Iran, Pt. Deaux...

A little Penny Arcade to get in the mood and then we'll continue with tonight's early morning fiesta of fervor. Click the image to imbiggen!



I have to admit that this news article from Wired amuses the evil 1337 h4x0r side of me a bit:

Looks like 4chan and the Twitter Shitters have been busy...

Being neither a fan of Twitter (a tool that reminds me of how much I hate AIM-speak with the fury of Thor) or 4chan (a website which apart from their DDOS shenanigans against Scientology, annoys me to death), I have to admit that I'm impressed. Twittering as well as blogging has allowed news from inside Iran to percolate out into the world, a concept that would have been unheard of twenty years ago.

It is a huge risk they are taking in reaching out. Could you imagine getting a bullet in the brainpan for blogging? It's true and it is happening right now, friends, make no mistake.

The interesting thing about the DDOS (distributed denial of service, which is basically attempts to flood websites and choke up their available bandwidth with junk attachments, clicks, redirects, etc.) attacks is that it works both ways. Yes, they have been bringing the Iranian government and state controlled media outlets to their virtual knees by these attacks, but this has an effect on those inside the country who are trying to get legitimate news and information out.

I've been keeping a watch on the BBC websites and Fark, since the Beeb has more of a world view perspective than the more USA-centered mass media and Fark is a wonderful news aggregator in times of crisis so you can find links in a pinch when shit hits the fan.

I wouldn't recommend my readers join in the hacking fun, but I do post this so that y'all can take notice of what a few hundred thousand geeks can do. Good luck, we're all counting on you...