John Robb, "Brave New War", and Group Size

[marct]

Hi Culpeper,

All good points, which I can't disagree, but I'm wondering if those that participate the most are actually below the range of 150 members.

Right now we are at 1255 registered members so if the 1:10:100 rule is holding, then we should have around 125 active posters. Of course, that's leaving out the lurkers who haven't bothered to register, so I just can't guess what the real figure is .

I don't know because I only participate on certain topics and on occassion have fallen under the table for breaking rules for which I take responsibility and was handled fairly. It is just a coincidence that I had a similar experience while reading that particular chapter of Robb's book and posting this thread. I guess on occassion I have participated as one that takes risks and overly optimistic as mentioned above as a sign of a member participating in group think (Illusion of Invulnerability).

I think it happens to all of us at one time or another. I know I've run into some situations where my assumptions were radically different from most of the people here - I guess it's that Canadian, academic, non-military background of mine .

In some ways, I suspect that the group think phenomenon is more likely to show up in areas where people share basic assumptions about "reality" and the focus of that community is more, hmmm, "fixed" let's say. Because our focus is "small wars" which, inherently, are all different, I think we have a built in advantage of sorts.

That pretty much sums up my motivation for starting this thread to begin with. I like this site and we should review this topic from time-to-time to make sure we don't become ineffective as a group. As individuals we should all be aware of the causes and consequences of a group falling prey to group think. Including myself.

That's a really good point. I mean, we've gone from ~3k unique visits per month this time last year to over 70k last month. That's a huge increase, and we are seeing some of the effects of it. Personally, I think Bill and Dave have done one Hades of a great job in holding this all together and expanding it.

I'm really glad that you brought the topic up because you are absolutely right - we could move to a group think, at least in some areas. So, what would you suggest that we, as a community and a council, do to help avoid that trap? Are there any new structures or rules you think would help?

Marc