The Internet is not a community, it’s only a community hall
Not long ago, according to the new-media guru Clay Shirky, the Sudanese government set up a Facebook page call ing for a protest against the Sudanese government, naming a specific time and place – then simply arrested those who showed up. It was proof, Shirky argues, that social media can’t be revolutionary on its own. “The reason that worked is that nobody knew anybody else,” he says. “They thought Facebook itself was trustworthy.”