Which brings me to Iran…

Now, before you go thinking that I’m some kind of hippie peacenik, know that I am quite fond of blood and guts and gore and veins in my teeth. Even as someone whose foreign policy views verge on realpolitik, I recognize the threat of a nuclear Iran to Middle East stability. I’m also aware that our options are limited.

But this isn’t about geopolitical choice so much as the language that shapes how we perceive choice itself.

Exhibit A: US Fears Israel Will Hit Iran Without Warning

“Whoever says ‘later’ may find that later is too late,” Israeli Defense minister Ehud Barak said. (The Post notes he switched from Hebrew to English when saying the words, “Later is too late.”) Leon Panetta, meanwhile, declined to refute a report that he was worried about an Israeli attack.

It’s probably unsurprising that Israel is trying to convey a sense of inevitability here. Still, one wonders if Israel has the capability of neutralizing the below-ground, concrete-reinforced facilities that comprise Iran’s nuclear workshops. In which case, the drum beating may be a nudge to the US to hurry up and complete work on its Massive Ordnance Penetrator, which may or may not be up to the task. (Either way, the MOP can be seen as a major advancement in military hardware as phallic symbol.)

Exhibit B: U.S. Intel: Iran Willing To Attack on American Soil

Dear Big Content,

I love your movies. Especially the ones that are all s’plodey and where stuff flies off the screen. And I love your records, the Led Zeppelin catalog in particular. I’ve always been a good customer: I don’t infringe, and I’m loyal to a fault. But I do have a few questions for you.

First, why do you treat me and my friends like punks? We buy your stuff. But you make it really hard to do it in a way that fits with our digital reality. I’m looking at you, movie and TV peeps. You really want me to accept the violation of a decades-old consumer compact whereby we could rent a movie on the same day it was available to purchase? Do you really think that making me wait TWO MONTHS to be able to rent Mars Needs Moms on DVD (I’m not even talking streaming) is going to drive me into Best Buy to plunk down for the petrochemical disc? Do you secretly like piracy? Because that’s exactly what you’re encouraging.

And music guys: how come you create the conditions where there are only three companies that can afford to offer your wares? Do you know how much fucking money you’re leaving on the table by clinging to your prehistoric licensing terms? Once upon a time there was this disruptive, infringing technology called radio. Completely freaked song publishers out. They wanted to force every broadcaster to pay an individually negotiated amount for every spin. In hindsight, that seems not only inefficient but imbecilic. Maybe the government needs to step up and prod you goofballs towards more internet-friendly terms. I bet you could even keep your car service! Now, I know that you fought the phonograph. And the CD. And the MP3. But you don’t have much fight left in you. So the time to get your shit together is probably now. And yes, me and my friends will be paying VERY close attention to make sure that the artist splits are fair. Because frankly, I’m not all that convinced that you’re providing much value anymore. Consider this your opportunity to be cut into the future while you still have a chance.

And would you please get a basic grasp of how the internet works? Why are you so keen to demonize an entire class of technology? Let’s take search for example. I can look up a recipe to make hash brownies. Or I can look up a recipe to make regular brownies. Now, we all know that those criminal scumbags offering the former must be dealt with in the severest possible manner. But what you’re proposing is like blowing up the entire library because you don’t like that the card catalog system tells you which shelf has the book on hash brownies. Are you really this boneheaded? I get that you’re jealous about Google making bajillions from search. But is that a reason to compromise a mechanism upon which millions of global internet users rely? I guess it’s true what they say: the entertainment industry isn’t all about the money — it’s about ALL the money.

Also, could you please stop pretending that the SOPA/PIPA debacle was about Silicon Valley vs. Hollywood? (Or, as you prefer to characterize it, homespun creators vs. Google.) Literally millions of internet users — many of them copyright holders — had issues with your overreaching bills. They didn’t jump into a controversial intellectual property debate because they wanted to. They felt compelled to, due to the fact that big-money industry lobbying groups like yours were attempting to speak for them.

So kindly cut it out.

I want to be your friend. But you don’t make it easy. The arrogance, belligerence and outright bullying that you employ is hardly endearing yourselves to an entire new generation of creators and rightsholders. If I wasn’t so goddamn genteel, I’d go ahead and list some of that stuff. But unlike you, I have a modicum of class.

