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A smart mob is a group whose coordination and communication abilities have been empowered by
digital communication technologies.
Smart mobs are particularly known for their ability to mobilize quickly.
The concept was introduced by
Howard Rheingold
Howard Rheingold (born 1947) is an American critic, writer, and teacher, known for his specialties on the cultural, social and political implications of modern communication media such as the Internet, mobile telephony and virtual communities (a t ...
in his 2002 book ''
Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution''.
Rheingold defined the smart mob as follows: "Smart mobs consist of people who are able to act in concert even if they don’t know each other... because they carry devices that possess both communication and computing capabilities".
In December of that year, the "smart mob" concept was highlighted in the ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' "Year in Ideas".
Characteristics
These technologies that empower smart mobs include the
Internet
The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...
,
computer-mediated communication
Computer-mediated communication (CMC) is defined as any human communication that occurs through the use of two or more electronic devices. While the term has traditionally referred to those communications that occur via computer-mediated formats ...
such as
Internet Relay Chat
Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is a text-based chat system for instant messaging. IRC is designed for group communication in discussion forums, called ''channels'', but also allows one-on-one communication via private messages as well as chat and ...
, and
wireless
Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided medium for the transfer. The most ...
devices like
mobile phone
A mobile phone, cellular phone, cell phone, cellphone, handphone, hand phone or pocket phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell, or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link whil ...
s and
personal digital assistant
A personal digital assistant (PDA), also known as a handheld PC, is a variety mobile device which functions as a personal information manager. PDAs have been mostly displaced by the widespread adoption of highly capable smartphones, in partic ...
s. Methodologies like
peer-to-peer
Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the network. They are said to form a peer-to-peer n ...
networks and
ubiquitous computing
Ubiquitous computing (or "ubicomp") is a concept in software engineering, hardware engineering and computer science where computing is made to appear anytime and everywhere. In contrast to desktop computing, ubiquitous computing can occur using a ...
are also changing the ways in which people organize and share information.
Smart mobs sometimes are manipulated by the
dispatcher
A dispatcher is a communications worker who receives and transmits information to coordinate operations of other personnel and vehicles carrying out a service. A number of organizations, including police and fire departments, emergency medical s ...
s who control the 'mobbing system' (i.e., those who own the contact list and the means to forward instant messages to a group) and are induced to cause distress and aggravation to individuals who have been targeted or singled out for whatever reason.
There is a tendency to keep the dynamics of smart mobbing 'covert', and not to discuss such incidents on the internet.
Flash mob
A flash mob (or flashmob) is a group of people who assemble suddenly in a public place, perform for a brief time, then quickly disperse, often for the purposes of entertainment, satire, and artistic expression. Flash mobs may be organized via t ...
s are a specific form of smart mob, originally describing a group of people who assemble suddenly in a public place, do something unusual and pointless for a brief period of time, then quickly disperse. The difference between flash and smart mobs is primarily with regards to their duration: flash mobs disappear quickly, but smart mobs can have a more enduring presence.
The term ''flash mob'' is claimed to have been inspired by "smart mob".
Smart mobs have begun to have an impact in current events, as mobile phones and text messages have empowered everyone from revolutionaries in
Malaysia
Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...
to individuals protesting the second
Iraq War
{{Infobox military conflict
, conflict = Iraq War {{Nobold, {{lang, ar, حرب العراق (Arabic) {{Nobold, {{lang, ku, شەڕی عێراق (Kurdish languages, Kurdish)
, partof = the Iraq conflict (2003–present), I ...
. Individuals who have divergent worldviews and methods have been able to coordinate short-term.
A 2009 entry in the ''Encyclopedia of Computer Science and Technology'' noted that the term may be "fading from public use".
Early instances
A forerunner to the idea can be found in the work of anarchist thinker Kropotkin, "fishermen, hunters, travelling merchants, builders, or settled craftsmen came together for a common pursuit."
According to
CNN
CNN (Cable News Network) is a multinational cable news channel headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by ...
, the first smart mobs were teenage "thumb tribes" in Tokyo and Helsinki who used
text messaging
Text messaging, or texting, is the act of composing and sending electronic messages, typically consisting of alphabetic and numeric characters, between two or more users of mobile devices, desktops/laptops, or another type of compatible compute ...
on
cell phone
A mobile phone, cellular phone, cell phone, cellphone, handphone, hand phone or pocket phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell, or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link whil ...
s to organize impromptu
rave
A rave (from the verb: '' to rave'') is a dance party at a warehouse, club, or other public or private venue, typically featuring performances by DJs playing electronic dance music. The style is most associated with the early 1990s dance mus ...
s or to stalk celebrities. For instance, in Tokyo, crowds of teenage fans would assemble seemingly spontaneously at subway stops where a rock musician was rumored to be headed.
