I've been interested in what David Reed had to say on Group Forming Networks and their theoretical basis inherent in the structure of the Internet.

It occurs to me that the current anti-war movement may be an example of that process in action.

Not only has it enabled the generation of a very large group of people acting in concert, but it has some other factors that seem uniquely to arise from information and its connecting technologies.

• The development of the protests have been based not on the actions of the protagonists but on a disseminated discussion on what they say they are going to do. participants are responding very strongly to hypothetical situations rather than the actual events.
• Not only has the Internet been the co-ordinating structure (making sure people know where. when etc), but it has also enabled the co-ordinators to negotiate, and at short notice, renegotiate and disseminate those dates, places etc dynamically and in tune with events as they unfold.
• The Internet has also enabled disparate, and sometimes diametrically opposed groups to work together on their common cause, rather than being bogged down in the intergroup squabbling that would formally be expected in such an event. The meta-group exists for a single purpose, and is maintained via the Internet, thereby avoiding all of the social interaction that would be almost certain to generate. Participants are dehumanised to the extent that they exist in the group only as the expression of those things on which they agree, and nothing else. By getting the extraneous stuff off the agenda, very fast decision making has been enabled.
• Conversely, the Internet has operated in exactly the opposite way with the probable victims of any attack. By thoroughly humanising them, constructing them as "People Exactly Like Us" but with no resources or ability to change the unfolding events, participants have become completely identified with Iraqis who will have to sit under the rain of bombs sent by the representatives of the participants. I couldn't describe it better than this cartoon from Mike Lucovich An impossible psychological position to maintain without psychosis.
• The whole process has also been made more powerful by the ability of the Internet to "chew' on information. It disseminates a statement from a politician that is picked up by knowledgeable people, deconstructed, refuted or undermined, alternatives proposed and those packages re-disseminated almost before the speech is over, and certainly, crucially, before the mainstream media can get it on the nightly bulletin. By which time the opponent talking heads are ready with the rebuttal. The inertia on which politicians and others have depended to get their message across in the clear has gone.

Evidence strongly suggests that terrorists used the Internet to plan their operations for 9/11. Computers seized in Afghanistan reportedly revealed that al Qaeda was collecting intelligence on targets and sending encrypted messages via the Internet. As recently as 16 September 2002, al Qaeda cells operating in America reportedly were using Internet-based phone services to communicate with cells overseas. These incidents indicate that the Internet is being used as a 'cyberplanning' tool for terrorists. It provides terrorists with anonymity, command and control resources, and a host of other measures to coordinate and integrate attack options.

Cyberplanning may be a more important terrorist Internet tool than the much touted and feared cyberterrorism option; attacks against information and systems resulting in violence against noncombatant targets

Like Blogs, Wikis and other online content management tools, 13myths.org is trying to make dealing with information more efficient, and very much faster. Their objective is to build a rebuttal tool for distributed processing of political knowledge. The idea being to systematise the existing chewing process that is afflicting those who have been used to the inertia of the media business providing the first mover of a statement with about 48 hours advantage over the rebuttal. By the time the response comes, it is no longer news and gets buried in the inside pages, even if the original statement is a barefaced lie. That process is being undermined by the Internet in general, now these guys are trying to create a tool to use the distributed knowledge of communities to create fast, clear, rebuttals through an iterative process that acts fast, getting the rebuttal to the media in time to be published alongside the original statement.