The news gave me lots to think about this week. This report on Morning Edition got my attention with a simple statement about the protests in Yemen, "You're seeing quite a number of tribesmen who have come from all around the country and they actually appear to be outnumbering the youth protestors now." I don't have any awareness of who the people coming to town are and what life in Yemen is really like, but the word "tribesmen" made me think of people who are not very sophisticated and may not have at their disposal the news-gathering and communication tools we're used to. (My baggage.) But they've still learned about the political situation in the country and they're still coming to join the protests. Reminded me that I may hold out for the power of social media and email, but this really shows that what's important is to use the tools that are available to you and to use them well. So in my world, I think there's a need to use the social tools that are there and to recognize that that in ten years or however long it takes we may well need to move to new methods. But there is a need to recognize that we can't insist on using or rely totally on older techniques.
http://www.npr.org/2011/03/25/134862113/In-Yemen-Pressure-From-Protesters-Builds
The NewsHour had two reports that turned my thoughts to the power that's becoming available to private citizens. Here's a story about citizen groups watching for military buildups with satellites.
And here's a report that talks about enabling the rebels in Libya and other places to report their casualties easily and accurately.
The application to take from this (and maybe even Wikileaks) easily is that the governments who have traditionally had the means to conduct the kinds of surveillance discussed here have a new responsibility to be accurate and open as they tell us what they're doing. We can tell if they're hiding the truth. And that means that citizens have a new responsibility to pay attention to what's going on around them and what actions are being undertaken in their names. It's going to be harder to claim that we didn't know what was happening.
Much later I discovered this site for graphic information about the radiation leaks in Japan. There is an unprecedented amount of information available to us today, and much of it may be clearer and more reliable than official channels.