad during the Olympics where a sleeping skier's buddies all silently agree to push him off the lift? I wasn't amused--packed snow isn't soft, and you could break a bone landing on it wrong from that height.)

    hyacinthus.
    • Yes it is just a f**king stupid ass way of saying "phone or etc (pda, blackberry msgr, etc.) that you can send text and other msgs with while moblie". I'm guessing under the broad catagory of PCD my aluminum "cluebat" would also be a PCD as I reguarly reach out and touch people with it.

    • He's making up terms all over the place, like this quote: "although I don't think we've ever fleshmet."

      Fleshmeat? I've heard of meat-space and "rl", but I've never heard that phrase. A google search reveals it to be in the title of several pretentious sci-fi stories, and as a reference to gore.

      Indeed, this whole article reeks of a hipper-than-thou attitude, whereby "cool" people have discovered a phenomenom that has been old old-hat to the Internet and science fiction crowd.

      I mean, really, witness the Niven story, and Sterling has been featuring exactly this sort of thing since the early nineties.

      Oh well, though geeks were some of the early adopters of cell phones, I guess we're less likely to use it for drunken phone calls and spontaneous parties. No one is going to notice until hundreds of adult children start doing it en masse.
      • Fleshmeat? I've heard of meat-space and "rl", but I've never heard that phrase

        Exactly. That bugs the crap out of me, too. The Wall Street Journal recently ran a tech article that talked about retail stores now putting web kiosks in stores like Barnes & Noble and the Gap. The author called retail stores with a web presence "clicks & bricks stores". That's funny, I could have sworn that as we were actually going through that phase of the bubble, they were called "click & mortar stores".
      • Am I the only one who can't stop thinking dirty when I hear "fleshmet"?
        • Oh, flesh-met. Less gross, more dirty.

          It still has minor usage on the net, seems like a forced attempt to coin a new phrase, or just isolated to txt msgers who are also bloggers.

          God, I hate these new Internet fads. Everything is so fucking... trendy.
      • That's what made the story interesting to me. It was about a bunch of young hipsters using their cellphones for barhopping, NOT nerds trading warez on irc. Real, tangible swarming around Prince William has significance and interest that the slashdot effect does not.

  • Yup (Score:2, Insightful)

    by the bluebrain ( 443451 )
    this is another social "scene" I can help define by not being part of it.
  • People have always been fairly spontaneous in nature. The concept of a flash crowd has been around for ages; the PCD manifestation of this being merely the most prominent today.
    Look at the good side of PCDs and their networks: they speed up communication between social and political groups immensely. Whether the end result is viewed as productive or not, the fact that the potential for speedy meetings and conversation anywhere is there is the essence of PCDs and a truly great thing.
    Of course there are downsides to them, such as the EM radiation's possibility of causing cancer... but this does not mean that PCDs are inherently bad. All things can be improved.

  • Difficulties? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Violet Null ( 452694 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @08:53AM (#3985697)
    There can be a dark side to all this. Swarmers can have difficulty living in the present.

    Living in the present? It sounds like these people have some problems living by themselves. We've already got attention-deficit disorder, and the article brings this up near the end -- that you get people who leave if the situation doesn't immediately grab (and hold) their attention -- but the extension of this would be people who can't (or won't) go and do things on their own, without their friends (or 'swarm').

  • slashdotting parties and marketroids (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Alien54 ( 180860 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @08:54AM (#3985704) Journal
    flash crowd

    Larry Niven's 1973 SF short story "Flash Crowd" predicted that one consequence of cheap teleportation would be huge crowds materializing almost instantly at the sites of interesting news stories. Twenty years later the term passed into common use on the Internet to describe exponential spikes in website or server usage when one passes a certain threshold of popular interest (what this does to the server may also be called slashdot effect).

    So now we get to slashdot a party, bar, or other social event.

    I wonder how long it will take for some marketroid to figure out a way to use the phenom as a way to promote their rather bad and awful party, bar, or social event?

    • "I wonder how long it will take for some marketroid to figure out a way to use the phenom as a way to promote their rather bad and awful party, bar, or social event?"

