Is Twitter Censoring Wikileaks Trends?

comforteagle writes "There are suspicions coming to the surface this morning that Twitter may be censoring WikiLeaks-related tweets from forming a trending topic. Why is still unclear at this point, as during Iranian protests a short while ago Twitter appeared to be in the fray of helping to spread the word. As of this morning it appears that Twitter may have some explaining to do. One of Twitter's engineers has chimed in over the weekend, but some aren't convinced."

Comments

Friday Was the Hot Day

[eldavojohn]

For Wikileaks trending. You can see here that Wikileaks was hot on Friday, not Sunday. Google Trends (for Google searches, not Tweets) actually heavily corresponds to this. Further more, if you look at Google Trends, you'll note that the recent trending on Friday wasn't even half of what it peaked at during the Afghan war cable release. It might even be less than that edited journalist shooting video. After checking Google trends for Sunday, "wikileaks" wasn't in the top twenty. I'm checking other Twitter harvesting sites for trends and not seeing anything that would indicate that Sunday should have been a huge day for Wikileaks on Twitter.

By no means conclusive evidence one way or the other though.

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Amorymeltzer]

The piece specifically talks about comparisons. All of the other idiotic nonsense that did trend didn't compare in level to #wikileaks. The direct link to one of the vastly more interesting ones, imo:

http://bubbloy.wordpress.com/2010/12/05/twitter-is-censoring-the-discussion-of-wikileaks/

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Suki I]

Good observation. This tempest sounds like a few people, with enough connections to news people, are convinced that the rest of the world *must* be as interested in this topic as they are. With that as their premise, they conclude Twitter is 'cheating.'

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Anonymous Coward]

If you look closely at your link tho, on Sunday #wikileaks, while it may have been less popular than it was on Friday, still recorded a higher percentage of traffic than #sunday did on sunday...

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's just that all you WikiLeaks fanboys refuse to acknowledge the true popularity of #mycatissooocute and #whatihadforbreakfast

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[interkin3tic]

This tempest sounds like a few people, with enough connections to news people, are convinced that the rest of the world *must* be as interested in this topic as they are. With that as their premise, they conclude Twitter is 'cheating.'

Wishful thinking that people would be more interested in international corruption than, say, the european music awards.

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Anonymous Coward]

it's just that twitter very badly needs renaming TWATTER cus it's full o TWATS

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Anonymous Coward]

As opposed to full of TWITS?

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Anonymous Coward]

Good observation. This tempest sounds like a few people, with enough connections to news people, are convinced that the rest of the world *must* be as interested in this topic as they are. With that as their premise, they conclude Twitter is 'cheating.'

I believe the more simplified term to describe the people you are talking about would be "tinfoil-hat conspiracy theorists". "zomg the world doesn't work the way I KNOW it works, and I'm really really really smart, so IT MUST BE CONSPIRACY EVERYONE OUT TO GET WIKILEAKS FIGHT TEH POWER"

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[GooberToo]

And if you bother to read the comments posted to the link you provided, not to mention twitter's own response, you'll easily see the only story here is that people are delusional in falsely believing that twitter is censoring anything. Its a fact which google's statistics as well as the sites which the linked article even validate.

So really the only story here is that people are going out of their way to create a story about the fact there isn't a story to be created. So in short of that, the new story is one of conspiracy which never existed in the first place while trying to hide the fact there never was a story.

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Ihmhi]

I submitted the same story, but included your link as well as the one from Student Activism instead of the submitter's link. (Better to use the source material rather than make the /, posting a summary leading to a summary IMO). (I don't particularly care about getting my name up as the submitter (I've submitted a total of 6 stories ever, only one of which has been approved), but I wish they had used the sources instead.)

I read over everything in the source pages and honestly it's rather difficult to say whether or not the whole thing is being caused by some active effort on Twitter's part. There's the genuine possibility that the algorithm somehow didn't think #wikileaks was a viable candidate for trending. However, my gut feeling tells me that it was an active participation in censorship on Twitter's part; it would be relatively simple for them to predict #wikileaks and put in counter-measures to ensure that it doesn't trend, but it would be more difficult to predict a term that was created relatively quickly like #cablegate.

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[horigath]

The comparisons on the blog are flawed.

The main example is that of "Inception" which the author cries trended for an extended period. However the example is almost totally wrong.

[Inception] managed to trend essentially uninterrupted from August 8 to August 26. During this stretch, the popularity of the phrase generally fell except for a significant spike around August 17th. It seems strange that Twitter’s algorithm would identify something to be trending in the midst of the sustained fall.

However, the data in fact shows Inception Trending almost uninterrupted from July 13 into early August. By August 8th, when he thinks it is constant, it is becoming less and less regular and by the end of his "essentially uninterrupted" period it is trending less than 50% of the time. On August 26th it was only on the list for a half hour!

The author then points out that #wikileaks hasn't trended, giving the figures to show that it hasn't showed up since July and August. Then of course, he mentions that #cablegate has in fact been trending since then, but avoids mentioning the full details. Given that Twitter tries to consolidate similar tags it seems pretty reasonable that #cablegate was just selected either automatically or manually as the "face" of the leaks on twitter. It trended on the days when news was exploding and discussion was increasing, rather than decreasing (although the author doesn't say how long these trends lasted and given his total misreading of the previous figures it's easy to suspect that it actually trended longer). That's how it's meant to work.