Consider this a friendly bit of advice from someone who cares. The road you’re going down leads to disaster and heartbreak. But it’s not too late to turn around.

Your pal,
Casey

You can’t say the ruling Mullahs don’t have a sense of humor. In response to US demands that Iran return a RQ-170 Sentinel stealth drone that went down over the eastern part of Iran, the country’s leaders have agreed to send back a toy version worth about four bucks.

The drone’s capture back in December 2011 sparked some debate in intelligence and military circles about whether to launch an operation to destroy it, or simply leave it in Iranian hands. The former was decided to be too risky, so the US ultimately chose to send a formal letter requesting the drone be returned. The same week they also sent letters requesting Justin Bieber stop being so damned adorable and for Tim Tebow to convert to Satanism.

Meanwhile, Iranian officials claim to have finished extracting data from the unmanned aircraft. They also plan to file a lawsuit against the United States in US courts for alleged invasion of their airspace. Good luck finding a friendly bench, fellas.

All of this makes one wonder why, with such sophisticated technology, there isn’t some kind of destruct mechanism on these drones. I suppose the lack of such a failsafe is why “military intelligence” remains an oxymoron.

Ah well, at least the President will have an interesting new paperweight for his desk in the Oval Office.

One of the reasons I haven’t been posting much is that I’m spending every spare bit of my energy trying to make sure a pair of ill-conceived pieces of legislation do not become law (at least in their current form). The bills in question are the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House of Representatives, and the PROTECT-IP Act in the Senate. (Of the two, SOPA is the worst.)

Now, both of these proposals could be considered well-intentioned, but their language is dangerously overbroad and could have serious implications on free speech, innovation and cybersecurity. I won’t bore you with the details, because I have a broader point to make. (Here’s my favorite analysis of the bills’ scope and provisions, if you’re curious.)

What pisses me off most is that there’s likely another way to achieve the bills’ goals — namely, combating foreign sites that traffic in unauthorized American intellectual property. Yet these alternatives are largely being ignored by a Congress eager to simply hand the internet over to Hollywood. And can say with certainty that these folks are always happy to restrict speech and quash competition in the name of preserving an antiquated business model.

In an agonizing twist of irony, Congress’ mad rush to codify online censorship is in direct opposition to the American government’s efforts to promote informational freedom abroad. This article in Slate expertly explains the discontinuity.

There is a recurring theme in terms of how recent legislation is being crafted. We’re seeing deliberate loopholes that don’t explicitly detail how your liberties will be restricted, but nonetheless establish the conditions under which such outcomes are not only possible, but likely.

Take for example, the highly controversial National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). Steve Benen has an excellent analysis about whether this law would allow for the permanent detention of American citizens.

Not to compare apples to oranges, but I was struck by the following disclaimer in NDAA:

Nothing in this section shall be construed to affect existing law or authorities relating to the detention of United States citizens, lawful resident aliens of the United States, or any other persons who are captured or arrested in the United States.

Oh, good! Then there’s NO WAY a court could interpret this statute as giving the president the option of indefinitely detaining without trial an American citizen suspected of terrorism!

This deliberate-loophole doublespeak reminds me of the opening renunciation in SOPA (emphasis mine):

(1) FIRST AMENDMENT- Nothing in this Act shall be construed to impose a prior restraint on free speech or the press protected under the 1st Amendment to the Constitution.

(2) TITLE 17 LIABILITY- Nothing in title I shall be construed to enlarge or diminish liability, including vicarious or contributory liability, for any cause of action available under title 17, United States Code, including any limitations on liability under such title.

That must mean that there can be absolutely NO WAY that any portion of a site that is “avoiding confirming a high probability” of infringement could be blocked by the US attorney general or have its commercial transactions halted on the mere accusation of infringement (the latter without any due process, and and with an impossibly narrow window for recourse). I feel so much better now!

We’ve always been at war with Eastasia.

To go any further would require a level of legal analysis that would likely put you in a coma. So I’ll close with this hopefully straightforward statement: American civil liberties are currently under threat, and our elected officials have abdicated their fundamental responsibility to safeguard these basic freedoms.

And that should scare the shit out of you.

