Central to the issues raised against online publishers by Eric Abetz is the effect of flash advocacy groups. Publishing has become such a commodity that its cost is near zero. Consequently flash advocacy groups flock around an issue and publish their opinion to the internet. Sometimes it gets eyeballs, sometimes not. In this twilight world of mass media influence, it largely remains the mass media who drives people to a flash advocacy group. The website johnhowardlies.com was one such flash advocacy group. But for every pattern that develops, there is also an anti-pattern. Together they combine to a positive that is greater than if those patterns existed in isolation.

Commoditization of Publishing

Information has moved to abundance from scarcity. Previously the limiting factor in publishing information was the high cost of printing and distribution. The printing process is now as simple as clicking a button on a website or an FTP client. A common attribute of abundance industries is the near-zero cost of construction. Software is another that approaches zero construction cost.

Distribution costs have also dropped to zero. A good example of this low cost is the ISBN numbering system adding four digits to increase to thirteen. The ISBN numbering system was concocted in the 1960s and did not envision the explosion in personnel publishing that has gone on since the digital era began. They are quite literally running out of numbers.

Creating a website with a unique URL costs less than $100 for a year. If the publisher is not concerned about the URL or where it is hosted, the cost can be $0. The cost of publishing a political opinion is now as cheap as standing on a soap-box in the Domain, or on Newtown Street and telling it how it is.

The flash-mobs and controversy that surrounds a flash-advocacy website is really just a modern version of the soap-box speaker. Just as the soap-box speaker goes home at night or when their voice is shot through, the flash-advocacy group rarely lasts beyond a single issue.

The old soap-box speakers in the Domain were seen as adding a vitality to the political process and producing the next generation of party representatives and leaders. It is my opinion that flash-advocacy groups are adding greater vitality to the current political system and adding to the political debate, not detracting from it.

Patterns and Anti-Patterns In Information Flows

A pattern that developed several years ago was the URL that contained a name of a company with "sucks" appended to it such as; paypalsucks.com . These sites appeared as a means to push back on the constant positive marketing misinformation some consumers saw the big companies putting out. They offered a contrasting viewpoint that wasn't present on the companies website.

These sites do have value in consumers being able to make up their minds about a service or product. Since there is obvious negative bias it serves as a counter-weight to the "hooray for everything" style of marketing information that a company's advertising budget enables them to push out to the mass media.

A political party is not much different. They constantly manage and manipulate the mass media to their advantage. If an independent voice pops up that is contrary to a party's public face that voice is either derided through an aggressive campaign of attack or drowned out in a swarm of advertising and pontification through the mass media.

The flash-advocacy groups are changing this dynamic. They will become a permanent part of the political landscape, in the same way soap-box politics was in the 1930s through to the 1960s. Politicians like Eric Abetz and John Howard are just going to have to get used to them. Trying to intimidate flash-advocacy groups through legislation and AEC oversight wont work.

Flash-advocacy groups can publish their information to servers outside of the Australian government's reach. On servers in the US, the Christmas Islands; even Sealand or some other future "Stateless". Since the Electoral Act disenfranchises the Australian Diaspora so quickly, many diasporans - who are out of the reach of Australian legislation - can quickly publish dissenting sites on servers overseas and the Australian government can do nothing about it.

Regulating and policing flash-advocacy groups is impossible. The structure of the internet ensures it.

Patterns and Anti-Patterns In Information Flows

But for every positive, there is another positive. Eric Abetz only came out against www.johnhowardlies.com as they thought it had a detrimental effect on their ability to get re-elected. But this assumes that flash-advocacy groups are static. For every www.johnhowardlies.com, there will be a doppleganger flash-advocacy group that publishes www.johnhowardtruths.com.

We would now have two competing websites adding to the debate. One publishing John Howard falsehoods, and another publishing his truths. Suddenly the voter has two sources to draw from. If those two flash-advocacy groups are publishing blatant spin, they can be countered by another internet phenomonen, the flash-research group.

Flash-researchers have shown themselves to be quite remarkable in bringing down figures in the once unassailable mass media. In what was called Rathergate, a false claim by a freeper was researched further, and resulted in journalistic fraud being uncovered. Other sites wanting to prove the opposite also researched the issue. Ultimately Dan Rather was found wanting, and defending a falsehood. Quite remarkable really.

Political Protectionism

Politicians spend a great deal of time ensuring that the media does not misrepresent them, and that their media image is well preened for public conceptions. But it is a new world of abundance. The mass media is already fragmenting into niche segments. Online circulation of mass media sources is out-growing their dead-tree circulations.

The abundance era will have to be embraced; and one aspect of this, is that information is not policeable in the same manner it was when the media moguls ruled the roost of information scarcity. The dead-tree rules don't have any bearing on the abundance realities.

Ask software developers, all the carefully constructed management principles of architecture and engineering fail. And they fail brilliantly, simply because they don't take into account the zero cost of construction. Publishing is now the same. It is a fluid medium that can route around any disturbance and inhibition.

Conclusion

To see increased publishing of opinions, advocacy and support as damage is totally and completely wrong. Increasing the number of voices only adds to the political diversity and debate. Incorrect and false advocacy publications compete against their anti-patterns which right the wrongs. Flash-researchers balance the incorrect and false memes. New flash-advocacy groups flock around the researchers that discover the truth. Eyeballs will follow and an improved political debate found.

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