160 lines
8.9 KiB
Plaintext
160 lines
8.9 KiB
Plaintext
Getting serious about anarchy online
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By Mitzi Waltz
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It was probably an NSA man's worst nightmare: a roomful of
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dedicated anarchists swapping e-mail addresses, planning new
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online linkages and surreptitiously swapping PGP tips.
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England, Scotland, Spain, the U.S., Germany, Italy, Holland,
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Northern Ireland and a few other places we'd best not
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mention were all represented. In a meeting hall papered with
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outrageous images created by Homocult, a radical working-
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class queer art group that specializes in shock-therapy
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graphics, some hovered over ongoing Internet and BBS demos,
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others scribbled down "how to get online" basics displayed
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on wall charts and the rest plied the Internet old-timers
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present with dozens of questions. Scottish brogues and
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Midwest nasality combined with the insistent beat of a Nine
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Inch Nails tape and the arrival of several cases of beer to
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crank up the noise level. Who's got the cheapest connections
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in the Netherlands? Any recommendations for Mac BBS
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software? What do I need to check out WorldWideWeb sites?
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Too many questions, but somehow they all got answered. Small
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groups soon formed to discuss individual interests and
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projects-in-progress, bring newbies up to speed on the
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basics, or pass on sensitive information. Tallboys of
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Strongbow's Super fueled the spirit of camaraderie for
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several hours, and three more workshops were instantly
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scheduled to handle the overflow and cover special concerns.
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Carefully orchestrating for chaos. Pulled together by a
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handful of above-ground activists, many of them meeting IRL
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for the first time, "Anarchy Online 101" was part of a 10-
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day anarchist convention held in London late last year.
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Organization was handled online, primarily through the good
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graces of the multinational Spunk Archive crew. The Archive
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is a repository of anarchist writings maintained on the Net,
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sort of the anti-authoritarian's Gutenberg Project. Matt
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Fuller from London's Fast Breeder BBS, itself a hotbed of
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digital thoughtcrime, led off with a critical look at
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digital media for the "culturally engaged," with on emphasis
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on DIY. For Fuller and the other anarchist sysops present,
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getting beyond preaching to the converted is the key reason
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for creating online meeting places. "Fast Breeder gets a lot
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of kids from the suburbs, and people who have access to the
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networks through work," Fuller said. "It's a way to link up
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with people who aren't political activists or who at least
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aren't involved overtly within political groups." It's also
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a way to let would-be hackers know that there's more to
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anarchism than a disk-full of half-baked anarchy files. "We
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have to develop a new kind of politics to deal with
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information economies," where companies ostensibly based in
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the First World farm out work to data-laborers in Eastern
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Europe, India or Ireland, Fuller said. If the goal of
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business is total control over the workforce, these
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arrangements seem ideal - workers don't live together, don't
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know each other, may not even speak the same language. They
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do, however, have the ability to communicate in new ways,
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and to "strike" using methods that have nothing to do with
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picket signs. "We want to create a space online where
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hackers can meet up with people who are interested in
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systems, in getting the tools to change them," he said. In
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an era when one guy with a modem can do more to bring down
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the infrastructure in a few minutes of love-bombing the
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phone system than 10 commandos with well-aimed AKs, hackers
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definitely have those tools. This crew was here to start the
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process of redistributing that wealth of knowledge.
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Bypassing media monopolies. Communication was also on the
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agenda. There's been a lot of talk since the Net's earliest
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days about its potential as an alternative news medium, and
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it's certainly proven to be the fastest way to spread an
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unfounded rumor worldwide. But hard news? Consider the case
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of the Zapatista rebels in Mexico. When the mainstream media
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was just getting out the word that some wacky peasant revolt
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thing was going on in Southern Mexico, EZLN documents were
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already appearing on the Internet in their entirety. The
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data took a convoluted trip. At a school somewhere very
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close to the uprising, a sympathizer sent electronic
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versions of the communiques to several friendly addresses at
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American universities. Within hours, Workers Solidarity
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Movement, an Irish anarchist group based in Dublin, received
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the texts in English via a mailing list originating in the
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U.S. WSA shot them off to Glasgow Anarchist Group in
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Scotland, which republished them widely online and also set
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up an Italian translation that went out on the Net. "A
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couple of days later we got e-mail from Moscow, where they
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had read it in Italian and wanted to know if we could send
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them a copy in English," said Iain MacSaorsa of GAG. And the
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process continued - messy but highly effective, and
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surprisingly fast. Within four days, complete sets of the
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guerrillas' communiques were available worldwide, often
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accompanied by historic commentary and in several languages.
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A supporting picket action called by a US-based solidarity
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group was able, via instant communication with counterparts
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in Europe, to set off coordinated demonstrations at
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embassies in the West. Twenty days after the first Zapatista
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action, an international information network was in place
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and humming along merrily. For anarchists, the Zapatista
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rebellion held special significance, since its "army" relies
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on a non-heirarchical structure and makes decisions by
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consensus. It's been a long time - not since the Spanish
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Civil War - that an openly anarchist-influenced group has
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had a reasonable hope of holding and protecting territory.
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Can using computer networks to get the word out offer them
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the opportunity for protection via the court of world
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opinion? It's a test case, but a deadly serious one for
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those on the front lines. It made this meeting most timely.
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Hands-on, heads up. Participants leave with pages of e-mail
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addresses and visions of community in their heads. It's more
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than visions, really. Just pulling the conference together
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created one group that will keep on communicating. Spunk
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pulled in more contributors to keep its archives growing,
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and cemented plans for interactive communications as well.
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The Spanish anarchists in attendance are already setting up
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a network of anarchist BBSes and figured out the best way to
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hook them up to the Internet from information received here.
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The Germans have a similar system running. A whole lot of
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people will be testing encryption programs over the next few
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days. Looks like somebody finally took that cliche about
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the "anarchistic structure of computer networks" seriously.
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Look out aboveI
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___Resources___ Many local BBSes and online services have an
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anarchist discussion group hidden away somewhere -
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PeaceNet's is particularly interesting. Here's just a few
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more @ resources: Usenet newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
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(dominated by anarcho-capitalists, reader beware),
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alt.politics.radical-left, misc.activism.progressive,
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alt.zines AAA Web - news and announcements mailing list.
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Send "subscribe" message to aaa-web@GNU.AI.MIT.edu The
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Anarchy List - anarchist discussion mailing list, currently
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flame-infested. Send "subscribe" message to anarchy-
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list@CWI.NL El Lokal, books and music in Spanish,
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ellokal@pangea.upc.es Extreme Books, books in English, send
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any message to catalog@mailer.extremebooks.com for catalog
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Freie ArbeiterInnen Union (German autonomist info via WWW) -
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http://anarch.ping.de/FAU Glasgow Anarchist Group -
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cllv13@ccsun.strath.ac.uk Practical Anarchy Online,
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newsletter: international @ news and analysis - subscription
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requests to cardell@lysator.liu.se Spunk Press Archive - e-
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mail spunk-info-request@lysator.liu.se, go WWW at
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http://www.cwi.nl/cwi/people/Jack.Janson/spunk/Spunk_Home.html,
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gopher to gopher etext.archive.umich.edu or FTP to
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etext.archive.umich.edu (/pub/Politics/Spunk) The Seed
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(alternative info via WWW) -
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http://web.cs.city.ac.uk/homes/louise/seed2.html Workers
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Solidarity Movement (N. Ireland) - an64739@anon.enet.fi
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