However, an even earlier example is the ''
Dîner en blanc'' phenomenon, which has taken place annually in
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
, since 1988, for one night around the end of June. The invited guests wear only white clothes and gather at a chosen spot, knowledge of which they have only a short time beforehand. They bring along food, drink, chairs and a table and the whole group then gathers to have a meal, after which they disperse. The event has been held each year in different places in the centre of Paris. It is not a normal cultural event because it is not advertised and only those who have received an invite attend—information on the chosen location is transferred by text message or more recently
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
. The number of people attending has grown, in 2011, to over 10,000. ''Dîner en blanc'' would be considered a smart mob rather than a flash mob, because the event lasts for several hours.
The
Professional Contractors Group
The Association of Independent Professionals and the Self-Employed (IPSE) is a British not-for-profit organisation. It was established in 1999 as the Professional Contractors Group, a protest group against the IR35 tax statute. Later, it expanded ...
organised the first smart mob in the UK in 2000 when 700 contractors turned up at The House of Commons to lobby their MP following an email sent out a few days before.
In the days after the U.S. presidential election of 2000, online activist
Zack Exley
Zack Exley (born December 5, 1969) is an American political and technology consultant.
Early life and education
Exley was raised in West Hartford, Connecticut. He studied abroad at Shanxi Normal University before earning his B.A. in Social Th ...
anonymously created a website that allowed people to suggest locations for gatherings to protest for a full recount of the votes in
Florida
Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...
. On the first Saturday after the election, more than 100 significant protests took place—many with thousands of participants—without any traditional organizing effort. Exley wrote in December 2000 that the self-organized protests "demonstrated that a fundamental change is taking place in our national political life. It's not the Internet per se, but the emerging potential for any individual to communicate—for free and anonymously if necessary—with any other individual."
In the
Philippines
The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no),
* bik, Republika kan Filipinas
* ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas
* cbk, República de Filipinas
* hil, Republ ...
in 2001, a group of protesters organized via text messaging gathered at the
EDSA Shrine
The Shrine of Mary, Queen of Peace, Our Lady of EDSA, or more popularly, the EDSA Shrine is a small church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Manila located at the intersection of Ortigas Avenue and Epifanio de los Santos Avenue (EDSA) in Bara ...
, the site of the
1986 revolution that overthrew
Ferdinand Marcos
Ferdinand Emmanuel Edralin Marcos Sr. ( , , ; September 11, 1917 – September 28, 1989) was a Filipino politician, lawyer, dictator, and kleptocrat who was the 10th president of the Philippines from 1965 to 1986. He ruled under martial ...
, to protest the corruption of President
Joseph Estrada
Joseph Ejercito Estrada, (; born Jose Marcelo Ejercito; April 19, 1937), also known by the nickname Erap, is a Filipino politician and former actor. He served as the 13th president of the Philippines from 1998 to 2001, the 9th vice preside ...
. The protest grew quickly, and Estrada was soon removed from office.
The
Critical Mass
In nuclear engineering, a critical mass is the smallest amount of fissile material needed for a sustained nuclear chain reaction. The critical mass of a fissionable material depends upon its nuclear properties (specifically, its nuclear fissi ...
bicycling events, dating back to 1992, are also sometimes compared to smart mobs, due to their self-organizing manner of assembly.
Examples
Essentially, the smart mob is a practical implementation of
collective intelligence
Collective intelligence (CI) is shared or group intelligence (GI) that emerges from the collaboration, collective efforts, and competition of many individuals and appears in consensus decision making. The term appears in sociobiology, politic ...
. According to Rheingold, examples of smart mobs are the street protests organized by the
anti-globalization movement
The anti-globalization movement or counter-globalization movement, is a social movement critical of economic globalization. The movement is also commonly referred to as the global justice movement, alter-globalization movement, anti-globalis ...
. The
Free State Project
The Free State Project (FSP) is an American political migration movement founded in 2001 to recruit at least 20,000 libertarians to move to a single low-population state (New Hampshire was selected in 2003) in order to make the state a stronghold ...
has been described in '
Foreign Policy
A State (polity), state's foreign policy or external policy (as opposed to internal or domestic policy) is its objectives and activities in relation to its interactions with other states, unions, and other political entities, whether bilaterall ...
