NY Times Links Cyberattacks Directly to WWP

Anonymous · Dec 16, 2010

Re: NY Times Links Cyberattacks Directly to WWP

Biella again: The Aesthetic Face(s) of Anonymous | Savage Minds

There are some commonalities across the difference faces of Anonymous; there is a common stock of cultural knowledge and aesthetic imperatives that helps shape tactics but what holds true for one iteration of Anonymous, does not hold true for all for Anonymous has a built in system for insatiability and change.
So with this in place I want to make some points more general points about the cultural dynamics of Anonymous:

Anonymous is rooted fully in our digital present. And yet, the phenomenon of using a name to make political claims is by no means new, Ned Ludd and Luther Blissett are two of the most famous examples of what Marco Desirris has argued in his dissertation is a improper name: “The adoption of the same alias by organized collectives, affinity groups, and individual authors.”

This is important because it is the condition of possibility for its generativity, democracy, and instability. Anyone can claim that x material (a video, a manifesto) has been produced by Anonymous. It also means that some objects made by Anonymous could have been produced by one person, as I have heard repeatedly about this very famous video, or in other instances, it could have been produced collectively as I saw with the production of the MasterCard manifesto.

Where is Anonymous? Lots of places: IRC channels, Pirate Pad, message boards, image boards, Facebook, other social networking sites, Skype and sometimes they eventually leave the Internet and hit the streets as they will soon. Perhaps Anonymous is even in your house (your father, mother, husband, wife, or that strange uncle of yours chipping in). By following Anonymous over the course of time, one can start to map the connections between these as I have done for the protests against Scientology.

Is Anonymous composed of hackers? Well, there are certainly some hackers involved, others have some technical skills and perhaps might characterize themselves as geeks but not hackers, (Here is probably my favorite morsel of someone from Anonymous poking fun at themselves for not having mad hacker skillz). There are others who are not geeks nor hackers, but just got sucked into this group and some hackers have condemned the DDoS attacks. It is a multitude, although let’s face it, it is a multitude with some limits for not everyone is in the social circles where knowledge for how to participate is found (but Google can help). As I will get to, Anonymous also has folks with mad design and art skillz.

Anonymity is not only tactical and practical but has a particular ethical valence when seen in light of our celebrity obsessed culture (this is what Mike Wesch has argued in a forthcoming chapter) and do so without simply celebrating Anonymous. It is good stuff.

There may be no individual celebrity but there is certainly art. And this is perhaps one of the reasons I like to study Anonymous—and something that is rarely addressed—is that Anonymous is interesting for making great art, in the form of videos, images, manifestos. They are effective in grabbing attention for their masterful command of art, channeling the material under a shared aesthetics, spectaclish in orientation, and under the moniker Anonymous, all the while delivering constant news. It would be far weaker as a phenomenon without the masks, without their fantastic art work, without those videos. We can create a picture of Anonymous only as basement dwellers or we might also take a look at their own pictures and representations to form ours; Anonymous is a faceless phenomenon that is everywhere represented via their artistic output.

Its aesthetics also helps ensure some coherence. While not everything produced by Anonymous follows its dominant aesthetics, much of it does. So while anyone can claim to be Anonymous, you will likely more more credible if you follow and play with established patterns and yet of course, there is always the danger of becoming hackneyed. I suspect we will see innovation within the shell of existing forms, which is so often how so much of art gets produced.

So in conclusion: I don’t think I have ever used a term that was enormously popular to describe the net in the 1990s–rhizomatic–but Anonymous does seem rhizomatic: yet there the rhizome exhibits some consistency, even as it morphs and spreads. Anonymous of the past set into a motion an aesthetic and set of tactics that help guide, even if they don’t determine, the shape and form that Anonymous will take in the future.

Anonymous · Dec 16, 2010

Re: NY Times Links Cyberattacks Directly to WWP

Anonymous, unmasked

Rockyj · Dec 16, 2010

Re: NY Times Links Cyberattacks Directly to WWP

The Economist

DEMONSTRATORS are a tiresome lot. They block streets and clog traffic, costing other people time and money; they divert police attention, draining budgets and perhaps helping criminals. But decent countries allow disruptive protests and even deploy the forces of law and order to protect them. That is the price of political freedom, negotiated over many years and subject to many checks and balances.

Now the issue has arisen in cyberspace, with online protests both in defence of and in opposition to WikiLeaks, a whistle-blowing site. Working out which sorts of activities deserve protection and which prosecution is tricky—and the details of prosecution even more so (see article).

Two ends of the spectrum are clear. Consumer boycotts are a matter of individual choice. There is nothing wrong with people expressing their disapproval of companies that have dumped WikiLeaks, such as Visa, MasterCard, Amazon, PayPal, by stopping doing business with them. But using the internet to try to disrupt, say, power supplies or the fire service, as happened in Estonia in 2007, is a crime.

Like this:

The closest equivalent to a DDOS attack in the offline world would be a mass sit-in or a mob milling around a building, making entry and exit impossible. In most countries the police would respond to such cases by clearing a path to the door, arresting protesters if they resisted violently, but allowing the protest to go ahead. Some argue that DDOS attacks are, similarly, a legitimate expression of dissent. Governments should have computers large and sophisticated enough to deal with such attacks; if necessary, they should help vital commercial services such as banks and energy companies to resist them.

I think I like this too:

Protesters in cyberspace, by contrast, are usually anonymous and untraceable. The furtive, nameless nature of DDOS attacks disqualifies them from protection; their anonymous perpetrators look like cowardly hooligans, not heroes. This applies to those attacking WikiLeaks too—a point American politicians calling for reprisals against Julian Assange’s outfit should note. Posses and vigilantes, online and off, mete out rough justice, at best. That is no substitute for the real thing.

WikiLeaks, protest and the law: The rights and wrongs of hacktivism | The Economist

agf · Dec 22, 2010

Re: NY Times Links Cyberattacks Directly to WWP

sinister cabal;1374027 said:

Relax. Magick is involved.

Glad you're still thinking of me.

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NY Times Links Cyberattacks Directly to WWP

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