      Been there. Done that. Count the number of Linux/hacker/security/opensource/etc conventions on Slashdot [slashdot.org] in the future. It's gotten to the point where I come to slashdot to find upcoming conventions. I've yet to find a better listing. (I wish it more timely sometimes, but it's definately one of the most comprehensive.)

    • I live close enough to Disneyland to hear the fireworks every night. Got a pass to it and California Adventure. The later is actually kinda fun and I'd be willing to pay, say, $15 for a day there. The shame is that they want $45.

      At $45 it absolutely sucks. Everyone knows it. No one goes there. On slow days last year they've had as few as fifteen paying guests on site, meaning the employees outnumbered them by a few orders of magnitude.

      Disney pumped tons of money into developing CA and their marketting types put almost as much into advertising. Fact is, though, that it is a failure in it's current form and no amount of marketting money is gonna turn it around. (Disney is getting on the stick and adding a ton of rides this Fall, but we'll have to see how it goes)

      The moral? I agree with you that it is inevitable that someone will eventually use this to try to promote a dog of a product. It won't do them any good. To paraphrase Field of Dreams: "Build it, but if it sucks, they still won't come"

    • Isn't the Flash crowd also from the Alfred Bester book about teleportation? ....trying to remember ...
    • Actually Niven was expounding (intentionally or not) on ideas expressed in Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination (1956). In it the individual power of teleportation by the power of the mind becomes an average joe's transport (known as jaunting). What happens to society when everyone can zip around? My fave are the driver's licenses adapted to a jaunting world.

      In Bester's take the flash crowds are not there to gawk but to loot after a disaster.

  • New Oxymoron! (Score:5, Funny)

    by bons ( 119581 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @08:56AM (#3985716) Homepage Journal
    "Smart Mob"
    News for Linguists. Stuff to banter.

    • Smart Mob (Score:2, Redundant)

      by Rupert ( 28001 )
      I was just re-reading Terry Pratchett's Maskerade (my copy is signed by the cast of this production [cix.co.uk]). "The IQ of a mob is the IQ of its least intelligent member divided by the number of people in the mob".
      • I think that's a paraphrase of Mark Twain, but I don't remember the original phrase. It was also used by Heinlein in, I believe, Stranger in a Strange Land. Possibly also somewhere Lazarus Long used it (but which volume?).
      • "The IQ of a mob is the IQ of its least intelligent member divided by the number of people in the mob".

        How about, "Any sufficiently large group of people is indistinguishable from idiots". Or simply, "Masses are asses."

  • Herd metality (Score:3, Insightful)

    by tanveer1979 ( 530624 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @08:56AM (#3985723) Homepage Journal
    Flash crowd, slashdot effect.... whatever you call it but the fact is that technology takes the instincts to a next level. Its called herd mentality, no matter how much we shrink the globe or what we do, is so wired in our genes or lets say jeans ;-), you go I come i go you come and we go they come!

    This is definately amusing :-). Centuries ago the same thing used to pass by word of mouth, and people used to flock for witch executions. And now sound has been replaced by electricity..The irony is that the meduim which is supposed to promote free thinking and freedom is also simultaniosly promoting whats it against!

    • The desire to be part of the 'in-group' or 'keep up with the Jones', which likely is something which is hard-wired as well...

      The downside is that just like 'flash crowds', the quality cannot always be judged by the quantity. For every quality story posted here, there are a million sites promoting the latest flash movie, silly photo, 'I am quizes' and the like. With cell-phone networks, you're more likely to see the 'flash crowd' effect revolve around a police stand-off, celebrity sighting, or breaking news story.

      The sad thing is that it's only going to get worse, as I've noticed an increase in the 'idiot on his cell-phone waving to his friend at home' during a live broadcast.

      Dr. Wu

    • Re:Herd metality (Score:2, Interesting)

      by s0meguy ( 265470 )
      My favourite example of herd mentality is the Office Computer Monitor effect. Stand three people in front of a computer screen and a crowd will soon gather and grow exponentially.
  • ...when will we be getting the associated personal teleportation devices?

  • feh (Score:2, Insightful)

    by K. ( 10774 )
    Wooh, go the americans, we can call each other or send text messages, let's all write sociology papers!