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[NanoGeek]

Who needs conclusive evidence when you have a good conspiracy?

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Junior J. Junior III]

How can we tell whether the trending data is accurate? What if the trending was still hot for Sunday in terms of tweets posted, but being suppressed by Twitter in terms of tweets visible?

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Anonymous Coward]

Any conspiracy that depends on greater popularity of largely boring diplomatic cable releases over The Walking Dead, in the US, on Twitter, on a Sunday, is flawed beyond reconciliation.

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[hitmark]

the opposite may also be the case, when news people focus intensely on something that the rest of the world could not care anything about (if not for the intense media coverage).

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Anonymous Coward]

Dem twits is a bunch o' twats.

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[jason.sweet]

So really the only story here is that people are going out of their way to create a story about the fact there isn't a story to be created.

In other words, " It's a mystery wrapped in a riddle inside an enigma!"

Begin GET_OFF_MY_LAWN_MODE:
I can still remember when conspiracy theories were about shit that really mattered.
End GET_OFF_MY_LAWN_MODE

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[StikyPad]

Thinking is hard.

Re:Friday Was the Hot Day

[Anonymous Coward]

Further more, if you look at Google Trends, you'll note that the recent trending on Friday wasn't even half of what it peaked at during the Afghan war cable release

That's not what I'm seeing on the graph. Not by a long shot.

Not the first time

[Sockatume]

I can't recall what it was, but Scienceblogs was atwitter with claims that Twitter was censoring a science/religion/something event that was being discussed. It turns out that (shock) people just weren't talking about it as incredibly frequently as they had been when it started trending.

Re:Not the first time

[horza]

Same thing was leveled at student protests in the UK and Twitter were absolutely adamant they were not interfering or being influenced by any authorities.

Phillip.

Hanlon's razor

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe the type of persons which like to tweet, are short attention spanned twit which are not interested in complex long running news like wiki leaks, but on what DJ hammer took on breakfast. Thus it not appearing in the trends, as the person concerned with it are a minority. I have only anecdotal evidence for it, but I work in IT, with a high percentage of nerd, and all looked at me with big eye when I mentioned wiki leaks last week, and today they just shrugged. The average sheep DO NOT CARE.

Re:Hanlon's razor

[DemonicMember]

I love that look, like wtf are you talking about...I get it all the time where I work. Average Joe and Average Jane don't even know what wikileaks is half the time

Re:Hanlon's razor

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure. Meanwhile, you (yes, you specifically) couldn't name a single bill that passed legislature last week (inside whichever country you're from; or to make it easier, the U.S. Congress). It's refreshing to learn that not everyone shares your interests, nor should they, even in matters you think are important but which actually aren't.

Re:Hanlon's razor

[Anonymous Coward]

"Maybe the type of persons which like to tweet, are short attention spanned twit ..."

The word you're looking for is Twat.

Re:Hanlon's razor

[trollertron3000]

True but what's to care about? Are there any serious revelations in the latest leaks? The Russians are mobsters, the US spies on everyone, China talks out the side of it's neck regarding NK, Arab nations are constantly back stabbing each other in power plays, Saudi Arabia is basically a puppet state for the US intelligence community, etc. It basically just confirms what everyone suspected - that our leaders really do read The Prince.

Re:Hanlon's razor

[cheekyjohnson]

You've got a point. Potential government corruption isn't important at all, especially for that government's citizens. Television shows and shopping are far more important!

Justin Bieber

[SimonTheSoundMan]

Perhaps that so many people are talking about wikileaks, it has stopped trending. Just like what was required for Justin Bieber.

Re:Justin Bieber

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup, trending is apparently based on the growth of a word's usage, not an overall total. So if something is hot, but not growing, it ceases to be classified as trending. A bit odd, but they probably have their reasons behind it. No doubt to stop craptastic celeb' gaming of their system.

Re:Justin Bieber

[GooberToo]

Actually makes perfect sense. If a topic has stopped growing, by definition, its no longer trendy. Furthermore, that likely means its either petered out or reached critical mass. Either way, trending via twitter no longer matters as its a dead topic or everyone already knows to following.

Trendy:

A fad, sometimes called a trend, meme or a craze, is any form of behavior that develops among a large population and is collectively followed with enthusiasm for some period, generally as a result of the behavior's being perceived as novel in some way.

Re:Justin Bieber

[NanoGeek]

Not odd at all. If trending topics was based on number of tweets only, then the tt section would constantly be Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga, cat, etc. By using the current system, it lets topics that are currently growing (trending) get on the list even if they are not the most talked about topics.

Sounds like conspiracy theory

[Anonymous Coward]

So now every time someone gets cold fries in their happy meal, it's going to be part of a big government conspiracy to stop freedom loving nerds from wiki leaking.

Maybe the wikileaks are overhyped and dull, and Justin Bieber really is more interesting to the world population?

Re:Sounds like conspiracy theory

[Anonymous Coward]

"freedom loving nerds"

You say "Freedom loving" like it's a bad thing.

Come on Twitter empoyees, you know where to leak!

[Dr. Spork]

If there is this kind of heavy handed crap going on at companies we are supposed to trust, we all know where to send the evidence. I know that not everyone agrees, but somehow I feel better in the world knowing that Wikileaks is on call, doing its thing.