' as an example of potential "smart
mob rule
Mob rule or ochlocracy ( el, ὀχλοκρατία, translit=okhlokratía; la, ochlocratia) is the rule of government by a mob or mass of people and the intimidation of legitimate authorities. Insofar as it represents a pejorative for majori ...
".
Other examples of smart mobs include:
*Smart mobs who arrange the meet up over the internet and show up at a retailer at a specific time and use their number to negotiate a discount with the retailer.
*
eBay
eBay Inc. ( ) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that facilitates consumer-to-consumer and business-to-consumer sales through its website. eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995 and became a ...
a collection of users who are empowered by the internet and eBay to buy and sell and maintain the quality control over all transactions through the rating system. People can leave positive, negative or neutral feedback, depending on how they felt about their transaction with that seller.
*
Text message
Text messaging, or texting, is the act of composing and sending electronic messages, typically consisting of alphabetic and numeric characters, between two or more users of mobile devices, desktops/ laptops, or another type of compatible comput ...
s that were sent in the
Philippines
The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no),
* bik, Republika kan Filipinas
* ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas
* cbk, República de Filipinas
* hil, Republ ...
, which are thought to be partly responsible for the demonstration that ousted former President
Joseph Estrada
Joseph Ejercito Estrada, (; born Jose Marcelo Ejercito; April 19, 1937), also known by the nickname Erap, is a Filipino politician and former actor. He served as the 13th president of the Philippines from 1998 to 2001, the 9th vice preside ...
. Examples of such a text message read "Wear black to mourn the death of democracy", "Expect there to be rumbles" and "Go to
EDSA
Epifanio de los Santos Avenue, commonly referred to by its acronym EDSA, is a limited-access circumferential highway around Manila, the capital city of the Philippines. It passes through 6 of Metro Manila's 17 local government units or cities, ...
".
*The
11 March 2004 Madrid attacks (11M), and the reaction from the people against the government in the Spanish elections of 14 March 2004.
*The
2005 civil unrest in France exhibited smart mobs—the French national police spokesman, Patrick Hamon, was quoted in the ''
Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' as saying that youths, mainly those of the Muslim faith, in individual neighborhoods were communicating by cellphone text messages, online blogs, and/or email—arranging meetings and warning each other about police operations.
*The
2006 student protests in Chile and
2007 Chilean government-Microsoft agreement are the example in
Latin America
Latin America or
* french: Amérique Latine, link=no
* ht, Amerik Latin, link=no
* pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived f ...
about the smart mobs and the use of weblogs, Fotologs, Photoblogs, text messages and digital organization in a few hours. Also due to their online organization has called the attention of the press as a source of news because of the strong activism online.
*On July 5, 2005, during
U2's performance of the song ''New Year's Day'' at a stadium in
Chorzów
Chorzów ( ; ; german: link=no, Königshütte ; szl, Chorzōw) is a city in the Silesia region of southern Poland, near Katowice. Chorzów is one of the central cities of the Upper Silesian Metropolitan Union – a metropolis with a population ...
,
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...
, the audience of 70,000 waved colored articles of clothing to form a giant Polish flag of white and red: fans on the pitch waved red, those in the bleachers waved white. This behavior was coordinated by fans communicating on the internet.
*On November 6, 2008, more than 500 students across Taiwan began a sit-in protest in front of the
Executive Yuan
The Executive Yuan () is the executive branch of the government of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Its leader is the Premier, who is appointed by the President of the Republic of China, and requires confirmation by the Legislative Yuan.
...
. Known as the Wild Strawberry Students Movement
野草莓學運, this assembly was mobilised overnight with the help of an on-line Bulletin Board System (BBS). The students were equipped with mobile technology such as HSDPA (high speed download packet access) and web-cameras. They soon set up a live broadcast that aired for 24 hours a day over the internet for more than a week, and they used mobile devices to keep up to date with government reactions on the mass media. One of the main themes of the protest was for amendment of the Assembly and Parade Law that curbed freedom of expression: this demand earned support from various non-government organizations nationwide.
