Gary Wolf wrote in the June issue of Wired about how smart mobs in New York’s World Trade Center outbrained the “authorities” and enjoyed higher survival rates because of it. Wolf is talking about the NIST report on Occupant Behavior, Egress, and Emergency Communications (warning: PDFs). There’s also this executive summary and this looks like a mind numbing PowerPoint presentation (also PDF). So, what about it?

For nearly four years - steadily, seriously, and with the unsentimental rigor for which we love them - civil engineers have been studying the destruction of the World Trade Center towers, sifting the tragedy for its lessons. And it turns out that one of the lessons is: Disobey authority. In a connected world, ordinary people often have access to better information than officials do.

Wolf talks about news coming in via cell phone and Blackberry, people making informed decisions that contradicted the authorities, and doing so calmly and efficiently.

We know that US borders are porous, that major targets are largely undefended, and that the multicolor threat alert scheme known affectionately as “the rainbow of doom” is a national joke. Anybody who has been paying attention probably suspects that if we rely on orders from above to protect us, we’ll be in terrible shape. But in a networked era, we have increasing opportunities to help ourselves. This is the real source of homeland security: not authoritarian schemes of surveillance and punishment, but multichannel networks of advice, information, and mutual aid.

As wolf says, “question authorities.”

Thanks to DefenseTech for the link.

Technorati Tags: authorities, authority, blackberries, civil engineers, communications, defense, disaster, disobey, egress, elevators, emergency, evacuees, question, question authority, report, review, security, smartmob

Posted June 2, 2005 by Casey Bisson
Categories: Politics & Controversy, Technology. Tags: authorities, authority, blackberries, civil engineers, communications, defense, disaster, disobey, egress, elevators, emergency, evacuees, question, question authority, report, review, security, smartmob.

3 Comments

Comments RSS TrackBack Identifier URI

Leave a comment

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website

 

User contributed tags for this post:

http sex com (268) - sex ocean com (124) - wtc coordinates (64) - http;//www world sex com (61) - WWW SEX OCEAN COM (58) - sexg rl (52) - www.sex ocean.com (52) - sex ocean.com (46) - http:sex com (44) - funny google earth coordinates (42) - sex com (39) - world trade center coordinates (29) - sex world com (25) - sexgae (25) - http://www.WORLD SEX.com/ (25) - about (22) - http://www.world sex.com (20) - google earth coordinates funny (18) - http://www sex ocean com/ (16) - www.sex ocean (16) - www.world ocean sex.com (15) - www.world sex.com (15) - http sex (13) - google earth coordinates (12) - www.sex ocean .com (12) - www.sex ocion.com (12) - http sex ocean (11) - authorities (10) - coordinates google earth funny (10) - http://www.sex ocean.com/ (9) - google earth world (9) - www.bangladeshi sex.com (8) - World Trade Center coordinates google earth (8) - timothy treadwell camp coordinates (8) - google earth wtc coordinates (7) - google earth world trade center (7) - world sex ocean.com (7) - www.sex.ocean (7) - sex ocion.com (7) - WWW SEX COM (7) - http://sex.com (7) - WWW SEX OCEAN (7) - coordinates google (6) - www.sex world.com (6) - www WORLD SEX OCEAN com (6) - sexy ocean com (6) - sexocean (6) - funny google coordinates (5) - Search sex com (5) - wtc coordinates google earth (5) - world trade center google earth (5) - funny coordinates (5) - www world sex com (5) - www.world sex ocean.com (5) - wtc google earth coordinates (5) - treadwell tragedy photos (5) - google earth funny coordinates (5) - googleearth coordinate (4) - world sex.com (4) - smartmob (4) - sex ocion (4) - ??? (4) - http.www.worldsex.com (4) - http;//.www.world.sex.com (4) - treadwell tragedy (4) - WWW.world sex in (4) - world trade centre coordinates (4) - http://www.sex world.com (4) - serial google (4) - google earth serial (4) - blackberries (4) - lessons googleearth (4) - google earth for blackberry (4) - google earth world trade center coordinates (4) - world trade centre google earth (4) - www.world.sex.com (4) - www.sex.ocean.com (4) - googleearth world trade center (4) - HTTP WWW WORLD SEX COM (4) - coordinates of wtc (4) - http://www.sex world.com/ (4) - summer casual wiki (3) - mss (3) - http://sex ocean/ (3) - google earth coordinates sex (3) - http://sex farmer com (3) - google earth co ordinates funny (3) - treadwell tragedy pictures (3) - wtc1 google earth (3) - http://www.sex ocean.com (3) - sex.ocean.com (3) - coordinate wtc (3) - www.world.sex.in (3) - www sex ocean.com (3) - http://www.indian anty sex.com/ (3) - www.world sex vedio.com (3) - worldoceansex (3) - http//sex.com (3) - 17 SEX COM (3) - www.world.sex.ocean (3) - HTTP WWW SEX COM (3) - all (3) - http://www.sex ocean (3) - 17.SEX.COM (2) - http//www.world.sex.com (2) - funny coordinates google earth (2) - www.sexy.ocean.com (2) - http sex destruction (2) - http/www/sex/com (2) - wtc coordinate (2) - pictures of the Treadwell tragedy (2) - www.sex.video.89 (2) - World Trade Center Movie (2) - http,www,world,freesex.com (2) - funnyvedio (2) - sex-ocean.com (2) - http://www.sex.world (2) - http://www.sex video 89.com (2) - cache wensGdgQN3AJ maisonbisson com blog post 10607 fun (2) - www.89.com pink (2) - http://sex ocean (2) - ocean sex.com (2) - www.sexy ocion .com (2) - www.sex-ocean.com (2) - oceam sex com (2) - http://sex ocean com/ (2) - http://www.sex ocean com (2) - http;//sex.ocean.com/ (2) - http://www google com/xhtml/search (2) - http://www.sex movie funny vedio.com (2) - world trade centre coordinates google earth (2) - sexg funny (2) - www.sex ocean. com (2) - www.sexy ocean.com. (2) - http://sex / (2) - http://www.sex ocean .com (2) - WTC coordinates google (2) - wtc googleearth (2) - WTC on google earth coordinates (2) - disaster (2) - earth google world trade center coordinates (2) - authority (2) - Timothy Treadwell tragedy photos autopsy (2) - Timothy Treadwell disaster (2) - World Trade Centre Co ordinates (2) - Google earth world trade centre coordinates (2) - timothy treadwell location coordinates (2) - blackberry google hearth (2) - defense of (2) - timothy treadwell tragedy (2) -