Controlling the Information Environment

Trying to control the information environment has long been a tactic for shaping public opinion through war time propaganda. What is new here, i think, is the same sort of things that are new when we talk about social media generally - you have the opportunity for horizontal networks to spread information. You have the ability to spread information much more quick and we have this kind of vorality issue where not only can things go out quickly, but they can spread to lots of people quickly. The other piece of this, which is less new, but is still sort of new, layered on top of the sort of fundamental features of digital information, is images and video.