Maybe no one actually cares anymore

[BitZtream]

It is entirely possible that most people don't give a flying fuck and censorship has nothing to do with it.

When Wikileaks releases something that actually is newsworthy rather than rather than being the worlds drama queen, then people might care, but so far all we have is wikileaks telling us their going to change the world with their NEXT release ... after every dribbling bits of 'leaks' the let slip out.

It also might help if they started to release things that were pretty much verbatim copies of what you can get via a Freedom of Information Act request.

The only people who care about Wikileaks are irrational people who want to rage against the machine and 'change the world'. Hell, even the majority of people that work with wikileaks think Assange is turning it into something of an utterly retarded step child

After you cry wolf several times, people stop giving a shit.

Re:Maybe no one actually cares anymore

[Posting=!Working]

When Wikileaks releases something that actually is newsworthy rather than rather than being the worlds drama queen, then people might care, but so far all we have is wikileaks telling us their going to change the world with their NEXT release

Yeah, there is nothing newsworthy about the kidnappings, torture, deaths, coverups and treaty violations found in the latest release. No one cares about those things, they're just being drama queens.

Links to the things mentioned above can be found on this post:

http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1896026&cid=34443616

Re:Maybe no one actually cares anymore

[cheekyboy]

If its so , blehhh.... then why are major leaders and govt people so upset and angry!?
Maybe if americans got of their ass, and looked at NONE usa websites, like UK ones they might learn something apart from
the lies that DoD corporates dish out (aka GE/NBC & friends)

Re:Maybe no one actually cares anymore

[Anonymous Coward]

The cable leaks have almost no worthy information. They don't show cover-ups, torture or anything else we didn't already know about. It's the equivalent on getting caught passing a note at primary school.

The Yanks have little to worry about.

Re:Maybe no one actually cares anymore

[Anonymous Coward]

This sentence no verb.

A group of dictionary-writers were arguing about what to put into the next dictionary. With the recent creation of new verbs, by celebrities, like the verb "refudiate", the linguists were in a deep dilemma. Do they recognize made-up words? Do they banish such words from the dictionary, which is supposed to represent proper English? So they broke into groups to come up with recommendations.

After lunch, a spokesman from each group stood up, and made a recommendation. Here's what happened next:

First Spokesman: "Our group recommends that we sentence such verbs to a 5-year banishment from the official publication."
Second Spokesman: "And our group sentences no new verbs to banishment."
Question from the audience: "Which recommends no sentencing?"
Second Spokesman, pointing to his group: "This sentence no verb."

sentence: –verb (used with object) to pronounce sentence upon; condemn to punishment.

Re:Maybe no one actually cares anymore

[Johann Lau]

It is entirely possible that most people don't give a flying fuck and censorship has nothing to do with it.

Fair enough, and likely true in this case. However:

After you cry wolf several times, people stop giving a shit.

Is this really what's happening? I'm more under the impression all the jaded bootlickers were suspiciously silent in the last weeks -- now there is ONE allegiation which turns out to be not true, and BAM! they all come back out of the woods, making their shitty little speeches like yours.

The only people who care about Wikileaks are irrational people who want to rage against the machine and 'change the world'.

I see what you did there. What is so funny about changing the world that you have to put it in quotes? The only people being 100% cynical about this are bootlickers, and no amount of monkey dance can change that.

Re:Maybe no one actually cares anymore

[Posting=!Working]

If you're being pedantic about it, that would need to be "This sentences no verb."

What are you trying to prove, anyway? That my signature makes sense?

Re:Maybe no one actually cares anymore

[BobMcD]

The cable leaks have almost no worthy information. They don't show cover-ups, torture or anything else we didn't already know about. It's the equivalent on getting caught passing a note at primary school.

The Yanks have little to worry about.

If nothing else they prove that everyone knew about these goings-on, and that it wasn't just the local evil men in the field. They clearly illustrate systematic corruption at the highest levels.

You can opine that even this is not new, but that's just your cynicism talking. Joe Public does not believe that Obama is guilty of high crimes. The cables illustrate that conspiracy charges, at a minimum, would in fact stick in a fair court of law.

Re:Maybe no one actually cares anymore

[Urza9814]

They show that the highest levels of our government (Secretary of State) were actively aware and involved in knowingly kidnapping, toturing, and otherwise abusing a man they _knew_ to be innocent. That is not newsworthy? That is something we didn't already know about. I mean, we knew it happened, but we didn't know how far up it went.

Do you really have to ask "why?"

[MikeRT]

Twitter, like Google, has been close to Obama. Wikileaks is making the Obama Administration (especially Hillary Clinton) look really bad both through the release of what was in those cables and their inability to "deal with" Wikileaks.

This is only slightly less retarded than asking why the mainstream media tends to run interference for Democrats, spinning everything they do in a positive light even if it's something that would have a Republican hanging from a cross on capitol hill.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Amorymeltzer]

inability to "deal with" Wikileaks.

Or maybe they recognize that the whole thing, while major, is being overblown while there are other, vastly more pressing issues with a major branch of government to deal with (I won't say which one, but it begins with an L and makes sausage factories look bad).

