[ranyume]

> To the extent that you agree with my claim, it would mean that even a beneficent government would have something to fear from social media

I'd say that governments are beneficial to the extent that they adapt to the people they're governing. It's clear that social media poses a grave danger to current governance. But that doesn't mean that all forms of governance are equally attacked.

My belief is that the current governance is just obsolete and dying because of the pace of cultural and technical innovation. Governments will need to change in order to stay beneficial to people, and the change is to adapt to people instead of making the people adapt to the current governance.