Smart mobs

The possibilities offered by new methods of communication are just as amazing as the dangers they include, even if these dangers aren't always apparent, according to Internet and mobile communications guru Howard Rheingold.

He will inform attendees of the Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum in Bonn, Germany, about the democratic potential encapsulated in the virtual communities and the future of Web 2.0.

Rheingold has examined the potential of online communities since the Internet's inception. His bestsellers "Tools for Thought" (1985), "Virtual Reality" (1992) and "The Virtual Community" (1994) have been translated into several languages and deal with how society has changes and continues to change when new forms of communication emerge.

Texting for change

So-called "smart mobs" are Rheingold's most recent field of study and he coined the term himself. Rheinhold described smart mobs as "small and large groups of people using mobile communication and the Internet to organize common actions in a new way with people they would have otherwise not been able to connect with, and in sizes and at speeds that were not possible before."

The phenomenon has already left its mark on politics after being employed by activists in Malaysia and anti-war protesters.

"The demonstrations that led to the fall of the Filipino president and the demonstrations that decided elections in Korea and Spain were organized by text messages," Rheingold said.

Rheingold has taught as an appointed lecturer at UC Berkeley and Stanford University in California and is a non-resident Fellow at the Annenberg Center for Communication. He will give the opening keynote address at this year's Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum (June 3-5) on whether the techno-social revolution will unite citizens of the world or divide society.

Author: Wilfried Solbach / Sean Sinico

Editor: Kate Bowen