This is right on. I would also suggest that this attack will probably accelerate calls for organizations to become distributed networks with regard to personnel as well with regard to computers--who wants to come in to a central office location when such are a more attractive target. These accelarated calls should also accelerate technology to make such personnel distribution possible--video-conferencing technology and the like. --Christian Nelson "Prof. Andrejevic" wrote:
Has anyone else on this list been struck by the parallel between the current portrait of de-centralized terrorist networks emerging in the media coverage and the organizational logic of distributed computer networks? Certainly both forms of networking emerged with a similar goal in mind: a resiliance to the forms of centralized large-scale attacks characteristic of warfare in the first half of the 20th century. Redundancy and de-centralization are defensive structures whose effectiveness is demonstrated by the fact (reported yesterday, I think) that despite the destruction of something like 10 percent of Manhattan's office space, suprisingly little data was lost. In the face of this kind of distributed networking, the type of military response envisioned by Bush/Cheney et alia seems disturbingly out of joint. Just as we wouldn't imagine that we could take down a network by hitting a node, so too does the goal of "taking out" Osama bin Laden seem more symbolic than effective (to the effect that it works to proliferate cells of resistance, it might even be read as counter-productive). I'm wondering if there's some way to use the commonly accepted discourse on computer networking to shed some light on the current debate over the appropriate U.S. response to the recent acts of terrorism.
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