WikiLeaks

[Marlin]

I just cut and paste the quote from some other wiki. Some of his quotes go on about his info comes from others, making him just a publisher, that he so often likes to proclaim himself to be. The quote I provided made him seem more an investigator/sleuth. Publishers don't seek out the info for their product, they just print it.

I am already at the point of not caring, like others have mentioned, nothing has changed with the release of any of his info. No one cares.

I would say realistically that change is coming. The bubble has to break soon. Hence my stockpiling of food/equipment/water purification gear/ammo/silver/solar and dyno powered equipment and so on. **** is gonna hit the fan soon, you all can find me in Missouri when it does! For those that have no hunting/mechanical/camping skills, good luck to you. ZOMBIE FOOD!!!

If he happens to be the straw that breaks the camels back, good for him, he will wish he was back in the outback instead of the UK at that point.

[Y33TREKker]

...I am already at the point of not caring, like others have mentioned, nothing has changed with the release of any of his info. No one cares.

Matters of opinion.

[Stephen Biko]

Ah the good old, "warranty only applies to the original owner" concept. Manning needs to go to jail anyway.
Wikileaks is all about defending the release of classified/secret info, but only if you go through them. Sounds like the Kirby and Cutco warranties, warrantied for life, as long as you buy through an official dealer, like that somehow makes it a different product?

That analogy is a circmand-level stretch of logic. But Wikileaks has pledged $20K in support for his legal defense - on the other hand the US government is exerting so much soft power to cut off all wikileaks funding that who knows what will happen, not content with leaning on Visa/Mastercard/Paypal it's starting to sound like Germany has been persuaded to "audit" the organization - Wau Holland - that handles most of Wikileaks donations. Want to bet they seize it?

[VXR]

That analogy is a circmand-level stretch of logic

[Marlin]

That analogy is a circmand-level stretch of logic. But Wikileaks has pledged $20K in support for his legal defense - on the other hand the US government is exerting so much soft power to cut off all wikileaks funding that who knows what will happen, not content with leaning on Visa/Mastercard/Paypal it's starting to sound like Germany has been persuaded to "audit" the organization - Wau Holland - that handles most of Wikileaks donations. Want to bet they seize it?

I am not seeing how it is a stretch. They (wikileaks) is preaching about the transparency of all information, but only if you go through them, giving them first dibs for publicity, filtering, use of the info and so on.

20 whole thousand dollars!!! Damn, here I was thinking they were cheap and not willing to help anyone unless you went through them.

"Most large law firms in the United States bill between $200 and $1,000 per hour for their lawyers' time"

So for a case of this high profile, that should get him, oh, say about one day of a good lawyer. Hell, Rangel spent millions, and he didn't even go to trial.

This is like saying I gave a homeless guy a penny yesterday, now I am a hero!!!!!!!!

[Y33TREKker]

...They (wikileaks) is preaching about the transparency of all information, but only if you go through them, giving them first dibs for publicity, filtering, use of the info and so on.

That's not what was being said either.

In the interview, Assange himself suggested that Wikileaks is seen as a "publisher of last resort". I'm sure everyone (you, me, AND Wikileaks) would be very happy if all the news coming from all "official" channels was unfiltered, but a person would have to be very naive indeed to say that is actually the way things work at this time, as alluded to with the talk about gag orders later in the interview.

Spin is all too common, and since you like analogies, here's another one. Even as you are reporting on this site your take on the events surrounding Wikileaks, various parts of the story are going through your filter and coming out skewed to your particular viewpoint. The question as always is why?

[spaceCADETzoom]

Does anyone believe wikileaks doesn't spin? "collateral murder"? Really? At least traditional news media has the journalistic ideal, as far removed from reality as it may be-- journalists at least pretend to uphold some professional standard. The idea that wikileaks is somehow the watchdog here is laughable. It's media without the traditional oversight of actual media. And double the deluded self righteousness ( and in comparison to how self congratulatory traditional journalism already is, that's off the charts)

[Y33TREKker]

...It's media without the traditional oversight of actual media....

Because the oversight of "actual media" these days is soooo above reproach.

Now that's laughable.

It would seem spin can even be accomplished with over-generalization. No one has said that ALL media is at fault, but it sure seems there are difficulties involved when it comes to reporting some things.

An example of high-profile whistleblowers needing other alternatives.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/eu_russia_hospital_fake

[Stephen Biko]

Does anyone believe wikileaks doesn't spin?

You know what else they do? They give you access to the raw materials so you can judge that spin for yourself. No one else does that. Even when the info isn't a secret, nobody else includes the raw source material when they publish a story, you have to dig and in many cases, like interviews, you'll never get access.

At least traditional news media has the journalistic ideal,

And what exactly is "the journalistic ideal?" Seems to me that its to inform the public. Maybe there is some other ideal I'm unaware of.

It's media without the traditional oversight of actual media.

Like the oversight of sitting on the government wiretapping info for a year? Or perhaps the oversight of CBS sitting on the Abu Ghraib photos until the New Yorker got a hold of them from another source? Or maybe you mean gag orders preventing the reporting of public government proceedings?