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Anonymous Coward]

Mainstream media is really nice to Dems now b/c they're in power, just like they were so nice to Bush, and especially to Palin, avoiding any nasty unwanted questions about civilian deaths or torture or breaking the Geneva convention or lying about -- well, everything....

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[GooberToo]

Posts like yours are somewhat frustrating because it fuels other paranoid people into believing that conspiracy is everywhere, when in fact, its nothing but self delusion fueled by others of a like-minded delusion. Much like moon landing conspiracies, there is absolutely no reason to give them anything other than a cursory glance.

You're suggesting that Google and Twitter are part of a massive conspiracy to hide a leak of material which largely, everyone who reads, already knows. Obviously, there are some exceptions, but those exceptions largely only serve to fill in detail and cause governmental chaos. Furthermore, you are suggesting that twitter is purposely censoring while Google is not only censoring but reformulating statistical modules to not only up hold the conspiracy, but but to ensure the results match that of twitter.

Which is more likely? People are just not that interested in reading about fairly well known information, which they are already not interested in reading day to day? Or that there is some massive conspiracy involving all of the world's governments and companies, both large and small?

Exactly. If these feelings persist in other facets of your life, medication might be worth reviewing with your doctors.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[rchh]

Twitter, like Google, has been close to Obama. [Citation Needed] Please refrain from saying something like this without actually backing it up.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Attila Dimedici]

just like they were so nice to Bush,

You know I have trouble telling if you are being sarcastic, or if you truly believe that, but you appear to actualy believe that the mainstream press was nice to Bush. The press continuously played up every accusation against Bush. The mainstream press was talking about how bad the economy was when unemployment was 4.8%. Now that unemployment is 9.8%, they are constantly talking about how the economy is doing wonderful, it's just those "unexpectedly" high unemployment numbers that we need to worry about.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Blakey Rat]

Twitter, like Google, has been close to Obama.

Are you... joking? I honestly can't tell.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Tharsman]

Let me guess... Tin hat for Christmas?

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Anonymous Coward]

What a crock of shit!

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[interkin3tic]

I'm amazed you found virgin ground between the old line of "The media has a liberal bias (because we've always said they have a liberal bias)" and "Reality has a well known liberal bias."

Sorry to spoil your fun, but I'm going to say that in fact, twitter has a well known conservative bias. For example, whose tweets are the only tweets that the media actually pays attention to? Sarah Palin.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Rutefoot]

Conspiracy theories in my mind always come down to two basic questions: How many people would would need to be in the know in order to pull off such a large scale deception? And how much do you trust those people to stay silent about the conspiracy?

Let's put it this way: Top secret documents accessible by people with reasonably high security clearance are now making their rounds around the web and news media. Do you really think nobody is going to think twice about involving potentially thousands of employees in covering up secrets when clearly it can't work for some of the most classified documents in the world?

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Monkeedude1212]

Thats what they want you to think...

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, you must not be talking about the press in the USA, because they were sucking Bush cock during both his terms.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[nomadic]

Twitter, like Google, has been close to Obama. Wikileaks is making the Obama Administration (especially Hillary Clinton) look really bad both through the release of what was in those cables

Actually the Clinton state department comes off pretty well in those cables; professional, perceptive, and hard-working.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[commandermonkey]

This is only slightly less retarded than asking why the mainstream media tends to run interference for Democrats, spinning everything they do in a positive light even if it's something that would have a Republican hanging from a cross on capitol hill.

Yeah and I bet your post will be modded down because everyone here is a commie librul! Wake up LAMESTREAM media. Do you think Clinton would have been censured or Spitzer forced to resign if they were not Republicans? How about all those Democrats like Sanford, Ensign and Vitter who were given a pass on their sex scandal and remained in office?

Don't even get me started on the last Democratic administration in the White House! Between the illegal wiretaps on US Citizens, the erosion of civil liberties, starting two wars where hundreds of thousand innocent civilians died, a treasury secretary and democratic appointed fed chair Bernanke telling BoA to lie on their SEC filings to cover financial issues did the LAMESTREAM media cover any of this in detail? No, they just glossed over it and used their media empire controlled by the nefarious liberal Rupert Murdoch to change the public discourse on seriously illegal stuff. The democratic VP at the time, Dick Cheney, even leaked classified documents containing the name of a current undercover operative to the press and then lied to congress! A republican Bill Clinton was censured for lying about a BJ but a leak of classified information that put a undercover operative at risk(more people than the pentagon says has been hurt by the wikileaks information) and nothing happens to them! The Democratic president at the time, George Bush, is even going bragging that he committed war crimes without any calls from the press that action be taken against him. You can be if it were a Republican in charge then they would have been impeached if not sent to the Hague.

You even have the librul media repeating false claim by democrats that giving money to really, really rich people who won't spend it is better for the economy than giving it to poor people who will immediately spend every penny(because, well, poor and things like food, rent and heating costs money that they do not have to spend.) I bet if it was republicans making those claims they would be laughed at by every media organization.

And don't get me started on the Bircher's/Tea Party advocates in the democratic party and their queen Sarah. You can bet if they were a fringe of the Republicans and not Democrats they would be scorned as unserous and a little dumb rather than celebrated by the libruls at Fox News.

The media is totally biased against Republicans!!!!!


P.S. You’re an idiot.


