With World Watching, Wikileaks Falls Into Disrepair 258
JDRucker writes "Supporters are concerned. Very concerned. Would-be whistle-blowers hoping to leak documents to Wikileaks face a potentially frustrating surprise. Wikileaks' submission process, which had been degraded for months, completely collapsed more than two weeks ago and remains offline, in a little-noted breakdown at the world's most prominent secret-spilling website."
Sad to see this happen (Score:5, Insightful)
Wikileaks provides an extremely useful service, one which is only possible on the Internet, considering its widely accessible scale. Here's to hoping things get straightened out -_-;;
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Yeah nothing at all. Well except for that video of US soldiers killing innocent journalists and children (and then laughing about it). And revealing ACTA in its early carnation. And other information that the People deserve to know. But yeah other than that, it's worthless than an NES.
I found this bit interesting. I wonder if the owner has been pressured to not renew the license? Or maybe he's just lazy. (shrug). "the site failed to renew its SSL certificate, a basic web protection that costs less
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
"the site failed to renew its SSL certificate, a basic web protection that costs less than $30 a year and takes only hours to set up..... Wikileaks' head Julian Assange declined to comment." - What's he hiding?
Perhaps the fact that there's a man in the middle now handling/reading his traffic?
Re:Sad to see this happen (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Sad to see this happen (Score:5, Insightful)
Tell what happend, not your analysis of what happened -
But, but.... how are we to know what to think!?
Re:Sad to see this happen (Score:5, Informative)
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the organization will attempt to present material in a way to maximize impact
Pretty sure this applies to the WSJ, too, and for that matter every other commercial "news" agency.
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the organization will attempt to present material in a way to maximize impact. Stop confusing Wikileaks with the WSJ.
And how is this different than the WSJ, CNN, Fox News or any of the "main stream media"? They are here to catch readers and sell advertising - NOT report the news in an unbiased way. Unbiased news without commentrary is education. WSJ, CNN, Fox News, et al, is entertainment.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
They did tell what happened. In fact, they release the entire raw footage to the entire internet, so that any random person could analyze it independently or make their own edited version. That's way WAY different from how the mainstream media operates.
But they also released an edited version, and that's all you watched, because you don't actually care enough to do the work of reviewing the primary source yourself. If you're too lazy to interpret the raw footage yourself, you're going to be stuck with so
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This is the issue I have with the mainstream media too. Tell what happend, not your analysis of what happened.
The problem with just reporting what happens is that it will also usually involve reporting what the government says. So in effect you already get an analysis/opinion. e.g. "The President said we need to stay the course and that pulling out of Afghanistan would encourage the terrorists.". If you look at the BBC news website, which prides itself on "balance", you will see this kind of reporting all the time. They report the event, e.g. an attack on a NATO base in Afghanistan and then some statements by off
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
What the fuck do you want, emotionless robots?
Actually, yes; That's EXACTLY what I want. Even better if the robot speaks with a proper British accent.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Then you weren't looking. Even the "editors" at Wikileaks reported having a bit internal fight over how to deal with the fact that they saw an obvious RPG launcher in the video. Regardless, have you bothered to read up on the reports from the ground (by third parties) in the immediate aftermath of the attack on the insurgents? You know, where the RPG ammo the guys were carrying was found scattered around (even under the body of one of the reporters)? At least be a lit
Re:Sad to see this happen (Score:4, Insightful)
I've said it before, I'm gonna say it now, and I'll probably say it again.
I can defend the first "firing run" of that attack helicopter. The video quality isn't great, but there may or may not be weapons carried by the group. Something that may be a shoulder mounted RPG or may be a large shoulder mounted camera/camcorder is being held up. Considering the circumstances, I can see where the pilot would be concerned about a possible ambush, and I'm ok with his decision.
The second "firing run", where the van is fired upon? Yeah, I hope there's a God to weigh that pilot. He calls out to the wounded journalist, telling him that all he has to do is pick up a weapon. If the wounded guy has a weapon, the pilot can fire again and kill him (put him out of misery, I suppose... or provide another reason for a trigger happy pilot to fire again). Then watching the van arrive... its occupants clearly assisted the unarmed man, and the pilot declaring to his superiors that the van occupants are "clearing bodies and collecting weapons"... that's a clear lie. The pilot's already noted the man is unarmed, and he is obviously wounded (and hence, alive). No collection of bodies, no collection of weapons.
