OP-ED: “Fight Terror With YouTube: Why Al Qaeda can’t make the leap to the more interactive web,” by Daniel Kimmage, New York Times, 26 June 2008, p. A23.

Like an authoritarian entity, al Qaeda wants its walled-garden when it comes to the web: environments and messages it can control.

That gets harder over time for al Qaeda in theory, and yet the Internet restrictions imposed by authoritarian Middle East governments plays into its hands, so says this RFE/RL analyst.

His answer? Push connectivity and let the P2P generation sort it out on its own:

There is a simple lesson here: unfettered access to a free Internet is not merely a goal to which we should aspire on principle, but also a very practical means of countering Al Qaeda. As users increasingly make themselves heard, the ensuing chaos will not be to everyone’s liking, but it may shake the online edifice of Al Qaeda’s totalitarian ideology.

Connectivity is the cause for the friction, but also the force that ultimately wins.