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gobbo writes "The buzz amongst my Muslim acquaintances is that the al-Jazeera site is under "cyber-attack." Shortly after posting photos of mangled Iraqi children the server became unavailable. I don't have satellite TV to see if they are reporting anything on al-Jazeera itself, but pinging their name servers fails too. For those who don't already know, the al-Jazeera channel is a pan-Arabic satellite TV channel out of Qatar." While I am certain many h4x0rs are political, I can't help thinking that script kiddies are like moths to the flame of rising page views. (this was initially posted incorrectly, and has been moved to the proper date)
I think this raises some new interesting questions.
For example, the US military claimed that Iraqi TV, as it was providing information and instruction to Iraqi troops, was a legitimate military command and control target. Would similar online media outlets be similarly classified?
More importantly, would hackers, even script kiddies, be considered combatants if they attack such a military target in a time of war?
I don't think this has any practical implications, just philosophical...
While consulting, I've come across companies doing all sorts of dumb or just lazy things which make their sites slow and not very scalable. Then they get a big burst of unusual activity for whatever reason, their site crashes, and they like to claim conspiracy because it means it's not their fault.
I'll believe this is a DDOS when I see the IRC transcripts from the people claiming to be the perpetrators (if that's not proof, I don't know what is :) Till then, this is Al-Jazeera crying because their site couldn't handle sudden worldwide interest.
I find the apathy on this site towards the possible gagging of a media organization disturbing. On a TV report this week, I learnt a lot about al-Jazzeera. Yes, they are pan-Arabic. Yes, they are critical of the US. They've also been threatened by every single Arab country in the region - closed down, ambassadors recalled, physical attacks. And it was bombed by the US in the first Gulf War when it reported the killing of civilians in a supposedly military target.
You can't have it both ways, even in a war. The Net is being used for some of the most blatant propaganda I've ever seen, but shutting down the Arab side of the argument isn't going avoid bigger problems later.
insecurity asks the wrong question irritation gives the wrong answer
There was an article in the Wall St Journal a few days ago discussing the bias of US reporters. They mentioned that many of the "embedded" journalists use the personal pronoun "we" all the time. They compared that with a clip from a British reporter who was careful enough to detach himself, referring to the soldiers using "they". "They are encountering resistance..." "They are approaching Baghdad..." etc. Its a noticable difference.
The article also mentioned that BBC seems to be doing a better job trying objective than US stations.
Would it be a good idea for Al-jazeera to publish their content on freenet? Their articles would then be immune to any kind of censorship like they claim they are victim of.
Al-Jazeera's pretty interesting. I've been watching it for about 3 years now. My Arabic isn't stellar, but I'm able to keep up with it pretty well.
Before the current war, it was a lot like a cross between CNN, with news & comentary, and Discovery, with documentaries.
It has an interesting history. As I understand it, the prince of Qatar funds it, but leaves it in the hands of the station to do all their own editorial control.
It definitely had an Arab point of view, but to me that makes sense. Looking at it from that point of view, I would almost say that it is fairly balanced. Just as an American would probably find CNN fairly balanced.
They don't hesitate to put Americans on (translated - unless you're former embassador Dennis Ross - he showed up on a debate show and handled it all in BEATUFIUL Arabic!). Rice and Powell have both been on there, but so has Saddam, and Tariq Aziz.
Is there an anti-American slant? Well, even though few Arabs like Saddam and his regime, very few are very keen on the idea of a superpower coming in and taking out an Arab regime. The whole region has an unpleasant history of colonialism and occupation, and for many, this just appears to be another chapter in it. A lot will depend on how we handle the post-Saddam iraq.
Another thing that is interesting... it's not a new thing that they're showing dead bodies and such. For as long as I've watched, they've not had a probelm with showing dead Palestinians or dead Israelis in that conflict. They don't talk over it either - sometimes just several minutes of showing what is going on or what has happened.
So, I've rambled on, not really answering your question, but I don't often get to talk about Al-Jazeera.