He lies to his superiors, and gets approval to fire again, wasting the van and its occupants. That's what pisses me off. Not the first firing, but the second. The first is war. It sucks, it's bad, but it's war. The second? That's murder. A line was crossed.
I hope that pilot spends the rest of his nights dreaming about the occupants of that van went through.
I'm pissed that our military covered it up. I'd be a lot happier if our government stood up and said "We're sorry. This happened. This is why it happened. This is where we made our mistake. This is what we're doing to make sure things like that never happen again."
Instead, I get to hear about it through Wikileaks, get to hear about *MY* government hiding things from *ME* that shouldn't be hidden, under the guise of national security. I'm sorry, but when a mistake is made, *MY* government should man up, admit it, and fix it. It should not sweep it under the rug to be hidden away, pretending that it's going to seriously impact the safety of the nation.
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You mean, "And other spin I want them to digest as if it were basic factual information." The video you cite is a perfect example of out-of-context agenda-driven spin, coupled with deliberately false and misleading commentary. They used video of an attack on weapons-carrying insurgents (in an area where insurgents had been shooting at people all day), and the un-marked embedded journali
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They used video of an attack on weapons-carrying insurgents (in an area where insurgents had been shooting at people all day)
No matter how many tymes I look and search I do not see those being shot at with any weapons. Not one. I doubt the children were armed either. And it's not like innocent civilians are never targeted. Mi Lai [pbs.org] was a real massacre of villagers by the US military in Viet Nam and not staged. Abu Ghraib was also real. To ignore or deny atrocities perpetrated by those in the US military
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Well, if you're not observant enough to see the guy leaning on the RPG launcher, or the guy next to him with the AK-47, then I have to question how many other bad conclusions you come to, and how often. Why don't you read up on the comments from people (like other reports) who quickly came up on the scene of that street, and found the weapons still on the bodies, and even found one of the dead journalis
Re:Sad to see this happen (Score:5, Informative)
No one came into even double the effective range of that alleged weapon. At no time was it ever pointed at anyone. The rules of engagement were not followed, period. Likewise the video also shows the firing of rockets into a residential area, killing bystanders passing by on the streets. The video itself showed clearly the callus nature of our troops and a blind disregard for the right to inhale oxygen, even for children, when it would be more fun to kill them and score as many points as possible in this the greatest of video games.
This is an old argument, and is getting really tired at this point. You want to blindly believe and conduct ad hominem attacks against those who draw other conclusions, fine. But please go ahead and label them as a 'pinko commie' in the first paragraph so less time is wasted getting to the end of your paragraphs.
Re:Sad to see this happen (Score:5, Interesting)
Ouch. I didn't say much about this video but i didn't see an apache shooting at innocent journalists or children. I did see an apache shooting at what they thought was an armed group. Then they shot a van that was trying to rescue one of the targets. I also saw that when the ground units arrived, a search of the van showed that there were children inside and the soldiers rushed the wounded children to safety. I then heard a chopper pilot try to convince himself he didn't do anything wrong by placing blame on the victim. It was a terrible thing to watch happen.
Unfortunately these kinds of situations happen often. Everyone reacts to them differently and the experiences will create veterans that can deal with them better (or the soldiers will f-up and be put in less trying situations). But there will always be shitty situations where the optimal solution can only be found in retrospect. The lesson being that you should always look for the 3rd option.. it's there somewhere.
Your posts usually punch my frustration buttons but you are dead right about ACTA. But don't take my comment to be asking you to stop (not that i expect you to).
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They might have thought the group was armed but they were obtaining permission to fire based on the cameras the journalists were carrying. By the time the possible weapons are visible they've already phoned home for permission. That some weapons were found on some people doesn't change that they'd have gunned the journalists down for their cameras alone.
Then they attacked the first responders in a follow-up attack (a typical terrorist ploy), and as you say - blamed the rescuer for the death of his children
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That would depend on your definition of useful and which side of the leak you are on... ;)
DISINFO TO DISCREDIT WIKILEAKS / ASSANGE (Score:3, Interesting)
The US Gov is undermining CREDIBILITY of Wikileaks, to discourage leakers.