I’ve censored the following, in protest of a bill that gives any corporation and the US government the power to censor the internet — legislation that could pass THIS WEEK. To see the uncensored text, and to stop internet censorship, visit: http://americancensorship.org/posts/15233/uncensor

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I live in Washington, DC and work in tech policy (as it relates to creative content). This means I have the dubious privilege of seeing how the sausage is made when it comes to the laws that shape our digital future. Increasingly, I’m witnessing a convergence of some pretty hairy issues that previously had limited public impact. And, for better or worse, policymakers — domestic and international — have started to pay attention.

There are three core concerns that will have an outsized effect on how we all experience technology. The first one encompasses the other two, which are of nearly equal importance. Bookmark this page, and we can talk about it in 10 years (provided we’re all still here).

1. Internet freedom
2. Intellectual Property Enforcement
3. Data Privacy/Security

Before I explain how these issues are converging, let’s look at what each means individually.

Internet Freedom
This is the mother of all tech-policy debates, and the one with the most potential to impact every facet of your online experience. The internet is essentially a packet-switching information exchange network that uses a simple protocol to allow all these interconnected machines to “talk” to each other. Its process is, by and large, neutral with regard to content. This is what has allowed it to become the most powerful engine for democratic speech in the history of humanity. That speech may very well be 90 percent LOLcats, but it also includes political speech and practically every other flavor of expression. In the United States, this means that our First Amendment rights are automatically ported over to this digital conduit. That may not be the case with other countries, which is why you see a lot of high-falutin’ talk from the State Department about the importance of maintaining global networks where free expression can flourish.

Unfortunately, recent American trends giving corporate speech unparalleled weight means that your own online speech could depend on how deep your pockets are. This is the crux of the so-called “net neutrality” debate, in which the Internet Service Providers (ISPs) want to charge a premium for the faster delivery of content, sites and services. Without clear rules of the road, speech that does not benefit the ISP’s bottom lines — or those of their corporate partners — may be delayed, or worse still, blocked. There has been progress in achieving at least some protections here. But these rules — promulgated by the Federal Communications Commission — are currently in danger of being stripped away by Congress.

Another thing to keep in mind is that the FCC established separate rules for the “wired” web vs. internet accessed on mobile devices. This distinction, to me, is arbitrary and pointless. There is ONE internet, regardless of how you connect to it. Having a tiered internet for wireless may end up impacting those whose speech has historically been at the greatest disadvantage, as underprivileged and minority communities are more likely to access the internet via mobile devices.

It will be very interesting to see how the American virtue of free expression plays out on our domestic networks, especially as we promote open technology platforms as a means of democratic participation overseas.

2. Intellectual Property Enforcement
Wikipedia defines Intellectual Property (IP) as “a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized… common types of intellectual property rights include copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights and trade secrets in some jurisdictions.”

IP is big business. REALLY big business here in America. Which is why there are so many large stakeholders pushing for stronger intellectual property laws on the internet. I have no problem with this in theory, as I am a copyright holder myself, and believe that I should have exclusive rights over how my expression is capitalized upon in the marketplace – that is, for a limited term, which was the balance struck by Congress when it devised our laws governing this part of IP. There are different rules for trademarks and patents, on which I am no expert. So I’ll stick with what I know.

Increasingly, copyright law is coming to loggerheads with the consumptive behaviors of internet users. This is something I’ve written about and spoken on extensively in my professional life. In the interest of space, and without picking sides, I can say this: rightsholders are currently pushing hard on Congress to pass laws that, to my reading, look like blunt instruments when it comes to protecting IP online. And by this I mean legislation currently proposed could, at worst, restrict legitimate speech and compromise the underlying security of the internet. For further details, I point you to my DC colleagues, Public Knowledge. (Full disclosure: my wife works for them.)

