Seems like Anon's been quite the talk lately-- first WikiLeaks, then the RIAA, then the GeoHot incident and finally, looks like some of its members are responsible for the PSN intrusion and subsequent outage. I've been following these events quite closely, and although I've been wondering this for quite some time, it looks more clear to me than ever: Is Anonymous finally showing its weak spot?
Now, before I go on I should probably mention that I don't consider myself part of Anonymous. I'm no good at hacking and I don't frequent 4chan or other anon-friendly sites at all. I do, however, aknowledge that Anonymous is dangerous, powerful and on occasion, right (with its silly moments, I admit). I used to read about its exploits, primarily in Encyclopedia Dramatica, and I kinda regarded them as the predator in the jungles of some of the darkest, most out-of-control sites. They kind of kept a little order, sorta like the alcoholic, belligerant Sheriff in a Western: he might be an asshole sometimes but damn you kinda end up loving him.
What makes me think Anonymous might be spiraling towards an absolute loss of power is not the fact that Anonymous is being harassed by a lot of powerful corporations / organisms, or the fact that Moot is trying to get 4chan under some semblance of control, going as far as to testify against a couple of forum users that posted some compromising photos on the boards. If anything, the last daring (or retarded, it all depends on how you interpret "pissing off some of the biggest Internet companies in the world") actions from Anonymous has showed me that its biggest strength -the fact that there's no structure, no known number of members and no official location- has worked on the big boys the same as with the pedophiles, perverts, kids, furries and whatnot. What, in my opinion is threatening the reputation and very existence of Anonymous is... well, is Anonymous. Starting with its bigger, more famous heists, Anon has gained popularity. And with its popularity the always lethal entitlement.
Some of you might say "yeah well, they've been fucking around with the Scientology Church and also got in that documentary". I won't deny it, and moreover, I also include these in the list of factors that slowly piled up until now, but none of those activities did get as much coverage as the RIAA/Pirate Bay mishap, the WikiLeaks or the PSN one. What every one of these actions has done is to swell Anon's ego, up until the point of emitting "official statements" and explaining the "reasons" behind their actions. There's a logical problem with that. You can't say things represent a group when you don't even know the approximate size of it, much less if the majority would approve of a determined action. And now with the PSN outage it's pretty clear to me that Anon is reaching the point of critical disagreement. Everyone talks for Anonymous yet no one has any kind of proof about being right. People are starting to point fingers to fellow Anons. Splinter, well-formed groups (such as AnonOps) are starting to surface to make statements related to these past events.
Anonymous might become way less anonymous in a near future.
Caesar was right about the Divide et Impera rule. If Anonymous start ratting each other, taking official stances and isolating themselves in order to solidly represent those stances Anon will soon be drained of its main power source-- that is, the anonimity and invisibility of it all. That in my opinion can have two sepparate effects: people no longer seeing a reason to be part of it anymore, and Anon losing a huge chunk of 'street cred' , meaning that more people will possibly leave the core to go solo or with small groups, and less people will form the hulk of Anonymous. I'm not saying it will explode or disappear, but it's possible that it'd wither and end up as the shadow of its former self. Just like the Mongol empire after uniting many, many belligerent individuals and groups under a single banner, keeping them together under the promise of mayhem and slaughter, it could get to the point of weakening up to the point of no longer being capable of keeping all these individuals together. And losing control over their actions means, among other things, losing part of its collective conscience and doing things that don't match with their past behavior, like dunno, stealing thousands of credit card numbers.
And y'now what? I think it's a shame. I think Anonymous is the lesser evil, and that we sould also thank them for a couple of things. Just my opinion, though.
Now, before I go on I should probably mention that I don't consider myself part of Anonymous. I'm no good at hacking and I don't frequent 4chan or other anon-friendly sites at all. I do, however, aknowledge that Anonymous is dangerous, powerful and on occasion, right (with its silly moments, I admit). I used to read about its exploits, primarily in Encyclopedia Dramatica, and I kinda regarded them as the predator in the jungles of some of the darkest, most out-of-control sites. They kind of kept a little order, sorta like the alcoholic, belligerant Sheriff in a Western: he might be an asshole sometimes but damn you kinda end up loving him.
What makes me think Anonymous might be spiraling towards an absolute loss of power is not the fact that Anonymous is being harassed by a lot of powerful corporations / organisms, or the fact that Moot is trying to get 4chan under some semblance of control, going as far as to testify against a couple of forum users that posted some compromising photos on the boards. If anything, the last daring (or retarded, it all depends on how you interpret "pissing off some of the biggest Internet companies in the world") actions from Anonymous has showed me that its biggest strength -the fact that there's no structure, no known number of members and no official location- has worked on the big boys the same as with the pedophiles, perverts, kids, furries and whatnot. What, in my opinion is threatening the reputation and very existence of Anonymous is... well, is Anonymous. Starting with its bigger, more famous heists, Anon has gained popularity. And with its popularity the always lethal entitlement.
Some of you might say "yeah well, they've been fucking around with the Scientology Church and also got in that documentary". I won't deny it, and moreover, I also include these in the list of factors that slowly piled up until now, but none of those activities did get as much coverage as the RIAA/Pirate Bay mishap, the WikiLeaks or the PSN one. What every one of these actions has done is to swell Anon's ego, up until the point of emitting "official statements" and explaining the "reasons" behind their actions. There's a logical problem with that. You can't say things represent a group when you don't even know the approximate size of it, much less if the majority would approve of a determined action. And now with the PSN outage it's pretty clear to me that Anon is reaching the point of critical disagreement. Everyone talks for Anonymous yet no one has any kind of proof about being right. People are starting to point fingers to fellow Anons. Splinter, well-formed groups (such as AnonOps) are starting to surface to make statements related to these past events.
Anonymous might become way less anonymous in a near future.
Caesar was right about the Divide et Impera rule. If Anonymous start ratting each other, taking official stances and isolating themselves in order to solidly represent those stances Anon will soon be drained of its main power source-- that is, the anonimity and invisibility of it all. That in my opinion can have two sepparate effects: people no longer seeing a reason to be part of it anymore, and Anon losing a huge chunk of 'street cred' , meaning that more people will possibly leave the core to go solo or with small groups, and less people will form the hulk of Anonymous. I'm not saying it will explode or disappear, but it's possible that it'd wither and end up as the shadow of its former self. Just like the Mongol empire after uniting many, many belligerent individuals and groups under a single banner, keeping them together under the promise of mayhem and slaughter, it could get to the point of weakening up to the point of no longer being capable of keeping all these individuals together. And losing control over their actions means, among other things, losing part of its collective conscience and doing things that don't match with their past behavior, like dunno, stealing thousands of credit card numbers.
And y'now what? I think it's a shame. I think Anonymous is the lesser evil, and that we sould also thank them for a couple of things. Just my opinion, though.