    Yawn goes the rest of the developed world, another fucking sms spam.

    So hungry goes the developing world, and am surrounded by landmines.

  • Dammmt... (Score:3, Funny)

    by liquidsin ( 398151 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @09:05AM (#3985767) Homepage
    I can't get to the link. It's been flash-crowded already.
  • I like cell phones, SMS, PDA's whatnot. I like the fact that I can be reached and I can reach my friends most of the time, and I like a calendar that beeps an hour before an important meeting etc. I think currently we are seeing a lot of people overusing their newly discovered communication media which has spawned the inevitable anti-cell phone movement. Eventually, however, I am sure what will happen is what has happened with every other new technology, i.e. these tools will become part of our everyday lives and the novelty will wear off. People will get used to all their toys and will discard the features they don't need. Not every celebrity sighting will be SMS'd to everyone at that point anymore. I think it is not a coincidence that only the 'social' side of the mobile technology has really caught on. People want to talk to other people, either via SMS 'chatting' or regular calls, download ring tones (so their *friends* will hear them when the phone rings!). The faceless 'mobile Internet' seems to Interest very few people. Contrary to many people, I also tend to think that the fact that people have the guts to talk about their private lives in public is a good thing. It's almost like free counceling. Of course, there is a limit to what I want to hear... - FF
    • Now, I'm a driver currently (of my many many careers). I drive. I don't need distractions. I definately don't need a cell phone on my route. I don't have a cell phone, hell I don't even have an answering machine. If I want to get ahold of someone I turn on the phone and call them. Now I do have ADSL and a PDA (which yes is a too that very much is indespensible to route mapping) but I think "always on" access is a bit much. "It's almost like free counceling." . . . well I don't know about that. If you really want to whine your problems to me that's fine. Just expect to be slapped, told to suck it up, and hit repeatedly about the head and shoulders with a cluebat.

  • Naw. (Score:2, Informative)

    by Brown ( 36659 )
    You don't say.

    Maybe mobiles aren't as coomon in the USA as in the UK, but here roughly 75% of the population have one, and if you're between 15 and 25 quite a few people look at you strangely if you don't (around Cambridge anyhow). They've become expected.

    For example, I was meeting my mates in London for my birthday 2 weeks ago; we were all coming in from different areas of the south of England. The day before we arranged a place and time - Victoria at 11:00. Come the next morning, everyone arrives in London, different arrival points, different times - out comes the mobiles> All 8 of us found each other within 20 mins of arriving, despite the 'group' having moved several times between the first and last person - some of whom didn't hear about the meet til that morning.

    Trying to do the same on such short notice without mobiles just wouldn't be possible. Mobiles have removed the need to plan - you can just do it all on the fly.
    • that's nice if you hated planning to begin with. I thrive on it. If I don't know what I'm doing next, then I get very uncomfortable.
  • I think the conventional (and most descriptive) term for this behavior is flash crowd.

    I thought the term was Crowds Gone Wild!

  • Cell phone (Score:2, Informative)

    by DaveMe ( 19844 )
    as cell phones increasingly become something that a teenager gets with her driver's license (...)
    I knew the US are lagging behind Europe in terms of cell phone usage, but I didnt think it was that much. In Germany, being 14 and not having at least a crappy Nokia 3210 means your parents are technophobic hippies, and that youre socially death.
    • Here in the U.S. you will often see kids who constantly show off their expensive Nextel cellular phones, make sure everyone has their phone number, and constantly talk to each other or even worse use the Nextel "Direct Connect" feature which allows them to talk to each other, but LOUDLY and with the addition of constant annoying beeps.

      Most of these kids deserve a swift kick in the balls.

      Tim
      • Here in the U.S. you will often see kids who constantly show off their expensive Nextel cellular phones, make sure everyone has their phone number, and constantly talk to each other or even worse use the Nextel "Direct Connect" feature which allows them to talk to each other, but LOUDLY and with the addition of constant annoying beeps.

        We had this phenomenon over here in Finland something like 8-10 years ago when mobile phone were still rare. The people who did have them tended to show off and talk into the (loudly) in a bus, and whatnot. Nowadays it would be like going "look people, I have a wristwatch, aren't I cool!" :)

      • I beg to differ.

