Blog 13 smartmobs

What Reingold predicts is and has been rapidly coming true. I spend a good deal of time on the internet interacting with people that I barely or don't know, and about half of that I do from my phone. My first experience with a "smartmob" was in highschool when a group of friends and friends of friends played a massive game that spanned my hometown. We called the game commando, and it involved small groups, usually pairs, that try to get from point A to B. They have no rules except to not get caught. After they start going, people in cars search for them and try to catch them. Every person got the number of one person in each group and everyone communicated with text messages and calls. There were about 50 runners and I knew about 1/3 of them. By communicating when we saw searchers, we could move more efficiently.

But what Reingold mentions about knowing who to trust is another really important factor. With the increased communicative abilities, you can communicate with anyone at any time. I frequent several forums in which everyone is anonymous, and under those circumstances, how do you know someone is telling the truth? To fix this, people have come up with elaborate ways of proving their points and very skilled at arguing/quickly getting evidence. But they also spend a good deal of time trying to trick people just for fun. I quickly gained my "internet legs" after spending several hours on wild goose chases.