Howard Rheingold has made a career chronicling the intersection of technology and society. His 1993 book, The Virtual Community, foretold the Internet explosion. His latest work, Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution (Perseus Publishing), offers a vivid mural of the strange new frontier of the mobile Web. What happens when the network meets wireless in the form of mobile media? You get “smart mobs”: swarms of people converging seemingly spontaneously — sometimes for good, sometimes for ill, sometimes for fun. The significance of smart mobs: They amplify the human talent for cooperation. Smart Mobs is a fascinating romp through the far edge of what’s next.