It has been very interesting to watch the information flow in Iran. Full disclosure: I was born and raised behind the iron curtain so I've thought a lot about

It has been very interesting to watch the information flow in Iran. Full disclosure: I was born and raised behind the iron curtain so I've thought a lot about autocratic regimes and network theory. It's very difficult if not impossible to stop a human wave revolution. Even if the police have guns and the protesters don't, it is usually impossible to stop, regimes just topple. Violent regime change by small groups of people also happens, but I want to concentrate on the classic thrown off by the populace scenario. To keep a population down, to have a police state and stay in power you need some percentage X of that population to function as police. To do it by brute force requires such a large X that it's hard to function as a state, see North Korea. But you can get away with a much smaller X if you can disrupt the formation of a human wave. And the best way to do that is fear, intimidation and preventing the flow of information. That's why police states spy on their people and control the media. Parades are for propaganda, except they can also turn to bad, see Romania and Ceauşescu. The spying is not about getting everyone who's dissatisfied with the regime. It's about getting at least some of the super links, and intimidating the rest. Controlling the media is about preventing synchronization, you want to prevent EVERYONE going out on the street at the same time. So no braking news, or reports of demonstrations. If there are large demonstrations anywhere, you definitely don't put that on TV, much less live TV. Even industrial accidents are suppressed and then slowly leaked over time, days. You just don't want to give anyone a reason to panic. Controlling a populace like that is very much like crowd control, it's even somewhat similar to how you control an animal that could kill you if it got spooked, like a horse. That control occasionally slips. Soccer is huge in the rest of the world and soccer matches are live even in autocratic regimes. And usually that's not a problem. Except when a soccer riot at live soccer match starts a revolution. Interestingly, I recall hearing that North Korea would not show the South Korean team's games in the soccer world cup live. And what Iran is doing is very smart. Evil but smart. Shutting down Facebook and youtube is smart. Why they left Twitter open is anyone's guess. Breaking up the crowds while they are still small, announcing fake rallies is poisoning the information well. Given how important information is to regime change, I am stunned the CIA has not done more to make Facebook unblockable, or at least difficult to block. Or airdropped encrypted satellite cell phones on the crowds. I am surprised and depressed there aren't free information distribution tools being made and given away by the NSA, CIA, etc to everybody living in autocratic regimes. It saddens me to think this is because they fear those tools could be used against friendly dictators. Watching the brutality of the police in Iran, how they beat people, students, women, anyone, I keep thinking to myself: Iran needs soccer hooligans. Iran needs semi-pro, British, well organized, taking-hooliganism-as-a-serious-hobby, with many years experience hooligans. And lots of them. Why are we not parachuting them into Tehran? You can also watch the crowds react, flow around blockades or confront them when numbers are on their side. And the police go from bullies to running away as fast as the balance of numbers changes. Watching has been painful, but Iran is after all the nation that used the human wave attack in the Iran-Iraq war, so I can't help but expect that to happen to the current regime soon.