4 ms·

Shouldn't having a "Mad Despot" also be a requirement? Both Island and Greenland are on the list, but are both democratic. They probably have few internet prov

• EwanG 14y ago
  In this case the article seems to be taking the approach (for fun I suspect) of "If you wanted to be a Mad Despot, and part of your plan was to cut off the Internet to achieve this, which countries should you target". While Ireland and Greenland are on the list, I thin there are better options for your "average" mad despot. On the other hand, you have to start somewhere...
  • lucaspiller 14y ago
    Just to point out it isn't "Island" or Ireland on the list but Iceland.
    • jpatokal 14y ago
      Iceland is "Island" in Icelandic and most other Scandinavian languages, and the OP appears to be Norwegian.
• aleyan 14y ago
  Agreed. It seems odd that the countries author chose to highlight are not special for much of anything but their size. If you are going to go for small countries, might well talk about individual states, prefectures, counties, etc. I bet if the Governor of Hawaii was a "Mad Despot" he could turn off the internet just as well as President of Iceland. PS. Greenland is really odd, because it is part of Denmark. Why did they break it out separately?
  • sanxiyn 14y ago
    Greenland is .gl, Denmark is .dk. On the internet they are different. :)
  • ht_th 14y ago
    Because it is an extreme case: small population, almost no diversity, and on an isolated island. There aren't many internet connections to Greenland and there isn't much demand for different ISPs either. So cutting a cable or an ISP off of the Internet cuts off the whole country (it's an autonomous country). So, a mad despot or a sloppy construction worker could cut Greenland off of the internet. Another interesting case mentioned in the Article is The Netherlands: a small country, a small population, but a enormous amount of ISPs and connections to other countries. Good luck cutting that off as a whole, you mad despot!
• Adirael 14y ago
  I don't think the map relates to the "Mad Despot", and I think it's only about risk of disconnection (including accidental disconnection). I was shocked to see Portugal there at first, but I guess they have transatlantic cables to USA or maybe to UK and not much to mainland / Spain, and that's why they are low risk. Original's Renesys (the map creator) here: http://www.renesys.com/blog/2012/11/could-it-happen-in-your-countr.shtml http://www.renesys.com/blog/2012/11/could-it-happen-in-your-... (I don't have time to parse it now, my first paragraph is just an idea)
  • pjmlp 14y ago
    Portuguese here. I had a quick look at the link you provided, it has to do with the amount of national communication providers really route the traffic across borders. Since most of the traffic goes over Portugal Telecom, switching them off, would already cut most of the traffic I imagine. Specially because they also own most of the internal cabling, even when the service is offered by other companies.
  • deleted 14y ago
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