        You said:
        "Most of these kids deserve a swift kick in the balls."

        Now, I put to your attention that a significant number of the aforementioned annoying kids are female, making the "Kick in the balls" a more difficult proposition.

        I propose we use "Boot to the head".

        He who has too much time on his hands:
      • Hey you kids get off my lawn.
    • In England having a phone as lowly as a Nokia 3210 would be social death for the 12-16 yr olds.. my little sister now constantly bitches how her 3310 is now 'sooo last year' and how she *must* have a new phone. Doubtless a similar situation occurs in schools across Europe..
  • That article is good, and definately insightful, but the kind of behavioral changes we're witnessing now are nothing compared to what we'll experience in the next 50-some years. I'd bet that in that time cell phone technology, and human-machine interfaces will both have advanced sufficiently to create implantable wireless communication devices that can be purchased and "installed" at a commodity level, in the same mannor as cell phones now. Although these devices may be inefficent for some time, and we may not reach what might be considered a telepathic level of communication for many more years, yet the kind of text messaging now available on cell phoness cannot be far off. I can only begin to speculate at the impact this will have, but I would imagine the development of similar patterns as those noted with cell phones, only more extreme and completely ubiquitous. The bottom line is that it is human nature to communicate with others, and anything that can enable or expand this will have profound effects in the coming years.

    And yes, the /. effect will have real, physical power and meaning.

  • Functional Telepathy (Score:3)

    by mattbelcher ( 519012 ) <matt.mattbelcher@com> on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @09:31AM (#3985945) Homepage
    Of all the "magic" powers, telepathy is the one I think we'll be able to simulate most accurately, and very soon. Suppose we merged cell phone technology with instant messaging buddy lists. Add a sub-vocal interface and a tiny earpiece and microphone, and you might as well be telepathic. (Albeit, for a limited number of daytime minutes!)

  • Welcome to the modern world, U.S... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by PetriWessman ( 584648 ) <orava&orava,org> on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @09:34AM (#3985984) Homepage

    It's nice to see the U.S. take notice of something that's an old phenomenon over here in wireless-happy Finland (and other parts of Europe). I remember first talking about this issue with friends years and years back. Practically everyone has had a mobile phone for so many years now that a lot of people don't even notice how much it has changed things. Little kids have mobile phones. Soon my cats will probably have one ;)

    For example, nobody agrees on an exact place/time to meet anymore. People just take a bus to the city center, and hook up with people while they're on the move. Likewise, people are totally used to being reachable all the time, and actually feel a bit cut off from society if their phone breaks or something. The same thing as with the Net and email, I guess. If you don't want to be available you turn your phone off or switch it to silent mode, but you want the option of being reachable to there.

    Quite amusing to see the States now start to reach this level and notice it. Not intended as a putdown, just as a statement - mobile tech is one area where many parts of Europe are still way ahead, very much due to GSM. Things will probably even out in the future.

    I write software for mobile messaging systems, so I have some idea of what I'm talking about, btw ;)

    • Obviously you keep your head in the sand and don't realize that in general these things are happening years ahead of time *before* a journalist actually ever figures it out and thinks "Hey, I could write about that." Journalists are notorious for doing this as is evident in the fact that most just in the last couple of years have figured out that not every internet address has to end in ".com" and/or start with "www." Or are your Journalist different in Finland? (somehow I doubt it)..
    • I have also noticed the atrophy of the ability to plan in my friends who have cell phones. I generally don't use one (occasionally activate a pre-paid mobile for long driving trips, should there be an emergency), and it is impossible to meet anyone anymore. They like to just say "meet me on 6th street in some bar" and then you are supposed to go to 6th, call them, find out what bar they went to on the spur of the moment, realize their habits have so atrophied they can't even tell you where they are in the bar, go to the bar and call them AGAIN, so you can locate them by the ringing phone.

      It's disgusting, really. I think some of my friends have almost completely lost the ability to plan more than 30 minutes ahead. They live 30 minutes (including a shower) from school and work, and any agreement to do anything that requires more than a half an hour preparation (such as meeting at a place an hour's drive away) requires constant communication, calling them to tell "you should be on the road now" or asking them to call you as they leave, or something like that.