You ARE familiar with the 2008 Army Counterintelligence Agency report, [itbusinessedge.com] which specifically calls to discredit Wikileaks through disinformation and propaganda, are you not?
The HIGHLY suspect connection of Manning with Greenwald STINKS of a PsyOp, [salon.com] then, hot on the heels comes this tidbit. Where from? Oh! DangerRoom on Wired.com.
I think we can now see wired.com as another polluted information channel, co-opted by the spooks. Leak mean
Absurd (Score:2, Insightful)
Manning got caught whistle blowing because he was tooting his own horn.
If you leak shit, stfu about it. While I don't agree with Manning on leaking the cables, the video was a little more understandable. I have also lost a lot of respect for Wired and their coverage of this. They are far too involved and it looks like a serious conflict of interest.
!Surprising (Score:3, Interesting)
They are either afraid of, or in cooperation with the groups whose documents they leak, or are truly out of funds. I am placing my faith of judgement in one of the former.
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When the US want's you dead, you're a terrorist
When a Muslim wants you dead, you're a heretic
When a cop wants you dead he says that "he felt threatened"
Kind of makes you feel like a turkey the week before Thanksgiving!
sigh. and I just got the list, too. (Score:4, Funny)
the list of which bankers, world leaders, and radio hosts are lizard people from other planets.
now you'll never know.
Re:sigh. and I just got the list, too. (Score:5, Funny)
the list of which bankers, world leaders, and radio hosts are lizard people from other planets.
now you'll never know.
Let me make an educated guess - All of them?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Garbage collectors, the real ones, the guys who come around on the truck into which they empty your garbage cans, and do it in whatever the weather is, as long as the truck can get through, are far more important than any of the other categories indicated.
Wikileaks' Response (Score:5, Interesting)
Taken from wikileaks' Twitter at http://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/17498238199 [twitter.com] is this:
"Wired's war on WikiLeaks continues. See comment by 'mpineiro' http://bit.ly/aZm4US [bit.ly]"
Not so quick to judge Wired's coverage at face value...
Re:Wikileaks' Response (Score:5, Informative)
Taken from wikileaks' Twitter at http://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/17498238199 [twitter.com] is this:
"Wired's war on WikiLeaks continues. See comment by 'mpineiro' http://bit.ly/aZm4US [bit.ly]"
Posted by: mpineiro | 07/1/10 | 9:21 am |
ADDITIONAL INFO REQUIRED TO FULLY UNDERSTAND THIS ARTICLE:
Below are some additional bits of information that may change your understanding of why this heavily-editorialized piece is appearing in Wired at this time.
1. The editor of the Threat Level blog at Wired, Kevin Poulsen, has recently been questioned by journalists and privacy activists for his strange role in the recent Wikileaks / Bradley Manning story. A number of questions have been asked of Poulsen in order to clear up any suspicions of impropriety or violation of journalistic ethics by Poulsen but he hasn’t been able to answer those questions, resulting in stronger suspicions and newly-revealed information that strengthens the suspicions further still. This entire matter could be cleared up and resolved except for Poulsen’s on-going non-cooperation.
2. Kevin Poulsen apparently did not like even being *asked* about conflicts of interest (something that all journalists are questioned on all the time as part of the job). To make matters worse, Poulsen is resorting to retaliation, as if this was a BBS war between pre-teens and not an important discussion about law enforcement abuses in the US, abuses committed by occupation soldier abuses in Iraq, a co-ordinated campaign to discredit Wikileaks and the unethical, allegedly illegal manner in which PFC Bradley Manning was interrogated by someone who Poulsen has known and worked with for years and years.
If you look at Poulsen’s Twitter feed (@kpoulsen), it is sparsely updated. It appears that Poulsen only posts on Twitter when he is announcing a new Threat Level blog post or he is openly attacking Wikileaks. It seems safe to say that the “editorial line” over in Poulsen’s corner of Wired is sharply opposed to Wikileaks.
Any journalist should be prepared to respond, without getting emotional or defensive, if legitimate questions about conflict-of-interest or ethics are asked of them. That’s part of the job.