3. Data Privacy/Security
Which brings me to my final issue, data privacy/security. Again, I can’t claim to be an expert here, but on the other hand, not many can. Here, we have everything from domestic defense to corporate espionage to individual rights and even First Amendment concerns. Some may have heard Eric Schmidt of Google‘s statement on total data transparency being the key to informational security. I’m sure the NSA would agree, so long as they are the ones with “total” access to the data. I bring this up because at no other point in history has informational privacy been of such import — perceived and actual. I can remember people on the street where I grew up being hesitant about having their name listed in the phone book. Now, everything we do and say online leaves a digital trace. Before you get yourself in some Philip K. Dick psychological tailspin, keep in mind that there’s a big difference between personally-identifying data and non-personally-identifying data. The former can be used to target, track and harass individuals; the latter is basically why Amazon knows what books you might be interested in reading next. Still, there is a lot of grey area with regard to how this information is collected, shared and exploited. And, at the moment, US privacy law is a patchwork of state-by-state regulations and jurisprudence. That might not be the case forever, as Congress has shown interest in establishing a federal privacy standard. Obviously, that could cut both ways.

Data security is the other side of the coin. Here, we reach the queasy intersection of defense, espionage — corporate and state — and hackerdom. Much of what occurs in the world of data security happens privately, or though private-public contracts between government and IT wizards. Obviously, any breach of US information security comes with pretty severe (domestic) penalties, but that doesn’t mean that hackers here and abroad aren’t trying to break into our informational infrastructure every second of every day. A serious breach is practically guaranteed, as is the subsequent crackdown. I believe this is what is referred to as the “Internet 9/11.”

The US isn’t just playing defense here. I’ve followed closely reports of how the administration very seriously considered a cyberattack on Libya’s air defense network in the lead-up to the NATO engagement. We ultimately decided against it, likely for a combination of reasons: one, we may not have wanted to be the first country to open the Pandora’s Box of cyberwar; two, we didn’t have enough time to pinpoint and exploit weaknesses in the Libyan network before airstrikes were scheduled to commence; and three, there were lingering legal questions about whether cyberattacks are considered “hostilities” subject to Congressional oversight within the War Powers Act. I guarantee these questions will soon be answered one way or another. And this will undoubtedly impact the evolution of global information networks.

All three of these issues intersect in myriad ways. The economics of digital entertainment is related to open networks vs. walled gardens, and also bumps up against data privacy/security on both the consumer and corporate end of the spectrum. Participatory democracy depends on open tech platforms and access to robust data pipelines and mobile spectrum. Overly-broad IP enforcement has the potential to limit exactly that openness while sending the signal to other nations that censorship is OK. Digital networks can also be exploited by despots (and even less-nefarious governments) to monitor the speech and movement of a populace. And around and around we go.

Taken together, as they are destined to be, these three issues represent the last tech-policy debate. How we respond will shape human interaction for decades, if not centuries to come.

Welcome to another edition of our sometime-series, The Contrarian’s Old-Time Conspiracy Hour! Today, we’re going to look at a pair of subjects closer to the truth than your average intrigue: The Great Pirates and the Gross Universal Cash Heist (GRUNCH). These two concepts were originally put forth by intellectual rapscallion R. Buckminster Fuller, a man whose genius knew few bounds.

Devised decades ago, Bucky’s hypotheses have never been more timely, what with the Occupy Wall Street protests and a tottering global economy. Great Pirates and GRUNCH are best taken as informed allegory, not hard fact. This is why they often get slapped with the “conspiracy” label. But unlike, say, reptilian shapeshifters who secretly run the world, the Great Pirates and GRUNCH are based on actual dynamics in trade, information and governance.

Let’s start with GRUNCH. Basically, this is the overarching strategy of the Great Pirates (more on them in a second). The theory posits that the nations of the world are actually “sponsored entities” of a few select financial networks. World governments (and their subjects) are kept in place through debts, which is why politicians are always going to raise taxes, no matter what they promise — they have to contain rising interest. Of course, even in politics, you have to pay to play. In 1980, Bucky estimated that it cost $100 million to run for president, $30 million to run for Senate and $10 million for the House of representatives. Obviously, the price tag is much higher now, but the story is the same: politicians are “sponsored” by the financial networks and their overlords, who invest in campaigns. The Supreme Court supports this arrangement, as demonstrated by the Citizens United vs. Federal Elections Commission ruling.

Now, Bucky didn’t think that there was any single gang of Great Pirates running the show; he believed that there were likely a number of them, often tugging in different directions. As an engineer, he found such shoddy staging inefficient, and therefore unacceptable.

