• by Cory Treffiletti , Featured Contributor, August 20, 2003

This past week was REALLY strange.

First of all, I spent much of this past week reading about, and watching, the newest reality show that has captivated the nation called, "Who Wants To Be A Governor?" The show stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Gary Coleman, and Larry Flynt as Sacramento hopefuls as they battle their arch-nemesis Gray Davis as well as all forms of rationale thought!

As if the race for Sacramento wasn't enough to clog the headlines and confuse millions of people, there came the Blackout of 2003 where all you east coast folks got to experience the world without electricity. This served to bring New York back onto a page 1 story in national and international news (Further demonstrating the ego of the Big Apple. It couldn't deal with California being the #1 news-story for even a couple of days).

Though these two stories managed to monopolize the headlines over the last few days, there is one phenomenon that is starting to pick up more steam and is worthy of being red-flagged as being of note. The phenomenon of Flash Mobs!

A Flash Mob occurs when a large group of individuals are convinced to congregate in one place, via Internet community tools, such as Email, Chat, or Bulletin Boards, and take part in a form of scheduled spontaneity. The funniest one I read about involved about 200 people all converging on a furniture store (I believe it was in London), walking around and looking at the furniture that was for sale, and then all leaving at exactly the same time. They browsed for about 20 minutes, and left. These happenings are mostly meaningless but demonstrate the power of the Internet as a means of organizing people in offline activity.

Even the Presidential candidates have been getting involved with this phenomenon. Howard Dean has been using MeetUp.com to organize his campaign and fundraising stops in various cities, and I know it's only a matter of time before "George W" sends out an Evite to voters in the upcoming elections.

Is it possible that all of these disparate stories are related? If I was a conspiracy theorist I would say they were. Since California was grabbing all the headlines, is it possible that an underground Flash Mob of power and energy workers all were organized to throw the wrong switches at the right time to send the eastern seaboard into darkness, effectively refocusing all attention to the New York City area once again? Is it a continuation of the ongoing East Coast/West Coast rivalry that plagued the lives of Biggie and Tupac? Maybe...

This theory is probably wrong, but my exaggeration serves to remind us that online tools can certainly be used for offline results. The Internet is the most aggressive form of media and is the most immediate (Where did you learn about the blackout? What was your source of information)? Flash Mobs are a phenomenon that can only be created using the Internet's community development aspects. Presidential candidates recognize this, California Governor candidates recognize this, and slowly but surely most advertisers recognize this as well.

I know that most of you agree with this already, so be sure to send this to anyone whom you feel isn't getting the message. They will not be able to ignore this for very long.