Notational

thoughtyoushouldseethis:

Tracking the birth and life of Anonymous, anthropologist and academic Gabriella Coleman set out to explain the mysterious group in her talk at TEDGlobal. The answer was less than comprehensive, but given the nature of the beast, that’s not particularly surprising. She came up with four ways to describe the group’s makeup:

1. Anonymous scales and is participatory; it is not just hackers. 
2. Anonymous may seem chaotic, but most targets are not random. 
3. They put on a good performance, obvious even to their detractors. 
4. They are visible and invisible. 

Read the full post here. For bonus points, read also Quinn Norton’s excellent Wired piece, How Anonymous Picks Targets, Launches Attacks, and Takes Powerful Organizations Down, which covers much of the same ground but in rather more detail than Coleman could include in a TEDTalk (or, for that matter, than I could capture in a live blog.)

[Photo c/o James Duncan Davidson; Graphics c/o TED.]