      It's not a good part of modern society.
      • I am assuming you are in Austin :)

        I have noticed that quite a bit in this town, with all the college students and technology worker types. I myself do it all the time, I rarely plan anything with people any more. Anything my friends and I do usually has no more than 2 hours notice, and usually just a vague plan to meet somewhere. And when you are on your way, you get a half-dozen calls to update where everyone is or a change in plans.

        I actually like it. I enjoy being able to just call up anyone and go do something whenever I am bored, and also have the ability to turn off my phone and ignore the world for a while. The only time I don't like it is when you have friends who will never make plans, just "go with the flow", and think nothing of changing those plans when the "bigger better deal" comes along. I have found this applies mostly to women.

        Ohwell, I have never been a particularly rigid or structured person anyway.
      • I have also noticed the atrophy of the ability to plan in my friends who have cell phones. I generally don't use one (occasionally activate a pre-paid mobile for long driving trips, should there be an emergency), and it is impossible to meet anyone anymore. They like to just say "meet me on 6th street in some bar" and then you are supposed to go to 6th, call them, find out what bar they went to on the spur of the moment, realize their habits have so atrophied they can't even tell you where they are in the bar, go to the bar and call them AGAIN, so you can locate them by the ringing phone.
        I do this too. But, I don't have a cellphone (by choice, but that's another issue). Perhaps that's why it's always problematic for me to set up things where meeting people is involved.
    • Quite amusing to see the States now start to reach this level and notice it. Not intended as a putdown, just as a statement - mobile tech is one area where many parts of Europe are still way ahead, very much due to GSM. Things will probably even out in the future.

      Not taken as a putdown. Please understand, however, that the U.S. is more rural than Europe. Perhaps in Europe, the success of personal communicators is guaranteed, simply because the population density is nearly 2.5 times that of the U.S. I'm sure there are places in the U.S., such as San Francisco or New York, that could be like this, but these cities are not typical, here.
    • I believe most /.ers realize Scandinavia is way ahead in wireless, not because the US is more rural (Finland has a *far* lower population density than the US: 15 people/km^2 v. 30/km^2 in the US) but because your government has encouraged the industry. The US press took note of this fact long ago (soda machines activated by cellphones! Finnish kids getting enlarged thumbs!) I think Americans are just more interested in their countrymen's doings than in the doings of others.

      I am always a bit confused by these postings from non-Americans: doesn't the Finnish media pay more attention to things when they happen in Finland? Hard for me to tell because when in Scandinavia I can only read the English-language papers. It does seem the Brits pay an awful lot of attention to things that affect only them (the Royals, cricket, the Pound - oops, sorry), but that just seems natural.

      What do you think?

  • One weak link and no automation would mean... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Rahga ( 13479 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @09:35AM (#3986001) Journal
    One weak link and no automation would mean... potential for a lot of wasted energy.

    Let's face it. I bet if poor old Prince William wanted his horde of money-and-power-hungry vultures off his back, all it would take is a few staff member or even a few defectors to infirltrate the network and fire off the occasional false alarm. If the level of sophistication in the group doesn't involve and automatic central server to relay these messages, then the wasted energy in communicating combined with the end result would probably see the group die off with ease....

    Without guidance or leadership in such groups, any activities that can have negative consequences on those with power could likely be thwarted with ease.

    Anyways, I personally live my life without a cell phone, and I love it. Of course, marriage and fatherhood mean that I don't have this need to feel my life with boring, unfullfilling noncompetitive social activity. In one level, I'm glad I don't have ammount of time to burn that these folks obviously do. On another level, a bit more time to pursue my own hobbies and goals would be nice...

    • That's why you need to build these groups around a network of trust.

    • I was just wondering, why do you assume your life of marriage and fatherhood is more fullfilling than other people's lifestyles? Are you basing this on any sort of qualitative information/data or do you simply like to spout off smugly?
      • I assume that it is more fullfilling to ME than those other lifestyles. Personally, I couldn't stand the barhopping scene or any of that....