*The release of the Baauer song,
Harlem Shake is one of 2013's most recent smart mob phenomena. The song reached 700 million views in the month of February on YouTube. The song and dance has influences from a dance originally released in the 1980s. The phenomenon involves large groups of people banding together, utilizing their weak ties, and all filming a video dancing to the Harlem Shake. On February 10, 2013, the upload rate of the "Harlem Shake" videos was 4,000 per day onto YouTube. The increasing popularity has enabled the video to become used as a political statement, such as in Egypt, where a smart mob formed to perform the dance outside the Egyptian Islamic president's headquarters. According to Rhinegold's characteristics of what makes a smart mob, such as a lack of centralized control and peer to peer influence, the "Harlem Shake" is the epitome of a smart mob.
[http://www.demos.co.uk/files/File/networklogic15rheingold.pdf ]
In popular culture
The comic book ''
Global Frequency
''Global Frequency'' is an American comic book Limited series (comics), limited series created and written by Warren Ellis and published by Wildstorm, Wildstorm Productions, an imprint of DC Comics.
It is a science-fiction series set in the prese ...
'', written by
Warren Ellis
Warren Girard Ellis (born 16 February 1968) is a British comic book writer, novelist, and screenwriter. He is best known as the co-creator of several original comics series, including ''Transmetropolitan'' (1997–2002), ''Global Frequency'' ( ...
, describes a covert, non-governmental intelligence organization built around a smart mob of people that are called on to provide individual expertise in solving extraordinary crises.
David Brin
Glen David Brin (born October 6, 1950) is an American scientist and author of science fiction. He has won the Hugo,[Anonymous (group)
Anonymous is a decentralized international Activism, activist and Hacktivism, hacktivist collective and Social movement, movement primarily known for its various cyberattacks against several governments, government institutions and Governm ...]
*
Collaborative software
Collaborative software or groupware is application software designed to help people working on a common task to attain their goals. One of the earliest definitions of groupware is "intentional group processes plus software to support them".
As re ...
*
Crowd manipulation
Crowd manipulation is the intentional or unwitting use of techniques based on the principles of crowd psychology to engage, control, or influence the desires of a crowd in order to direct its behavior toward a specific action. This practice is co ...
*
E-democracy
E-democracy (a combination of the words electronic and democracy), also known as digital democracy or Internet democracy, is the use of information and communication technology (ICT) in political and governance processes. The term is believe ...
*
Flash crowd
"Flash Crowd" is a 1973 English-language novella by science fiction author Larry Niven, one of a series about the social consequence of inventing an instant, practically free displacement booth.
One consequence not foreseen by the builders of t ...
*
Global brain
The global brain is a neuroscience-inspired and futurological vision of the planetary information and communications technology network that interconnects all humans and their technological artifacts. As this network stores ever more information, t ...
*
Recommendation system
A recommender system, or a recommendation system (sometimes replacing 'system' with a synonym such as platform or engine), is a subclass of information filtering system that provide suggestions for items that are most pertinent to a particular u ...
*
Science studies
Science studies is an interdisciplinarity, interdisciplinary research area that seeks to situate scientific expertise in broad social, historical, and philosophical contexts. It uses various methods to analyze the production, representation an ...
*
User-generated content
User-generated content (UGC), alternatively known as user-created content (UCC), is any form of content, such as images, videos, text, testimonials, and audio, that has been posted by users on online platforms such as social media, discussion f ...
*
Virtual community
A virtual community is a social network of individuals who connect through specific social media, potentially crossing geographical and political boundaries in order to pursue mutual interests or goals. Some of the most pervasive virtual communi ...
*
The Wisdom of Crowds
''The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the Many Are Smarter Than the Few and How Collective Wisdom Shapes Business, Economies, Societies and Nations'', published in 2004, is a book written by James Surowiecki about the aggregation of information in groups, ...
References
External links
“Shop Affronts.”''The Economist'' 1 July 2006.
* Wray, James, and Ulf Stabe
"70,000 U2 Fans Form Huge Polish Flag to Cold War Anthem" Monsters and Critics.
* Page, Jacky
"150 students in the streets of Dijon for flash mobs with pedagogic virtues."France Blue Burgundy.
Howard Rheingold's ''Smart Mobs'' websitefrom
Wayback Machine
The Wayback Machine is a digital archive of the World Wide Web founded by the Internet Archive, a nonprofit based in San Francisco, California. Created in 1996 and launched to the public in 2001, it allows the user to go "back in time" and see ...
, now rename
"People Power Redux— ''
Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' magazine.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Smart Mob
Community organizing
Superorganisms
Collective intelligence
Crowd psychology
Social information processing