3. In the If-It-Wasn’t-So-Serious-It’d-Be-Funny Department, both Poulsen and known police informant Adrian Lamo are WELL AWARE of the SERIOUS implications of Poulsen being involved with law enforcement in any way. As a result, they both say the exact same thing when anyone asks about the nature of the relationship: “It’s a reporter-source relationship,” they’ll both recite. Lamo, who has much less to lose than Poulsen and possibly has reason to feel resentful that he has to take all the heat for something that benefited both of them, recites that line with a hint of sarcasm. But, maybe I’m reading something in the tone that isn’t actually there. Could be.
4. Poulsen was asked (you might even say “challenged”) by Salon columnist Glenn Greenwald to release the unedited, un-redacted portions of the chat transcripts between Poulsen’s long-time source/friend (Lamo) and PFC Bradley Manning also, releasing the logs would help clear up any perceived impropriety by Poulsen or Wired.
Poulsen refused to do so then and continues to refuse the many requests by Greenwald and others to release the logs. Even worse, the reason Poulsen gave about why he wouldn’t release them was shown to be untrue, as documented by Greenwald. Poulsen has never said ANYTHING MORE AT ALL about THAT maybe under the advice of his attorney?
The logs that Poulsen won’t release would have enormous value in the public domain — they would help individuals & government/law enforcement watchdog groups deal with the increasing erosion of our civil liberties. They also show an unfortunately side effect of California’s
Re:Wikileaks' Response (Score:5, Insightful)
Which doesn't change the facts of the Wired article at all...either submission forms work, or they don't. It's an easy question.
Attacking the source of a factual article is a bit...unseemly.
Re:Wikileaks' Response (Score:5, Insightful)
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Wow. No bias in YOUR view of the situation.
BTW, these days "journalistic ethics" is an oxymoron. In fact, I'd put it right up there with "politically correct".
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I was one of those phone-hack-happy teens who worshiped Kevin Poulsen after reading The Watchman. I was excited to see him reporting on Wired, but over time his comments became very disillusioning.
Heroes are fine and dandy until you grow up and learn that they only exist as long as you don't suspect them of being a human being. Of course, he wasn't so much a hero as a fucking lunatic who exploited everything he came across...
Re:Wikileaks' Response (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess other journalists don't take kindly to people doing their jobs better... WIRED: "They took our jobs!'
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The biggest joke is, Wikileaks doesn't go out there to find news. Wikileaks waits for news to come to it.
You'd think a group of people who were paid to go out and find what was happening in the world would be able to do better....
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
When the video of the US air-strike spread across the globe [...] they were doing exactly what they should: finding and publishing the truth,
So editing and editorializing the promoted version of the video to make very strong untrue implications (the group had no weapons, the air-strike people knew that was they said looked like a RPG was actually a tripod, etc) is "doing exactly what they should"?
Wikileaks is primarily an anti-establishment propaganda group, that has chosen to operate by means of (sometimes misrepresented) leaked information. The public benefit of the leaks is only incidental to their purpose. This can be seen by their very publ
Re:Wikileaks' Response (Score:4, Insightful)
Wikileaks IS an anti-establishment propaganda group. As such they provide a very important counterbalance to all the pro-establishment propaganda we are saturated with on a daily basis. Why is it that no one complains when the US government deliberately omits information (or flat out lies) to win public opinion?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Ya I think people need to separate "factual" and "true". It is perfectly possible to have something where the entire content is composed of facts, there are no lies or made up information, and yet have it not be true. The reason is that you can selectively choose what facts you present, what ones you ignore, and use that to editorialize something that is different than the whole picture. So while their information may be factual, the overall picture is not true.
I saw someone on /. who talked about how Bill
News is not bland fact production (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, they produced an edited video that demonstrated a point of view. Quelle horreur! That's completely unlike the Washington Post, the IHT, the Economist, the NYT... Ahem.
In fact, what is completely unlike them, Wikileaks published the unedited video at the same time. Unlike establishment journalism [techdirt.com], Wikileaks offered source material from which you can form your own opinions.
Given the choice between an organization that offers an opinion and also the unedited information from which they formed that opinion, and one that only offers the opinion while withholding the unedited information, which one do you want to call a "propaganda group"?
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Oh, and Greenwald's article on Manning, Lamo and Poulson is detailed and fantastic:
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/06/18/wikileaks/index.html [salon.com]
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Further Lamo's coverage under the Shield law, even if it worked like you indicate it does, would be of questionable value since he is not a Journalist. He's not even working as a freelance journalist. He's a source w
More spin than a v8 unicycle. (Score:5, Insightful)
Nice job quoting an article with more spin than a v8 unicycle.