P.P.S. The problem isn’t Republican vs Democrat for media interference, the problem is those in power vs the rest of us. Favorable stories give the reporters access and “credibility” with the people they cover. Write a bad story and you can be black balled and see major obstacles for your career. What seems to make it worse is that it doesn’t matter who is in power the media will uncritically report whatever they are told and rather than fact check you get an equally biased and BS sound bite from the “other” side to give the appearance of balance. Republicans win, Democrats win and we the Citizens get screwed.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[GooberToo]

Large scale conspiracies and secrets can be held for fairly lengthy durations. Decades even, when the information is worth keeping secret. Look at projects like the F-117. Likewise, there are some aviation projects which have been ongoing for decades and all we know is, to paraphrase, by even today's standards, they seem pure science fiction.

Conspiracies happen all the time. But, contrary to common misconception, they need not be nefarious. Some times they are a birthday party. Other times, they save lives and no one ever knows; or at least not for many decades.

But, as you rightly point out, there are costs associated with conspiracies. IMOHO, you left out one variable. What is the benefit of a conspiracy in comparison to maintaining it. By that measure alone, the conspiracy cries here are just dumb. Spending political capital on issues which largely don't matter to the public would be as dumb as believing there is a conspiracy here.

Who knows, there may be a conspiracy at work here. But at the end of the day, there is absolutely zero reason to believe there is a conspiracy which means, for now, we're operating in the realm of the truly paranoid.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[PeeAitchPee]

Not sure about Twitter but Google's ties to the Obama administration are well documented:

http://biggovernment.com/capitolconfidential/2010/11/11/mr-issa-take-note-of-google-and-obama-coziness/

and

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/07/23/googleburton/

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[BobMcD]

Uh, you must not be talking about the press in the USA, because they were sucking Bush cock during both his terms.

Since you're rebutting something that you well know contradicts what you're putting forward - please do feel free to toss in a link or two.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[HeckRuler]

Well that largely depended on where you got your news from.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[m50d]

Because the sole measure of how well an economy is doing is unemployment, right?

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[_xeno_]

Because the sole measure of how well an economy is doing is unemployment, right?

I don't know about you, but I'm doing far worse now than I was under Bush, and I'm still employed. So, yeah, I'd say that from my point of view, the economy is far worse now than it was before.

Of course, I live in Massachusetts, which completely fucked up their health care system, so part of the increase in costs is due to that. Luckily for the rest of you, the problems that Massachusetts created for itself (more people getting care from the emergency room than ever before, fewer medical services being offered, fewer doctors, and on) are local to the state, and aren't a huge mistake that the federal government is duplicating across the nation.

...Oh, wait.

I should probably post AC since I have, in the past, supported the health care program, but recent facts of how it went in Massachusetts show it to be a complete disaster. And that's a link to an NPR story, so this isn't just random conservative talking points, it really has been a complete disaster, which the entire nation gets to share in now. Yay change.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Rutefoot]

I'd also like to add: 3) What are the consequences of being caught vs the consequences in letting the event happen? 3.5) Are the odds in your favour enough to take the chance given the answer to the above?

In this case, the information is out there. Most of the damage is already done. How much damage is would even be avoided by removing it from trending topics?

Now think about how much damage it would cause to get caught asking/forcing major companies like Google and Twitter to help "reduce" the damage. I'm not only talking about the damage to the government. I'm also talking about the damage to Google and Twitter and other involved sites.

Not to mention, for a government who would go to lengths to force/ask Google and Twitter to remove trending topics, they've done a pretty awful job at reducing the damage in other mediums.

Re:Do you really have to ask "why?"

[Attila Dimedici]

I'm sorry, I didn't take the time to list all of the economic indicators that were positive for most of George W. Bush's eight years and have been negative and getting worse in the two years Obama has been in office.
Actually, unemployment is a very good proxy for most economic indicators, especially when you have large swings in unemployment. Additionally, while occasionally there have been times where unemployment was low but the economy was otherwise weak, they are always short and I don't ever recall a time when unemployment was high while the economy was otherwise strong (except when the economy was just starting to recover and even then unemployment wasn't this high). When unemployment is high with no expectation of significant improvement, the economy is in very bad shape. Currently, the Administration is saying that unemployment is likely to stay at over 9% for the foreseeable future.

The obvious solution...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Obviously, everybody should just obsessively tweet #heilwhale until the problem resolves itself.

Extra credit will, naturally, be awarded for terrifying photochops of the failwhale with Chertoff's skull-like face...

God dammit

[Dunbal]

This is all so fucked up, we should all go back to basic internet principles. The internet should not be used for anything other than porn.

Re:God dammit

[Anonymous Coward]

This is all so fucked up, we should all go back to basic internet principles. The internet should not be used for anything other than porn.

I second this

Re:God dammit

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course that's the rulers dream, feeding ignorance and blind nationalism/patriatism, keeping the people distracted and entertained with basic matters and useless gossip from some useless public figures. Im not interested in kardashians, britneys *insert random "popular" figure here* sex tape or related.

I do not want an internet just for that. It didn't do any good for the television networks, one of many reasons why people turned away from it towards the internet, and acts and treaties keep being negotiated behind closed secrecy away from the public knowledge in order to persuit and protect the interests of the powers that rule. Or should i say, enslave by advanced means, where your given enough to barely survive and kept away from becoming a possible nuisance or threat.