        I wouldn't be able to stand it. If you or anyone else ejoys that type of lifestyle or activity, then have at it. :)
    • ...What this would create a Partial Reinforcement effect. As any behavioral psychologist can tell you a behavior that gets reinforced partially at random intervals will happen much more often than behavior reinforced every time.

      A classic example of this would be a brat crying for candy. If parents give in every now and then, this child will cry only more often and more intensily whenever (s)he wants something.

      If those "lusty ladies" could not be sure that the message they got was the real one, there would be the oposite effect, a rush to that spot to be the first to confirm weather or not it is true. And those times when it is not, will only fuel the hunger for the next chance.
      • Honestly, that thought did occour to me.... Then there's the potential to completely muck up the system by having insiders both verify the fake reports as being true and deny the true reports....

        Either way... It's good to be the king! Too bad it sucks to be the prince ;)
        • lol, I think this is thinking a bit too much ahead, but what the hell. I think this kind of system is very good at error correction and false positives. Because think about it, it is composed of personal aquantances. Each person has a friend list. If a message does not come from that friend list, it is very likely to be discarded. So you pretty much HAVE to bribe insiders. Now, suppose you bribe a number of lusty friends with promices to meet the prince. It will become fairly obvious to all the first tier reciepents of this message that this particular person is giving negatives all the time. Thus their credibility will be reduces and their alamrs will not propogate. I imagine such system would single out trouble makers fairly quickly, probably even after several false alarms in a row. Of course one could just start faking message from every member of the system to all their friends. But I think if this abuse of power ever got out, prince would have a lot more to worry about than screaming girls : ) On the bright side, maybe it will bring encryptions to the masses out of the need to have trusted and verified messages!

  • Idoru (Score:2, Interesting)

    by f00Dave ( 251755 )
    William Gibson's "Idoru" hit the nail on the head: it's insufficient merely to have the technology available, there needs to be a pre-existing group of interested parties (a "SIG" for all you old-timers =] ).
  • at 03:30 in the moring in ANY neighborhood, ANYTHING of remote interest will draw a bloody crowd. I worked MIDs as an EMT and policeman. The 64K ? was always HOW do they know and where do they come from ?

  • People ARE nodes in a network. Always have been. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Ungrounded Lightning ( 62228 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @10:50AM (#3986627) Journal
    What happens when people become nodes on a network?

    People ARE nodes in a network. They have been since before there was electronic communication. They have been since they were prehuman apes.

    It's called "being a social animal."

    It's why making friends who might engage in mutually-beneficial projects and getting such friends to introduce you to other such friends, is called "networking".

    Engineering and analyzing the structure and emergent behavior of electronic communication netowrks has given us additional understanding of the behavior, even as the electronic networks themselves have aided and amplified the functioning of the social networks.

    "Global village" was coined when the only ones with effective access to large-scale communication was the professional newscriers and gossips. But general access to directed communication enables a "global city" - with distinct boroughs of differing cultures and interests but without geographic limitations.

    • Yeah, but they used to be purely biological nodes in a network. Now they've become BORG nodes. And just like the BORG, this amplification gives them the ability to do more (faster, better, more efficient, etc.).

      Resistance is futile. You too will want a cellphone one day (your kids certainly do).

      • Resistance is futile. You too will want a cellphone one day (your kids certainly do).

        I've wanted one (or a radio phone) since at least 1967.

        At least that's the earliest I remember looking at whether anything less solvent than a government agency could acquire enough miniature parts to hack a transciever into a Princess (tm) phone handset and use it to talk to an automated base station.

  • Taking this to the next level... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Andy Dodd ( 701 ) <atd7@c[ ]ell.edu ['orn' in gap]> on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @11:00AM (#3986700) Homepage
    There are already technologies that let a phone get a general idea of its location based on what tower it's talking to (Palm.net and the VII/i705 - why oh why doesn't CDMA data have this feature? And I don't think GSM has this sort of integration, partly because both data services were designed for phones possible with an external data device, not integrated solutions like the Kyocera 6035 or the Treo)

    I see in the future a variation of IM software (Why use current IM solutions when you have SMS???) in which you mark yourself as saying, "I'm available" with possibly a little bit of personal info (age 18-25 or whatever), that shows up to anyone looking to find people in their immediate area. (Maybe defined as "my tower and adjacent x towers" since I believe the GPS capabilities in E-911 are on demand and NOT user controlled.)