For those who actually follow these things thou, it's important to note that Kevin Poulsen (of Wired) is the same Journalist (and I use the term loosely) posting the edited chat excerpts from conversations between whistleblower Bradley Manning and wannabe hacker/cum police informant Adrian Lamo.
So much for an actual story.. moreso just Wired trying any attempt it can to bring down Wikileaks.
(Protip: Reading the comments on the wired story alone give you most of the information publicly available on the Poulsen/Lamo lovefest)
Re: (Score:2)
That's great. Now. Are there any actual inaccuracies in the story? No?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The problem is, they aren't providing raw information,
Except of course thats a lie, the uncut video was released along with the commented one. Not raw enough for you? Complain to the US military, Wikileaks can't release stuff they don't have.
Please change the title (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Witty.
Re:Please change the title (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Are those European or African Walruses? Or the kind that BP advices to watch out for in the Gulf of Mexico?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Will Wikileaks weather wicked waylays while we watch wistfully with wonder? We waste weeks while wretches wreak waste! Wikileaks, worthy watchdog, warrants works! Wisen wayward wits with winning words (when we wake, where we work, while we walk)! Wax wealth, wield weapons, wear white, woo wet whorish women!
Wait, what?!?
It was bound to happen. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
I was in 100% agreement right up until this part:
You really shouldn't just decide that people have no ethics, and will do anything that suits them like that. To meet that definition, they would have to be psychopaths. Perhaps what you meant is that anyone will do anything, if their beliefs tell them it's a good thing to do, and they can muster the resources.
Not true? (Score:5, Informative)
http://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/17461648435 [twitter.com]
And even if Wikileaks was to disappear, there's always Freenet if you want to leak something:
http://freenetproject.org/ [freenetproject.org]
Of course, you'd have to check your own data to make sure there's no metadata that can be used to identify you. But Freenet covers the anonymous distribution angle.
Re: (Score:2)
A Freenet, the project that perhaps did the most amount of damage to Java's reputation with regards to performance.
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But Freenet covers the anonymous distribution angle.
How many nodes or super-nodes would you need to control to compromise Freenet's security? It strikes me that the more pieces you have on the table, the easier it is to solve the jigsaw puzzle.
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Kind of a pain, though, if you're nomadic or don't have a lot of geeky friends.
Disrepair? (Score:2)
Or sabotageeee?
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They didn't renew their SSL certificate. That is disrepair.
what happened to the other wiki? (Score:2)
the one called wikipedia. it's an open collection of interested individuals
(for absurdity, here's the wikipedia article about wikipedia:)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia#Community [wikipedia.org]
and it works
what about wikileaks?
its run like the illuminati:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikileaks#History [wikipedia.org]
and its a wheezing barely functional wreck
of course, editting a wikipedia article does not expose you to the kind of danger that vetting a wikileak does, but obviously, there is a lot of eager flesh out there that would
Not by accident... (Score:4, Informative)
Not by accident that Reporters Sans Frontiers has launched an "anti-censorship shelter" online, consisting of VPN, onion routers and training docs. Sound familiar?
Wikileaks is essentially a pilot project. They have demonstrated the need. The day-to-day work will be picked up by long running groups with funding models and full time staff and a CEO who doesn't go out his way to piss off every anti-secrecy activist who so much as murmur reservations about their comprehensive lack of transparency.
http://en.rsf.org/reporters-without-borders-unveils-25-06-2010,37809.html [rsf.org]
The Reporters Sans Frontiers project is a honeypot (Score:3, Interesting)
Reporters Sans Frontiers/Reporters Without Borders are primarily funded by the US government [zcommunications.org] [zcommunications.org] through the National Endowment for Democracy which was founded during the Reagan administration to channel funds to organizations abroad that would support US foreign policy. Sometimes this funding is direct [ned.org] [ned.org], sometimes it is conducted through the international arms of the US Democratic Party or Republican Party [counterpunch.org] [counterpunch.org].
I'm sure that the US government would much prefer that
Hm? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Wikileaks lost the majority of their credibility in January when they decided to stop actually being a decent site and instead beg for donations for a few months.
