I'm currently reading The starfish and the spider: the unstoppable power of leaderless organizations. Fascinating book. What really struck me in the part I was reading tonight was the foundation of cigarasylum was directly in response to another site not to be named changing from a starfish to a spider organizationally. Which in the context of the analogy used in the book means changing from an leaderless organization to a traditional hierarchical organization. I realize there is a lot more to at the detail level and there was lots of drama etc... but in the big picture that is as good a synopsis as any. Fascinating read if you are into org theory and I am a bit of a nerd that way.
Cheers.