So who are these Great Pirates? The late, great, Robert Anton Wilson has a typically elegant summation:

The Great Pirates signify those men combining elements of what ethologists call the alpha male, historians call the despot and sociologists call the sociopath… our primitive ancestors, Fuller says, were conquered by wave after wave of these despotic-sociopathic Great Pirates, until all humans became accustomed to being ruled by Great Pirates, since the only other choice was to be murdered by them.

The Great Pirates then discovered that other people were working at science, and hired the scientists to produce gadgets to suit their own needs. Therefore, Bucky says, science knows more about weaponry than about “livingry.” Fuller’s experimental geometry and housing were attempts to contribute to the livingry he felt science had largely ignored.

If you to accept the basic outline here — and I do, to a fair degree — you’ll quickly recognize where the far right and far left get it wrong. The right sees government as invasive and liberty-depriving, but they fail to grok that the majority of today’s governments are merely puppets of a corporate behemoth that seeks only increased profits. Today’s left views government as the only entity that can tame the corporate beast, completely missing that policymakers are already ensnared by the financial/corporate apparatus.

Until a critical mass of people realize the nexus of criminality here, we are likely to remain in bondage. So listen up, lefties and Tea Partiers: you can yell about freedom or the corporatocracy until you’re blue in the face — the fact of the matter is, you are only dividing yourselves. And guess who benefits from that? Why do you think “wedge issues” exist? Because the people running the campaigns don’t want you to pay attention to the real issues.

Is Occupy Wall Street the commencement of a new understanding? I have no idea, but the cynic in me highly doubts it. Maybe I’ll be proven wrong.

If you want to learn more about the Great Pirates and GRUNCH, I recommend you check out Bucky’s book GRUNCH of Giants — available free at the Buckminster Fuller Institute.

Conspiracies are fun. Everybody has one, or at least the inclination to maybe-kinda-possibly entertain one. For example, I used to be partial to the John F. Kennedy assassination. Some folks are into alien cover-ups, others believe that our current president was born in Africa. The world of conspiracies is vast and often interconnected — pick up a thread here, and you never know exactly where you’ll end up.

Which brings us to The Contrarian’s Old-Time Conspiracy Hour. Consider this another idea for a recurring feature that we’re unlikely to follow-through with. But we’ll have some fun with this entry, at least.

One area that naturally lends itself to conspiracy theories is intelligence work. From US-sanctioned “wet teams” to CIA‘s notorious MK-ULTRA program, covert ops make for wild stories. The interesting thing about the spy game is that it’s really tough to separate fact from fiction. Today’s post deals with the former — namely, CIA’s alleged control of the media. Or are these “facts” yet another misdirection? Welcome to the house of mirrors.

“The Central Intelligence Agency owns everyone of any significance in the major media.” — Former CIA chief William Colby, who died under rather mysterious circumstances.

Our little conspiracy is largely informed by a Carl Bernstein story which originally appeared in a 1977 edition of Rolling Stone. Bernstein, you surely recall, is the journalist who, along with Bob Woodward, helped break the Watergate scandal. His subsequent investigation, which resulted in the article “The CIA & The Media,” laid the cornerstone of a durable, if lately neglected conspiracy: the manipulation of the American press by shadowy government entities.

Perhaps this conspiracy died down because the US government became more audacious in its manipulation of the media. The George W. Bush administration was hardly subtle in this regard. Still, the information in Bernstein’s story, dated though it may be, paints a disturbing picture of clandestine control of the “fourth estate.”

The directive under which CIA conducted its media operations was called MOCKINGBIRD. The extent of its reach, and indeed, whether it existed at all, is a matter of debate. The working theory holds that Frank Wisner, CIA Director, Office of Special Projects (OSP) managed to cajole high-ranking media officials into running CIA reports in their respective press outlets. By the 1950s, the New York Times, Washington Post, Newsweek, CBS and more had been folded into the operation.