Right, anyone that won't work for free is not to be trusted.
Re: (Score:2)
When it comes to social/charitable projects, that's more true than you might expect.
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Insightful)
If your goal is to /really/ spread around leaked documents for the benefit of mankind, you will find a way to do it regardless. Complaining that people aren't giving you enough money and taking down a site is simply babyish. Yes, you aren't going to become a millionaire* by doing it, but if you are /really/ doing it for the benefit of mankind, you will do it for free and find ways to make it work.
*Assuming you don't get a list of future lottery numbers or something
Except that it really does cost money to run a server, pay for bandwidth, pay for lawyers, etc.
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, such things cost a bit of money, but this is the internet, distribute things via torrents and other ways, use other servers, etc.
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Insightful)
PB only upsets entertainers.
WL upsets people with real power. People who can make you disappear. People who are willing to do really bad things (TM) to you.
They could have failed to get the SSL or someone could have made them fail to get the SSL.
I don't care if they ask for money. It's an easy way for those of us without free servers and admin time to help out (and yup I've donated).
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Interesting)
I think citizens will only revolt when it becomes apparent that the message is being stifled, not when the message is "out there." And by stifled, I mean with soldiers (real ones, not police in fancy armor) in the streets shooting people. The general trend in Western societies is to just assume that we're fine, that all is as it should be, and when people complain to say "why don't you go to North Korea or something and then try saying that!". I think the difference between Iran and America isn't that our government is less corrupt, but that our citizens have become more corrupted with crap like American Idol and/or Facebook. Our protests are totally lame and half-hearted. The people who talk the most about revolution have beer guts too large to allow them fit in a fox hole, and age degenerating their eye sight, so they probably can't shoot very well either. Wikileaks is almost irrelevant in the face of cultural apathy. It really almost doesn't even matter if WikiLeaks were flourishing because only the people who are inclined to care would, and there aren't nearly enough of them to cause any major changes.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:4, Insightful)
The most likely cause for a revolution at this time is termination of unemployment benefits for the 10% of the workforce which can't find a job.
Considering the trillions they are throwing away elsewhere, that $100 to $140 billion is pennies on the dollar vs sending the national guard and paying police overtime to maintain order.
There are a lot of graduations below outright revolt. Increase in crime (with resulting increases in policing costs and incarceration costs ($30k a year to house a robber vs $12k to $18k unemployment benefits), protests (increased police costs), riots (increased police and national guard and property damage), vandalism, petty theft, drug abuse, etc.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I think people don't protest because the only people with a legitimate complaint here are the urban kids getting screwed by the drug war. Pretty much anywhere else... what are you complaining about? There are plenty of details to bitch about, to go support a candidate about, to write letters to the editor. But society is still working. We can still get up, do mostly what we want, go home to our families.
It doesn't effect people. For all that we're invading two different countries right now, the monthly casu
Re: (Score:2, Flamebait)
The citizens will revolt when:
1) Cheap food is unavailable AND
2) Cheap psychoactive drugs are unavailable AND
3) Cheap entertainment is unavailable
Not before. The elites who control the money of the world know this very well. Nobody is revolting in Peru or even Haiti. Nobody is going to revolt here either. WikiLeaks is a sideshow for the rubes, much like the conservative republican/liberal democrat smackdown that goes on daily.
Of course, even the wealthy have no answers either to oil depletion, the replay of
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Informative)
Kinda like this: http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Special:Support [wikileaks.org]
?
Yo Grark
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Insightful)
If I were running a company dealing exclusively in secrets, I wouldn't trust anyone who came forward to donate their time toward handling said information to not be a mole.
Regardless, no mater how much time gets donated, they would still need at least some capital.
Re: (Score:2)
All of the Wikileaks stuff makes it sound like they are doing this purely out of the goodness of their hearts, if they really were doing something out of the goodness of their hearts they would do it no matter what the cost really was and find ways o
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Wikileaks lost the majority of their credibility in January when they decided to stop actually being a decent site and instead beg for donations for a few months.
You're right. They should have just shut down in January instead of waiting until now to run out of money. Do you see the problem with your logic here?
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I seriously have to take issue with that. If all of the others are for-profit, you will never get what you want... only what they tell you we want. "Reality TV" is a classic example of them telling us what we want. I haven't watched TV since.
