But there is a real weirdness about many of the protesters. Captured very well with this image:
<http://weaselzippers.us/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/OWS-Evil-Corporations.jpg> It's as if these people know what they are fighting, but have no clue how to fight it. Ghandi got people to hand weave clothes and to march to the sea to make salt. He knew what the score was. During the fights over racism in the US, people who were upset about racist rules regarding bus riding refused to ride the bus! They new they could force the bus company to comply or go bankrupt... and it worked. In contrast, these people are protesting the same things they are clearly patronizing. As Owen points out: "Down with the evil corporation!" they send out on Twitter, with a tie in to their Facebook or Google+ page, featuring a link to a Youtube video that will be covered with Toyota ads, uploaded from their Motorola phone, over the AT&T network, in the hopes that I will access it over my Comcast broadband from my Dell. Seriously, you get the impression that if Coca Cola offered corporate sponsorship in the form of bottled water, soda, sun shades, and logo-covered out houses, it would be a done deal. I'm not against the protest. This country has serious issues to work out, and many of the protesters scattered points are valid. But there are some simple steps to fighting the battle that are being missed. If you want to hurt the evil corporations with their super-rich owners... stop giving them your money. Technologically, I thought some of the most interesting things about the Arab spring were all the creative ways protesters circumvented popular, corporate-run communication channels (in their case because the government shut down access). Surely it would be possible to do the same here if people really wanted to make a principled stand. Eric On Tue, Oct 11, 2011 12:40 PM, Paul Paryski <ppary...@aol.com> wrote: >The Occupy/AE phenomenon might be an excellent example of emergence? An Occupy ABM? Clearly any mass protect movement will be chaotic with many agendas finding expression. As is the case in Europe where Occupy is receiving large press coverage, the main motivation is that the very rich Wall Street gang largely caused the economic crisis and it is the poor and middle class who must pay the bill while the super rich, corporations and the financial sector get bailout $$ and no real reg reform. I hope some of you will participate in Santa Fe's Occupy protest at the Roundhouse on Saturday. >> >cheers, Paul > > >>-----Original Message----- > >From: Owen Densmore <o...@backspaces.net> > >To: Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com>; discuss <disc...@sfcomplex.org> > >Sent: Tue, Oct 11, 2011 6:21 am > >Subject: [sfx: Discuss] Lessig & OccupyBoston > >> > >Larry Lessig is one of the more interesting twitter feeds: >> > > >> ><a class="user" title="" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102); text-decoration: none; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; background-color: rgba(0, 72, 255, 0.148438); " href="">Lessig</a> >> >The Harvard Tea Party students joined the <a style="color: rgb(102, 102, 85); text-decoration: none; " href="">#OccupyBoston</a> march yesterday. <a target="" href="http://t.co/aKMkU6Ji"; style="color: rgb(102, 102, 85); text-decoration: none; " onclick="window.open('http://t.co/aKMkU6Ji');return false;">http://t.co/aKMkU6Ji</a><a style="color: rgb(102, 102, 85); text-decoration: none; " href="">#criticallyimportantfirststeps</a> <a style="color: rgb(102, 102, 85); text-decoration: none; " href="">#rootstrikers</a> > > > > >> > > >>I'm surprised just how intense the whole American Spring has become. I don't watch TV news shows, but my impression is that there is not much media coverage. The AS is hard to classify and there are many elements so that I think it has caught the media off guard. And naturally it is not in their interest, or at least so they think. > > >> > > >>But AS is busting out all over: AmericansElect, the Free The Net efforts, Occupy(fill in the blanks), and more. > > >> > > >>One interesting part of all this is that for a long time I didn't "get" social media. Now seeing it in action is fascinating: > > >> Twitter: is the dynamic info stream, pointing to > >> Facebook: which acts as an aggregator. > > >> YouTube: which acts as near-live video feeds > >>Facebook is being rivaled, I think, with other blogs/sites/G+, but for now it seems to be where the tweets point. > > >> > > >>I wonder if a different/augmented aggregator could be mashed up from Twitter & Facebook/G+ & YouTube to build Reed's Law sub-nets, or simply machine learning based classifiers. > > >> > > >>After seeing all this (Especially the Tea Party joining in the OccupyBoston movement) I'm amazed the government hasn't closed it down. I suppose they'll just subvert it. > > >> > > >>Do "follow" Lessig, it's often fascinating. > > >> > > >> -- Owen > > > >> > > >-- > > >You received this message because you are subscribed to the Santa Fe Complex "discuss" group. > > >To post to this group, send email to <#> > > >To unsubscribe from this group, send email to ><#> > > >For more options, visit this group at ><a target="" href="http://groups.google.com/a/sfcomplex.org/group/discuss"; onclick="window.open('http://groups.google.com/a/sfcomplex.org/group/discuss');return false;">http://groups.google.com/a/sfcomplex.org/group/discuss</a> > > > > > > > > > ============================================================ >FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College >lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org > Eric Charles Professional Student and Assistant Professor of Psychology Penn State University Altoona, PA 16601
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