Bernstein’s article focuses on one Joseph Alsop, a reporter who penned countless foreign affairs stories in more than 300 newspapers. He didn’t work alone. Even Ben Bradlee — the storied Washington Post editor who presided over both The Pentagon Papers and Bernstein’s own Watergate reporting — was thought to have been with MOCKINGBIRD. And the list by no means stops there. According to Bernstein:

Among the executives who lent their cooperation to the Agency were Williarn Paley of the Columbia Broadcasting System, Henry Luce of Tirne Inc., Arthur Hays Sulzberger of the New York Times, Barry Bingham Sr. of the LouisviIle Courier‑Journal, and James Copley of the Copley News Service. Other organizations which cooperated with the CIA include the American Broadcasting Company, the National Broadcasting Company, the Associated Press, United Press International, Reuters, Hearst Newspapers, Scripps‑Howard, Newsweek magazine, the Mutual Broadcasting System, the Miami Herald and the old Saturday Evening Post and New York Herald‑Tribune.

And placing stories was apparently not all the agency called upon its press agents to do. Bernstein:

Appropriately, the CIA uses the term ‘reporting’ to describe much of what cooperating journalists did for the Agency. “We would ask them, ‘Will you do us a favor?’” said a senior CIA official. “‘We understand you’re going to be in Yugoslavia. Have they paved all the streets? Where did you see planes? Were there any signs of military presence? How many Soviets did you see? If you happen to meet a Soviet, get his name and spell it right…. can you set up a meeting for us? Or arrange a message?’” Many CIA officials regarded these helpful journalists as operatives: the journalists tended to see themselves as trusted friends of the Agency who performed occasional favors — usually without pay — in the national interest.

Sometimes they did get paid. Charles Douglas Jackson of TIME supposedly split time running CIA’s Psychological Operations and being Vice-President in charge of his company’s media empire.

Although it is pretty shocking to realize that our supposedly “free” press may not be entirely so, the relationship between CIA and reporters dates back to the early days of the agency. Director Allen Dulles, the man whose operational DNA is still very much a part of CIA, stocked the fledgling organization with Yale men, most of whom had a reportorial bent. That these Ivy Leaguers would in turn recruit more of their kind for strategic purposes makes perfect sense.

America has, since its inception, held its press as an example of freedom and integrity — particularly in comparison with countries where information is tightly controlled. Interesting then, that one of the pillars of our liberty has such a duplicitous past.

TOT TRIAL TAKES TOPSY TURN!

Did you hear? Casey Anthony has been found NOT GUILTY of killing her two year-old daughter, Caylee. The internets are aflame with outrage! Nancy Grace‘s head ACTUALLY EXPLODED on TV! Forget the Tea Party, this decision is the real spur to revolution!

I didn’t follow the case closely, but after the verdict, I did a little bit of research into the evidence and arguments. While I understand the jury’s decision, I will cop to being a bit troubled by the fact that our justice system is seemingly content with letting the death of a toddler go unsolved. It just doesn’t sit right on a fundamental human level.

The jury’s decision is fun to parse for a legal nerd like me. But that’s not what I’m really fascinated by. I’m more interested in how the proceedings played out in both the mainstream media and social networks. Recent history is peppered with highly controversial cases — from OJ to MJ to JonBenét — which have provoked strong reactions in observers. But the Casey Anthony trial was different. This isn’t because of the stomach-turning particulars, but rather the confluence of old-school media and user-powered platforms like Facebook and Twitter. It makes you wonder what the Rodney King aftermath might have looked like if it had happened yesterday.

People like to talk about “old” media vs. “new” media, as if one didn’t influence the other. But surely, the nation’s interest in the Anthony case was encouraged by TV pundits like the relentlessly shrill Nancy Grace, a woman who deserves an award for hyperbole. (Note to self: launch the Annual Contrarian Media Hyperbole Awards).

Now I know it is our duty as American citizens to respect the jury system. But I know one thing: as the defense sits by and has their champagne toast after that not-guilty verdict, somewhere out there, the devil is dancing tonight.

Isn’t that something? Such sustained, sensational coverage no doubt contributed to the way people perceived the case. A quick scan of related Twitter hashtags reveals multiple death wishes to Casey Anthony. This isn’t to say that she’s not potentially guilty, but it does hint at how strong emotions can be shaped by mass media reporting.

What might have been an opportunity to examine how our legal system functions instead became a powerful demonstration of mob mentality. One can be skeptical about whether justice was served and still be disturbed at the bloodlust just beneath the surface of our supposedly civil society.