    New to a city? Take a bus to the city center and mark yourself available to meet people. (As opposed to the mentions of such activities existing already that require you to already have the phone # of the person you're messaging.)

    People would be able to create "networks" on the fly that anyone could find and join into.
    • One implementation (Although not exactly automated) of such an idea can be found at www.relatia.com - Unfortunately, www.freefor.com does not seem to resolve to anything, otherwise I'd play with it.

  • Go to the source (Score:3, Informative)

    by kellan1 ( 23372 ) on Wednesday July 31, 2002 @11:09AM (#3986766) Homepage
    Just a repackaging of what Rheingold himself wrote 2 weeks ago, Smart Mobs [edge.org], with a few amusing if poorly documented anecdotes thrown in. The original is more interesting.

  • human contact? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by beaverfever ( 584714 )
    If I may quote a posting already listed as a troll:

    "people who tend to use these new PDA technologies are seriously missing out on the more traditional forms of human contact."

    I believe there is a lot of truth to this, and anyone who takes a good hard look at culture in San Francisco will see it. There are a lot of people here who know lots of people and always have a party to go to but their best friends are the ones they left behind in other towns and cities, the ones they met before social connectivity ruled their lives. Also, the connected culture, as illustrated in the article, is a culture of following, of never really going anywhere without prior review and approval - where is the discovery, adventure and education in that?

    The fact that it is becoming normal to be frequently interupted by cell phone ringing and ignored by the people around you while they chat on cell phones could produce a social backlash. It has on a minor scale, but those who choose not to be totally connected by refusing PDAs and cell phones are more of an ignored anomoly right now.

    It will be interesting to look back in ten or twenty years and see how much of this is just a trend for the moment (CB radio - what?) and how much sticks - tv is generally accepted as vacuous entertainment with few redeeming qualities and it's still going strong.
  • I saw an early form of this when I was a student at UCLA in the early 90's, especially among Asian students who were more likely at that time to have cell phones.

    The behavior began with a lot of evening calls going around among "friends" beginning with the key phrase: "what are you up to tonight?". Sooner or later there would be someone who was up to something! And that activity would start to become the "thing to be doing tonight". I would watch friends initiate (or participate in) the construction of a party or movie outing in minutes. When we got there, a small crowd was always waiting (conversing on cell phones of course). Heh.

    Unfortunately, a big draw-back to this was that the smallest complaint in the "swarm net" would lead to a compromised outcome. I saw way too many dumb movies due to this effect, and thus I no longer swarm.

    - James
  • So the military and police forces have a hard time coping with these people? Well, they do have strategies to counter it. Someone's already suggested sending false messages, but why not just intercept the calls people make so that you can see where the crowd is heading? Even though the whole gathering is like a small P2P network, since everyone will be sending similar messages (due to the snowball effect when the ringleader makes an announcement) all you have to do is listen to a couple of people and you can see what they're going to do. If you're desparate, then you could just jam the cellphone frequencies and they'll be split into a massive collection of isolated agents rather than a cohesive swarm.

    At which point you can move in with the water cannons.

  • Personal communication devices always allowed people to communicate easily and to coordinate their plans at the spur of the moment. As PCDs became widespread, they allowed their owners to converge rapidly in large groups, for purposes social or political.

    This must be in some alternate reality. In real life, "PCDs" are marred by lousy user interfaces, tiny keyboards, short battery lives, miniscule screens, low resolution, limited range, and incompatibilities.

  • And where is the cell-phone radiation paranoia crowd when you need em...? But then, I'm not the expert on how much power these things broadcast. I'd imagine if it wasn't range you need to worry about, it's data integrity...

  • Seriously, I have thought long and hard about the role of cell phones in society (yeah I was a cultural studies scholar in college), and I see it as a form of primitive telepathy. I'm not trying to be weird or joke around; if you really think about it -- cell phones give you instant communication with others.

    (Not the kind of telepathy where you can read others' minds, the kind where you can communicate instantly with other telepaths.)

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