Re:God dammit

[Tharsman]

Wait, it isn't?

Re:God dammit

[Dunbal]

I agree that television and facebook are the modern "circus", but perhaps it's because of my age: at some point you just realize it will never stop. Even if the "glorious revolution" were to happen, it all turns to shit again within a couple generations and sometimes sooner.

Re:God dammit

[Anonymous Coward]

and games

Re:God dammit

[Anonymous Coward]

Not if they gave the government less power than they have now. That would stop at least some of this blatant corruption.

More links to details

[teamhasnoi]

According to one of the commenters, this may be a result of adjusting the algorithms to git rid of endless "Bieber" related trends.

At what price Bieber Freedom?

If a forest of trees fall, but no one can report it, did it really happen?

Re:More links to details

[IBBoard]

And did it fall on Bieber? Please say it did. ...

Actually, it'd need to be a huge tree to take out all of his fans as well, so that we didn't end up with a "oh noes, teh Bieber is dead" flood instead!

Re:More links to details

[Monkeedude1212]

If a forest of trees fall, but no one can report it, did it really happen?

That's a silly question, of course it did.

Re:More links to details

[KingAlanI]

I knew that counteracting the Beliebers' spamming was the cause for the revision of the trending topics system, but interesting to see complaining about the TT system coming from someone besides aggrieved popstar fans.
Yeah, it's somewhat of an annoying black box at any rate.

I'm amazed

[oldspewey]

I am amazed at how many fronts have been opened against wikileaks in the past few weeks. Clearly, there are people who want it crushed, but I can't recall ever seeing the number and variety of attacks against another "thorn in the side" as we're seeing against wikileaks.

The takeaway lesson: those who try to learn the truth and spread the truth will be destroyed.

Re:I'm amazed

[Blakey Rat]

God people on Slashdot are paranoid.

Or maybe... just maybe... not enough people are tweeting about it? Did that extremely simple, common-sense, explanation ever occur to you?

Re:I'm amazed

[oldspewey]

Twitter aside, I think my basic point remains

Re:I'm amazed

[_Sprocket_]

Twitter aside, I think my basic point remains

And how many of these other fronts are also paranoid over-reactions? You're invoking numbers here. You can't fall back on the point when the numbers are shown to be in question (granted, the numbers are implied but not stated - which is the kind of emotional slight-of-hand that gets us in to these messes to begin with).

Re:I'm amazed

[Anonymous Coward]

Please read the article. The statistics indicate there are way more people tweeting about wikileaks than are tweeting about the currently trending topics. It's about 3 times more popular than the top trends.

Did such an extremely simple, common-sense action as reading the article or checking ever occur to you? Fail.

Re:I'm amazed

[BobMcD]

God people on Slashdot are paranoid.

Or maybe... just maybe... not enough people are tweeting about it? Did that extremely simple, common-sense, explanation ever occur to you?

And yet here you are, in this comment, calling people names. If your position is the more reasonable one, why the passion in your response? Besides, it isn't as if twitter would be the only thing Wikileaks has had to worry about over the last year or so. Or, what, if trends start to appear then Assange would be free to travel to the US again?

Please just note how by dismissing a single element of what some perceive to be an alarming trend you have DISMISSED THE ENTIRE SITUATION as paranoia.

To me, it seems 'the sir dost protest too much'. Dissonance, most likely.

Re:I'm amazed

[Blakey Rat]

Please read the article. The statistics indicate there are way more people tweeting about wikileaks than are tweeting about the currently trending topics. It's about 3 times more popular than the top trends.

And yet I have no idea how the "trending topics" are determined, nor does the article writer seem to know. Considering the change they made to it a little while ago, I wouldn't be surprised if "total amount of traffic" isn't a big factor at all, since the entire point of the change was to de-list topics that *always* had a high amount of traffic.

Re:I'm amazed

[Anonymous Coward]

http://studentactivism.net/2010/12/05/wikileaks-twitter-3/ It's being tweeted about.

Just censored.

Re:I'm amazed

[Blakey Rat]

And yet here you are, in this comment, calling people names.

I didn't call anybody names. But I will now: BobMcD is a moron who can't read plain English.

If your position is the more reasonable one, why the passion in your response?

Because I'm sick of having to read paranoid rantings modded-up in every single goddamned story. The majority of the people here can't be paranoid nutbags, right? Then why are they getting modded-up? (OMG, I just made a paranoid conspiracy theory!!! They're out to get me!)

Besides, it isn't as if twitter would be the only thing Wikileaks has had to worry about over the last year or so. Or, what, if trends start to appear then Assange would be free to travel to the US again?

What? I have no idea what point you're trying to make...

Please just note how by dismissing a single element of what some perceive to be an alarming trend you have DISMISSED THE ENTIRE SITUATION as paranoia.

By "single element" do you mean Wikileaks not showing up on Twitter's Trending Topics list? The thing this topic is about? Am I reading this right? You're actually chiding me for being on-topic?

Re:I'm amazed

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you tried visiting WikiLeaks recently? The main .org site has been down for the past couple of days as the results of DDoS attacks. It may be the result of this clown http://twitter.com/th3j35t3r/, but I've been seeing mirrors picked off for one reason or another all weekend.

