Information, Network Survival - Control

"The atom is the icon of the 20th century. The atom whirls alone. It is the metaphor for individuality. But the atom is the past. The symbol for the next century is the net. The net has no center, no orbits, no certainty. It is an indefinite web of causes. The net is the archetype displayed to represent all circuits, all intelligence, all interdependence, all things economic, social, or ecological, all communications, all democracy, all families, all large systems, almost all that we find interesting and important." Kevin Kelly

I've quoted this before - I think it may be my favorite quote about current events, because it is so true.
We live in a great, big, network. From the physically urban, to the suburban, more and more is tagged onto the network every day creating great digital, informational, communes.
We are surrounded by services, other people and connections (even undesired ones) all the time. Survival takes on a different meaning, for those who are not mindless sufferers of the modern condition, inside the web of network-urbanized humanity.
Being on the fringe of this, physically and digitally (I am a techno-neanderthal, with an understanding and an interest in all things modern and technological, but a five year old computer, no iPod, and a fairly personally private person who still machines things by hand on an old fashioned lathe without Computer Numerical Control), I like to watch like a fly on the wall. One of the things I have always found fascinating is the databases of arcane, controversial, knowledge that begin to amass in the midst of these environments.
People start collecting information about unusual things - spycraft and the intelligence trade, surveillence technology and defeating it, mental training, fighting methods, hacking, survival, chemistry, lock-picking, cryptography. There are websites all over the internet that are vast repositories for this sort of information, and there are even more people who practice it and have become adept at it, for no particular, good, reason. Its not their job, or related to a job they'd like to have - They have no darker mission, psychotic desire or zealous religious calling to be martyrs or super-soldiers - They are clerks, stockboys, brokers, photographers, artists, shoe salesmen, gas station attendants, computer repair technicians, writers, insurance salesmen, people from all walks of life, and all careers.
So why? Why do they do it - Why do they spend late hours collecting, sorting, posting, reading, practicing, training, these bizarre skillsets?
Why does a housewife sit in-front of her computer, night after night, with a set of Rytan's and a pile of old locks she found at the flea-market, working on one of the ones she hasnt defeated yet?
Why does an ear/nose/throat doctor on another side of the world sit up late during the night, every night he's not working, practicing lying in his bedroom mirror, or watching videos of people testifying in court, talking to the television news, trying to detect who's lying through subtle movements, and speech patterns?
Why does the computer technician for an elementary school in Bath, Michigan, spend too much time at work, reading material about intelligence operations and tradecraft skills, when he's never even been out of the United States?
In an ever maddening world, of chaos and destruction, of invasive technology, government and business, of hyper-connected agoraphobia and panoptic surveillance, some of us, desperately, need to control our environment.
We are no longer a generation with a future - not like our parents or grandparents had a future they could hopefully look forward too. The world is too volatile, full of rapid change and innovation for both the positive and the negative (as technology is rapidly innovating, so is warfare on the scale, and of the style, that Al Qaeda plays - thus far in the new century global terrorists have to be said to be among the greatest innovators we have seen. See the Global Guerrillas link at left), for any presupposed "future" to have the ground to stand on. We have to survive the now, to have a future - and essentially, with the high-risk, low survivability, state of the world now, we have no future to speak of. There is the future, as a natural thing, but not something we can predict or say anything concrete about. There is no future, things are changing to rapidly to to have a grand master plan - "We have only risk management. The spinning of any given moments scenarios" William Gibson.
In this environment we need to retain some ability to be in control and to move, silently, through the world without disturbing the sleeping giants, going about our business in control of our lives and destiny. That helps us manage the risks - a buffet-table of odd skillsets, outside of the convetional, tie your shoes, drive your car, type, push papers, sign checks, go home, take a bath, balance your checkbook skillsets.
The only control you can have is to take control of the things you arent supposed to. Even if its just in minor ways.