On the other hand, PBS provides intellectual stimulation that is simply not available elsewhere. What is there for kids to watch as they grow up? What did you watch growing up? PBS is indispensable and we need at least one more of them, not less of them. Where ar
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh... Not everyone. I think PBS is a waste of money. It was originally sold to the congress as an alternative to the 3 TV networks. There are now hundreds of alternatives so the tax dollars still being paid to PBS are a legacy to a problem which was fixed long ago.
No, because we need a non-commercial voice on the public airwaves. We've essentially given away our public bandwidth to big corporations. We should maintain at least one commerce-free public station. Corporate interests are not our interests.
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:4, Insightful)
This is why it makes me sad to see PBS sliding into being almost just-another-commercial-outlet. Remember when underwriting acknowledgments at the top of the show were a textual/voiceover mention of the company, and not a whole ad-like video segment? And when no PBS station would be caught dead airing show-length commercials and pretending they're shows [salon.com]?
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And how, exactly, is PBS not neutral?
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And how, exactly, is PBS not neutral?
They're biased in favor of the truth, maybe? And the truth, as we all know, has a well-known liberal bias? : - )
Actually, PBS does lean a little to the Left/Liberal side. But the people who get all bent out of shape about that are really complaining because it isn't heavily Right-Wing/Conservative. They can't understand how a straightforward presentation of the facts doesn't, and won't, and can't, always, and in every case, support the way they see things, so when it doesn't, they're sure it's a Godles
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Oh, and an off-hand jab? This?
Personally, I think conservatives find the very idea of a publicly owned broadcast system communistic and repugnant.
How is that a jab at all? It is not negative. Is it even untrue? Have conservatives embraced communism while I wasn't looking? Is it bad to say they don't like it? Do they not look at PBS that way? Maybe they don't, but stating that I think they do is hardly negative. I bet conservatives don't like terrorists, either. Is that insulting to conservatives?
Seriously, if conservatives find what I just said insulting, that certainly explains why they don't like PBS: because they tak
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Insightful)
The awards list [pbs.org] alone should be enough to counter your argument that there is a comparable alternative.
Tax dollars account for less than %1 of the operating costs of PBS.
There are NO commercial alternatives for truly important investigative reporting such as FRONTLINE, no commercial childens programming comparable to Sesame Street, no commercial news broadcasts that are willing to do more than a sound bite on any topic other than the PBS World Report.
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The awards list [pbs.org] alone should be enough to counter your argument that there is a comparable alternative.
Industry mutual masturbation is not a counter argument, but the rest of your point stands.
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Industry mutual masturbation is not a counter argument, but the rest of your point stands.
Yes, television industry groups hand out television awards. It seems that the International Maple Syrup Institute didn't have the time or inclination to do so. That's a shame, given that their obvious lack of bias would more than make up for their ignorance of the subject matter.
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Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Ha! If anything, PBS is more necessary now than it was before. With all of the big corporate entities buying and merging, your radio, newspaper and television media is increasingly controlled by fewer and fewer people. Or are you one of those people that think that corporations are more benevolent and altruistic than your government? At least in government there's always the threat that a politician will lose his or her job if they displease the people. With a corporate entity, they don't have to appease anyone as long as they make money.
Taxpayer-funded national broadcasters, like ABC (Australia), BBC or CBC can be critical of the government in a way that corporate broadcasters cannot be critical of their parent company.
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Name one of those alternatives where I can get what I get from PBS.
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What about an archive of the site and all those things hosted throughout the world via torrents and the like? Etc..
For some reason I don't like the idea of donating my IP to a swarm full of the stuff that wikileaks has..
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Wikileaks lost the majority of their credibility in January when they decided to stop actually being a decent site and instead beg for donations for a few months.
Since, as we all know, servers and bandwidth are free, particularly for a site that gets shit-hammered with traffic.
Re:Wikileaks.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Freedom is not free. I don't see any problem with wikileaks or wikipedia or any other site asking for donations to pay the bills
.
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Such a request would border on extortion.
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Freedom is not free.
It only costs $1.05, so it shouldn't be that long of a fund raiser.
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The civilians controlling the military are in the federal government and already have access to all this information.
Now, do you see how stupid you really are?