And that bloodlust isn’t limited to the Great Unwashed. Corporate media feeds on it, opportunistically repackaging our obsessions as easy fodder for ratings. This creates a worrisome feedback loop that plays to our basest collective instincts.

I’m not a believer in a “fixed” human nature, but rather a spectrum of potential behaviors that are rooted in any number of factors. These phenomena are not limited to individual expression. As Carl Jung observed of the rising specter of Nazism, groups of people, too, possess a “shadow” personality that is subject to collective agitation. Here is the seed of the so-called “mob mentality” (or “participation mystique,” in Jungian terms). This phenomenon often presents itself as chaotic, but can be harnessed and directed to very destructive ends (as borne out by the Third Reich).

I’m not suggesting that the reaction to Casey Anthony verdict bears any direct relationship to Nazi brownshirts. Yet as the linkages between German propaganda and mass behavior were once poorly understood, much remains unclear about the interaction of traditional and networked media. At the right time and under the right conditions, the combo could produce calamitous results. This is the flipside to the “Twitter revolution” that  tech evangelists point to as driving democratic change in the Middle East. (The fact of the matter is that little actual organizing happens on these networks; most of it is Western echo chamber.)

At the dawn of the Internet Age, many of us overestimated the power the new platforms would have in remaking our media landscape. Certainly, they have upended business models and created an unprecedented environment for individual expression. But they have yet to replace traditional media. This could be due to the relative influence these corporations have over public policy, but I think it also has to do with ingrained consumer behavior and expectation. And by the time that a critical mass of the populace is fully acclimated to the new channels, old media will have figured out a way to control the underlying architecture — through law or corporate collusion. (For those playing along at home, this battle is raging as I type, and is the main reason for my existence in Washington.)

What I’m getting at is this: the continued strength of traditional media, coupled with the unique contours of the social web, creates an entirely new world for information. Like anything, there’s bound to be a good and not-so-good side.

To truly address the feedback loop described above would require a more open and participatory media environment, and not just in the realm of social networks. Whether this is possible or not, given marketplace and political pressures, remains an unanswered question. How that question is answered will determine nothing less than the future of information exchange.

Take that, Nancy Grace.

• Serial Killer of the Week. For the third year in a row, Scott and I spent the Fourth of July holiday with family at my parents’ camp on Chateaugay Lake in northern New York State. My parents chose to buy land on this particular lake because it is quiet, pretty and dirt cheap. Why so cheap? Because there is nothing, nothing around for many, many miles in every direction except a big, scary, maximum security prison — Dannemora. The prison is actually called the Clinton Correctional Facility, but everyone calls it Dannemora after the town that hosts it (take the street tour down main street between the prison’s giant cement wall and the dilapidated abandoned buildings and liquor mart that face it) or “Little Siberia,” because a lot of its residents are convicts from NYC who feel very far from home in this remote locale. It was while driving past Dannemora’s beautifully imposing stone architecture twice today that I decided to feature the prison itself and some its more notable guests this week. Tupac Shakur and Ol’ Dirty Bastard both did time here, but today I’ve selected a few fellows whose celebrity comes entirely from their crimes.

Vincent Johnson, the Brooklyn Strangler.

John Jamelske. A sadistic prick who kidnapped several girls and women and held them as his captive sex slaves in a bunker beneath his home in Syracuse.

David Berkowitz.

Carl Panzram. This one is the most interesting to me because he had a surprisingly long career as a violent, angry, misanthropic psychopath. He hated people and expressed that in a wide variety of antisocial behaviors ranging from arson and B&E to rape and murder. At least two movies have been made about him, one starring James Woods. Still, very few people have heard of him. Have you?

Eric Smith. When Smith was 13 years old he killed and sodomized a four year-old neighborhood boy. Today, he is 31 and has been denied parole five times.

• Fetish of the Week. Plushophilia. “Plushies” are aroused by stuffed animals.

• Religion of the Week. Woodism. A religion devoted to and inspired by Ed Wood, of course!

• Links!

All hail Florida!

No, Jesus, fuck, no, no, no.

World’s most pierced woman got married! Sweet story.

Please sterilize these fucking people.

Freak bear crash (not a typo).

And I’ll just wrap up with one more upstate New York story: a new local celebrity! This homeless guy who is pushing his “wife” in a wheelchair camping trek.