Wikileaks - Behind the News
Yesterday’s Wikileaks debate at Docfest was truly fascinating, and featured an absolutely stellar panel - data journalist James Ball, Judith Ehrlich, director of The Most Dangerous Man in America, a documentary about Pentagon Papers leaker Daniel Ellsberg, Frontline Club founder Vaughan Smith and “wikivisionist” @exiledsurfer.
The whole discussion can be heard in the link in my previous post, and my take on WL seemed to be shared by some members of the panel. I’ve always been of the opinion that Wikileaks, as is the case with any political actor, was much more interesting before it became the story. Further, though, yesterday’s discussion leads me to think that it’s not just the quality of the story that has been damaged by the iconization of Julian Assange, but the good that it can do for the world.
The suggestion by @exiledsurfer (iirc) that the channels for whistleblowers to leak to WL have closed, and that no new information has been leaked to WL in 12 months is disappointing. In a way, the whole idea of Wikileaks is unavoidably self defeating. It has to be based upon a cultish dedication to the open information philosophy in order to change how the world thinks about secrecy, but perhaps the practical implementation of a service for whistleblowers requires one too many compromises for Assange.
The conclusion must therefore be that Wikileaks has, in a way, served its purpose. It has shown what is possible, and changed public perception of data, information, privacy and secrecy forever. As James Ball says, “Google wasn’t the first search engine, Windows wasn’t the first operating system.” It now falls to others, perhaps even the mainstream media to appropriate the techniques and ideas of Wikileaks and build on them.
Wikileaks - Behind the News
Yesterday’s Wikileaks debate at Docfest was truly fascinating, and featured an absolutely stellar panel - data journalist James Ball, Judith Ehrlich, director of The Most Dangerous Man in America, a documentary about Pentagon Papers leaker Daniel Ellsberg, Frontline Club founder Vaughan Smith and “wikivisionist” @exiledsurfer.
The whole discussion can be heard in the link in my previous post, and my take on WL seemed to be shared by some members of the panel. I’ve always been of the opinion that Wikileaks, as is the case with any political actor, was much more interesting before it became the story. Further, though, yesterday’s discussion leads me to think that it’s not just the quality of the story that has been damaged by the iconization of Julian Assange, but the good that it can do for the world.
The suggestion by @exiledsurfer (iirc) that the channels for whistleblowers to leak to WL have closed, and that no new information has been leaked to WL in 12 months is disappointing. In a way, the whole idea of Wikileaks is unavoidably self defeating. It has to be based upon a cultish dedication to the open information philosophy in order to change how the world thinks about secrecy, but perhaps the practical implementation of a service for whistleblowers requires one too many compromises for Assange.
The conclusion must therefore be that Wikileaks has, in a way, served its purpose. It has shown what is possible, and changed public perception of data, information, privacy and secrecy forever. As James Ball says, “Google wasn’t the first search engine, Windows wasn’t the first operating system.” It now falls to others, perhaps even the mainstream media to appropriate the techniques and ideas of Wikileaks and build on them.
Posted 11 months ago 3 notes
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