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Tomorrow's Wars Will Be Livestreamed (vice.com) 75

Something unique and (in some way) unprecedented happened earlier today. The start of the invasion of Mosul, a city held by ISIS in Iraq, was live-streamed on Facebook and YouTube, and thousands of people around the world watched it. There were several streams that got popular, but one shared by Kurdish outlet Rudaw was getting the most traction -- it was re-posted by major outlets like the Washington Post and Channel 4 in the United Kingdom. Motherboard adds: While some viewers commented on the merits of the offensive, for others, the livestream itself was the most startling thing. As angry cartoon faces and "Wow!" emoticons floated over top of live images of war, viewers noted that it all seemed like a bit too much like a sci-fi fever dream about a war-obsessed culture. For most English-language viewers watching these streams, there was no explanation, no given context, no subtitles or translation -- merely images of a mostly-barren foreign landscape peppered with men and trucks, idling and standing around, sparsely punctuated by violence. But in 2016, decades after Lessons of Darkness was completed and on social media instead of in a darkened arthouse theatre, the void spits out something other than deep, metaphysical understanding about human nature. Instead, in the comments, people ask for money. They talk about porn. They quote Green Day lyrics. They call people "cucks." To be fair, however, not everyone reacted this way. But a lot of people did. "There's journalistic value in the livestream,"
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Tomorrow's Wars Will Be Livestreamed

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  • I saw live stream of the Iraq invasion, it has been done, I only expect it to be livestreamed now with drone feeds, body cams and all.

    • We must gamify it.
      • I thought maybe we must autotune it as well?

      • by decep ( 137319 )

        You mean a body count?

      • We must gamify it.

        Joking or not, the irony of this statement is you're talking about the same society who would welcome the next livestream warfare pay-per-view event with open wallets, but becomes seriously offended when someone says the word "Christmas" in public.

        It's fucking amazing to me that society places far more value on being politically correct than they do with morals or ethics. One would have thought that after the 2008 financial crisis we would have learned something about the importance of prioritizing the lat

        • One would have thought that after the 2008 financial crisis we would have learned something about the importance of prioritizing the latter, and demand more of it from our leaders.

          Yeah, that's why we ended up with Tweedle Lecher & Tweedle Liar as the main choices this year...

        • by Maritz ( 1829006 )

          We must gamify it.

          Joking or not, the irony of this statement is you're talking about the same society who would welcome the next livestream warfare pay-per-view event with open wallets, but becomes seriously offended when someone says the word "Christmas" in public.

          It's fucking amazing to me that society places far more value on being politically correct than they do with morals or ethics. One would have thought that after the 2008 financial crisis we would have learned something about the importance of prioritizing the latter, and demand more of it from our leaders.

          You're quite sure you're not exaggerating? Never saw anybody get "seriously offended" by the word "Christmas" in public.

    • by afgam28 ( 48611 )

      Live comments are the problem, not live streaming. This time the live feed is being mixed in with live comments like "WHY THERE IS NO SHOOTING, EXPLOSION. I WANT TO WATCH A WAR” and emoticons.

      • Only fools livestreem a firefight they are in, as it lets the enemy know where they are and what they are doing. You want your combat video and pics to be uploaded after the action is over.
        • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

          Only fools livestreem a firefight they are in, as it lets the enemy know where they are and what they are doing. You want your combat video and pics to be uploaded after the action is over.

          That's one reason. Another would be to creatively edit it - cut out the bad-for-our-side stuff, and put in tons of good-for-our-side stuff, complete with slo-mo replays, highlights and other things.

          Livestreaming won't be done - it's too easy to create opposition to what you're doing at home, plus exposing everyone to the

  • I would like to know more...
  • it'll be shut down (and fast). We're starting to see this with Black Lives Matter where the major streaming sites are setting up systems to exercise editorial control. This is why the Iraq war has lasted so long. Our media turned a blind eye to the carnage...
  • by waspleg ( 316038 ) on Monday October 17, 2016 @07:24PM (#53096203) Journal

    all we need is an alien bug invasion to make "Starship Troopers" a reality. What's doogie howser up to these days anyway? Psychic warfare research?

  • War as a spectator sport? And here I thought "Reality TV" couldn't get any worse after Survivor.

    • by rikkards ( 98006 )

      This isn't new. At Waterloo and the Battle of Fort Sumter there were bystanders safely standing off to the sides watching. It was even remarked at both how it was an outing for the civvies nearby.

  • I spent some time watching the coup in Turkey on Periscope. In one feed, a bunch of pro-government forces were outside of the army barracks in Ankara, they were moving in, and one guy got shot and had to be pulled to safety (not sure if he made it). In another feed, tanks were guarding the bridges over the Bosphorus Bridge, and a tank fired a round into a armored personnel carrier. Scary stuff!

  • ... Amused to Death
  • The overthrowing of the communism in Romania (the "revolution") was live-streamed on TV back in 1989. Made quite an impression at the time.

  • Future wars will be livestreamed...unless the war is in Ethiopia, in which case see the next post.
  • "The revolution will not be televised" - LOL
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
    • Uh.. not so much. War is business as usual. The revolution is absolutely NOT being televised here.
    • by jrumney ( 197329 )
      The revolution Gil Scott Heron was talking about was more like the revolution in Ethiopia, or in North Dakota right now, where the people revolting are not the ones with the power to feed you a one-sided propaganda view of what is going on, or at least block your view of the other side's one-sided propaganda.
  • "We are a war-like people" - Saint Carlin
  • Both sides in a conflict have a vested interest in preventing live coverage of their operations, and at least one of those sides usually has control of the local infrastructure, with the other side usually trying to destroy it. Satellite is the only viable option, and even that can be spotty and jammable, and is exceedingly expensive in any event. Sneakernet will always work, but not for live streams.

The fancy is indeed no other than a mode of memory emancipated from the order of space and time. -- Samuel Taylor Coleridge

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