Re:I'm amazed

[BobMcD]

Because I'm sick of having to read paranoid rantings modded-up in every single goddamned story.

So don't click on them. It isn't exactly hard. I personally avoid tons of articles on this site. There was one below here that was entitled something like 'I need a developer' and I was fairly certain it would be a self-referring 'OMG PHBs are so lulz' waste of time. There's no shame in having taste preferences.

So when you encounter an article entitled, 'Is Twitter Censoring Wikileaks Trends?', what, pray-tell did you expect to find within it, exactly?

Who made you the slashdot comment police?

By "single element" do you mean Wikileaks not showing up on Twitter's Trending Topics list? The thing this topic is about? Am I reading this right? You're actually chiding me for being on-topic?

For someone who cannot demonstrate better reading comprehension than this particular moron, you sure are bad at filtering what you post. Think about it - you just displayed a poorer level of comprehension than me, who you have labeled as a complete simpleton. That can't be good. But, acting under the assumption that you were just rushed, I'll spell it out slowly for you...

A) You're dismissing the topic out of hand

B) You're doing so in rebuttal to a comment about 'how many fronts have been opened'

C) You're using this rebuttal as a means of measuring that 'people on Slashdot are paranoid'

Therefore your position can be summed up, in it's complete context, as:

Because Twitter isn't attacking Wikileaks, anyone (on slashdot) who believes that Wikileaks is under attack is paranoid.

That is broken, logically speaking.

Have a nice day!

Re:I'm amazed

[Blakey Rat]

So when you encounter an article entitled, 'Is Twitter Censoring Wikileaks Trends?', what, pray-tell did you expect to find within it, exactly?

The usual Slashdot pattern is:
1) "Editor" posts ridiculously biased, or flat-out wrong, article
2) First few comments correct article

But when they post conspiracy theories, we get:
1) "Editor" posts ridiculous paranoid conspiracy theory pretending to be a legitimate article
2) First few comments trip over themselves not only justifying the conspiracy theory, but trying to expand it in new off-topic directions

So I guess, while you're generally correct, my only mistake is thinking that Slashdot comments would correct ridiculous conspiracy theories the same way they correct biased/wrong articles.

Therefore your position can be summed up, in it's complete context, as:

Because Twitter isn't attacking Wikileaks, anyone (on slashdot) who believes that Wikileaks is under attack is paranoid.

First of all, nobody (well, except you) is making the claim that Twitter is "attacking" Wikileaks-- where did that ridiculous little nugget of nonsense come from?

Secondly, my message is more along the lines of: "Because Twitter isn't censoring Wikileaks, people who believe Twitter is censoring Wikileaks are paranoid." That seems like pretty solid reasoning to me.

Whatever people think about *other* activities that may or may not be occurring against Wikileaks is off-topic, and therefore I'm not addressing those.

Re:I'm amazed

[BobMcD]

Secondly, my message is more along the lines of: "Because Twitter isn't censoring Wikileaks, people who believe Twitter is censoring Wikileaks are paranoid." That seems like pretty solid reasoning to me.

I accept this phrasing of your message, and take the identical exception to it. In order to ascertain that Wikileaks was not under fire one would need to consider more than a single datapoint. I've got nothing against you repudiating this one point on whatever grounds, but I do draw the line at you knocking them all out in one fell swoop. That's not intellectually honest.

Whatever people think about *other* activities that may or may not be occurring against Wikileaks is off-topic, and therefore I'm not addressing those.

Re-read the post you replied to, and try that again. You could have asserted your opinion at any level within this thread, but you elected to do so here - underneath this assertion:

I am amazed at how many fronts have been opened against wikileaks in the past few weeks. Clearly, there are people who want it crushed, but I can't recall ever seeing the number and variety of attacks against another "thorn in the side" as we're seeing against wikileaks.

The takeaway lesson: those who try to learn the truth and spread the truth will be destroyed.

To reply to something or someone else under this specific reply button is incorrect.

Re:I'm amazed

[makomk]

Errrm... probably about an order of magnitude more people than some of the other topics that make the top trends on Twitter, by the looks of it.

Re:I'm amazed

[hajus]

It doesn't seem to be the absolute number of tweets, but rather the increase div size.

    dt/t where t is the # of tweets.

That's just from the hints dropped from the above posts and links though, so I'm not sure how accurate that is.

Re:I'm amazed

[tingentleman]

I just made a YouTube video comparing a trending topic as at 11am 7th Dec with #wikileaks : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smLnQnA6AKc If you don't BELIEVE ME grab a Twitter client and try this same experiment for yourself...

Not censoring, just not helping.

[Anonymous Coward]

So let us see how this appears to be working out

The American government is looking very poor to the rest of the world as comments which should never have been made public are out in the open.

The American government can make it very difficult for companies, not say cutting off accounts etc, but reducing their lobying power, not providing the same level of overseas visas etc, perhaps even asking for other investigations (something tax related) which will come to nothing but none of them want the light shined in that direction.

So, apart from a few 'headlines' the urge to ask content aggregators to 'not help' certain topics has been happening. In almost all cases of 'trends' it generally needs a helping hand, just as print newspapers, listing in top 5/10 'most viewed'.

This is not a conspiracy, but plain and simple politics.

