I started to post this on the Saddam’s Execution thread because the use of the cell phone & the internet to reach a broad audience jumped out at me, but it seemed like it belonged in a different category.
Remember everybody preaching the "CNN Effect" at the CTCs just last year? Networked camera/video cell phones are everywhere over here. Our guys are using them, their guys are using them (although their guys are better at it then our guys). They are far cheaper and more available then back in the States. $200 here a very capable tri-band video cell phone and you get what would cost $500-$700 back home. The network for sending stuff is close (and remarkably cheap)
A little bit of movie maker savvy, or Adobe photo shop, access to you tube, or a well connected hub and your message gets out. Where it goes from there is anybody's bet.
It beats the pants off of a state sponsored media, or even profit driven media - no QA /QC, but it grabs the initial impression.
Just about everybody over here is a collector - its just a question of who they are collecting for and why they are doing it.
There is an IO fight at the low tactical levels, capture the right image and get it to a site that has allot of links, and it will get out. Very smart to post to the web first – it goes to the audience its really targeting in a very private manner – with little to no adult supervision or peer context competition. The cable TV/major mainstream media outlet must also then consider to carry it, even if its late – it will still get some ratings from the older crowd who get their news primarily from FOX/Al Jazeera/CNN/BBC and the like.
Not every bad guy over here carries a RPG or detonates an IED. Was that cell phone video of Saddam supposed to be covert? Maybe. Maybe he was lowering his hand so he could get a glass of chai. It could be that there are several cell phone videos out there - it would not surprise me. You bring somebody to a meeting here and an American pulls out a Sony Cybershot camera- the Iraqi will pull out a very slick Nokia - in this environment who has the better tech?
I'm attaching a proposal I sent up through the CoC. Guess what - its not something I came up with - the IA did - they just can't resource it to the degree I think would get the most out of LTIOV info (although they do share video at weekly meetings) - hence I asked for $$$ (in a pretty .ppt form). Guess what else - they say this is nothing new, the bad guys are already doing it, and are resourced better then our guys.
I also want to pass on a great read I picked up as a ref. from a T.X. Hammes article - "Linked: The New Science of Networks" by Albert'Laszlo Barabasi will teach you allot about networks and the Internet. I don't know if Kilcullen had included the Internet in his "know your turf" statement, but the enemy is using it as a psychological mobility corridor.
The Cell Phone/Web Page effect
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