Twitter, Black Swans. The Complexity of the web v The simplicity of Print

from todays Washington Post:

Michael Arrington

TechCrunch.com
Friday, August 7, 2009; 12:15 AM

Twitter, Facebook and LiveJournal spent yesterday battling a DDOS attack that started around 6 am California time. Twitter and LiveJournal went down hard, Facebook stayed mostly online but was clearly under strain. CNET reports that a single individual's accounts on the services may have been the primary target.

Now, nearly 24 hours later, Facebook and LiveJournal appear to be performing normally. But Twitter is down completely and has been for the last few hours.

There lots of ways to describe it when unknowable random events occur. The most popular meme in some circles people say "Black Swan." In other places people say "Shit happens."

The more complex the system, the greater the likelihood of Black Swans. The smarter the system the faster the response.

Print, on the other hand, is a very simple system. No response necessary.