[Marlin]

You know what else they do? They give you access to the raw materials so you can judge that spin for yourself. No one else does that. Even when the info isn't a secret, nobody else includes the raw source material when they publish a story, you have to dig and in many cases, like interviews, you'll never get access.

I am kind of curious how you know its the raw data? We have already established that they(wikileaks) filter it. Also, why hasn't all the info been released? Is he now hoarding data? Shouldn't he just release it as soon as he gets it for the sake of transparency?

Instead all this hype gets built up, and whether or not it changes people's opinions means nothing. It isn't changing anything, Clinton is still SOS, Obama is still president, Bank CEOs are still getting HUGE DISGUSTING bonuses, no one has been fired, nor are they. Nothing is going to change short of an armed revolution. And that, folks, is just not gonna happen in America. Some part of me wishes it would, The Postman type scenario, but not likely anytime soon.

So I retract my previous arguments against Assange, he can go ahead and post every state secret he can find, short of blueprints for megaweapons or biological weapons, it will have no impact on the world at all, we already hate our elected officials, we already know they scam, scheme, cheat, lie, steal, probably murder, and there is nothing you can do about it. What are you gonna do, elect a different guy next time round, call the cops, Alex Jones tried that on air, reported to the FBI that he had leads that point to terrorists having lunch at the Pentagon. Anwar Al-Awlaki, number 2 on America's kill list, having lunch at the Pentagon a few months after 911...Was anything done about it ?

[Y33TREKker]

...Or maybe you mean gag orders preventing the reporting of public government proceedings?

An excerpt from that story.

"The right to report parliament was the subject of many struggles in the 18th century, with the MP and journalist John Wilkes fighting every authority – up to the king – over the right to keep the public informed. After Wilkes's battle, wrote the historian Robert Hargreaves, "it gradually became accepted that the public had a constitutional right to know what their elected representatives were up to".

What's amazing is that things should ever get to the point where that should even be questioned.

And I have to finally say it Marlin, give the quote in your sig, I'm surprised you've had such a problem with what Wikileaks says they are attempting to do.

[Marlin]

An excerpt from that story.

What's amazing is that things should ever get to the point where that should even be questioned.

And I have to finally say it Marlin, give the quote in your sig, I'm surprised you've had such a problem with what Wikileaks says they are attempting to do.

What I am saying is that wikileaks is not what they say they are. It is all too convenient and neat. If they have something important, why isn't out yet? Everyone acted surprised that our government was spying on other important world leaders. Wouldn't you be disappointed if they weren't??
My sig is more related to all the ridiculous social programs we have. Our codling of the minority instead of following the wishes of the majority. The encouragement of mediocrity and so on.

[circmand]

Wikileaks is init for their own personal agenda. They have posted this themselves. Anyone deluded to think they are a brand new "news source" That is out there to report news for the good of the people is just plain ignorant. There is a group os greatly deluded people that is always sitting out there waiting for the next populace hero to appear. They jump on band wagon after band wagon that appears. They believe what ever the next "hero says" by that I mean says what they want to hear. They believe it never question it and for thousands of years now refuse to believe they are a group of idiots giving power to the next idiot every time it happens. It just seems to difficult for them to check facts.

[Stephen Biko]

I am kind of curious how you know its the raw data? We have already established that they(wikileaks) filter it.

So, with zero evidence to support it, you believe that they are lying about their entire reason for existence? You can't name even one document that wikileaks has published and has later been shown to be fraudulently edited. I think that's practically the definition of prejudgment.

Also, why hasn't all the info been released? Is he now hoarding data? Shouldn't he just release it as soon as he gets it for the sake of transparency?

They used to do it that way. In fact, they released over 1.2 million documents that way - just make a press release and put out a zip file containing all of the documents from each source. But the information overload meant very few people bothered to even dig through it. So this year they've taken a different tack.

Nothing is going to change short of an armed revolution. And that, folks, is just not gonna happen in America.

So nobody should try to make things better because its really hard to make things better? Now that's a self-defeating prophecy. The enemy of good is perfect.

Plus, you've also got this US-centric view that completely misses the point. Information released via wikileaks changed an election in Kenya such that none of the officials in the named report were re-elected. Their Kaupthing publication prevented the Icelandic government from sweeping banking reform under the carpet - maybe the rumored BoA documents will do the same here.

[Stephen Biko]

Everyone acted surprised that our government was spying on other important world leaders. Wouldn't you be disappointed if they weren't??

That's an oversimplification. They were spying at the UN in direct contravention of treaties the US government has agreed to. We haven't agreed not to spy in general, just not to abuse the trust that the UN is meant to engender.

My sig is more related to all the ridiculous social programs we have. Our codling of the minority instead of following the wishes of the majority. The encouragement of mediocrity and so on.

Your sig is also wrong. If you think about it for just a second it should be obvious - in Jefferson's time there were no social programs. Gerald Ford said it in 1974. However, in Jefferson's time there was plenty of censorship, that's why protection of the press is the first item in the Bill of Rights. And FYI, at that point in history the term "press" did not refer to journalists, it referred to the printed word as from a press - thus any idea that 'journalists' were singled out as being more free to publish than anyone else is erroneous.