Anon

Latest Wikileak

[digitaldc]

I think they were being censored, but it is hard to tell for certain.

Anyway, the latest Wikileak states that there is going to be a huge scandal and uproar about the ne

No they aren't

[JamesP]

Blame Justin Bieber

What happened was... all the JB fans were skewing the trending topics by tweeting about him all the time.

So twitter changed TTs from being a measure of amount to a measure of growth (or derivative)

And I think wikileaks grew slower, hence no TTs.

Re:No they aren't

[Anonymous Coward]

And as people are aware, I'm a huge fan of JB

Re:No they aren't

[aonic]

Looks like Justin Bieber wins against Wikileaks:

http://www.tomscott.com/stupidfight/#wikileaks-vs-justinbieber

Re:No they aren't

[BobMcD]

So your position, if I'm summarizing correctly is:

Twitter isn't censoring Wikileaks because Twitter is actually just censoring Bieber?

To me this is still censorship, but perhaps only accidental in the former case.

Re:No they aren't

[JamesP]

No, my point is:

Twitter trending topics calculation is not influenced by volume of tweets, but by tweet growth rate.

Hence Wikileaks tweets does not have what it takes to become a TT (that is, high growth rate)

Why is everything a conspiracy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is it that for some, every time something negative happens for Wikileaks, there must be a conspiracy that is behind it.
1. When the first accusations were leverage against Assange for rape; many were screaming that the CIA was behind it.
2. When Amazon stop hosting Wikileaks, the government MUST HAVE been behind it.
3. When Paypal froze Wikileak's account, more government pressure.
And now this. Could it have occurred to those people that the US government isn't behind every one of those things?

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[nomadic]

"And now this. Could it have occurred to those people that the US government isn't behind every one of those things?"

Nope; this is slashdot. Very little critical thinking, but a lot of fanaticism. Many of the people here can't get their tinfoil wrapped heads around the concept of Occam's Razor.

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, a US government official (a Senator I believe) and a Canadian government official has called for the murder of the chief editor of Wikileaks.

That is a fact, published in well known publications.

That is not a conspiracy theory.

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[Nidi62]

Exactly. The government is competent enough to arrange false charges against Assange in Sweden to discredit him, gets companies to drop hosting or other support of Wikileaks, and may even have people out there looking for Assange to kidnap him rendition-style. And yet it's not competent enough to keeps these leaks from coming out in the first place. All the hallmarks of a conspiracy theory.

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you think a U.S. Senator making a death threat is either unusual or among the worst things that have been said, then you haven't been paying attention to politics for very long. Many of the members in our congress would be diagnosed insane by a shrink provided his identity had been unknown.

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[Magada]

You don't need to be competent to try and bully people. Quite the opposite, in fact. By contrast, keeping secret things secret (and deciding in a cogent manner what should be secret) does require competence.

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[Headw1nd]

Why is it that for some, every time something negative happens for Wikileaks, there must be a conspiracy that is behind it. 1. When the first accusations were leverage against Assange for rape; many were screaming that the CIA was behind it. 2. When Amazon stop hosting Wikileaks, the government MUST HAVE been behind it. 3. When Paypal froze Wikileak's account, more government pressure. And now this. Could it have occurred to those people that the US government isn't behind every one of those things?

I know, right? Next week when Assange dies in a car crash, they'll probably blame that on a conspiracy too.

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[VShael]

That's ironic.
1) There's good evidence the CIA *are* behind it.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article27005.htm

2) Elected officials (Joe Liberman) took credit for it
http://techcrunch.com/2010/12/01/amazon/
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/12/how_lieberman_got_amazon_to_drop_wikileaks.php

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[stdarg]

Why is it that for some, every time something negative happens for Wikileaks, there must be a conspiracy that is behind it.

Because this is the kind of thing that is highly embarrassing for the government but they can't openly do anything about it due to the Constitution. Their only options are 1) do nothing or 2) do things secretly.

Since odd things are happening to Wikileaks, it's hard to believe that they are doing nothing. So they are doing secret things to harm Wikileaks.

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is it that for some, every time something negative happens for Wikileaks, there must be a conspiracy that is behind it.
1. When the first accusations were leverage against Assange for rape; many were screaming that the CIA was behind it.
2. When Amazon stop hosting Wikileaks, the government MUST HAVE been behind it.
3. When Paypal froze Wikileak's account, more government pressure.
And now this. Could it have occurred to those people that the US government isn't behind every one of those things?

I know, right? Next week when Assange dies in a car crash, they'll probably blame that on a conspiracy too.

Here's the scary/hilarious part: If Assange decided to commit suicide next week, they'd all blame that on a conspiracy, too, and start hallucinating^W "discovering" ways they "know" it was all a government setup.

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[BobMcD]

Surely such a claim, that the government would exert such power over privately-owned corporations would require at least one example, right?

Because it isn't as if they can just haul the most powerful communications companies in the world in to their offices and start making demands, right?

SURELY we'd know about that sort of abuse? RIGHT?

We're being reasonable here. Thoughtful, critical-thinking types who don't just blindly repeat things...

Re:Why is everything a conspiracy?

[Synonymous Homonym]

Apart from the fact that Twitter isn't censoring, but the topic simply not trending,
the US government being behind what PayPal and Amazon did is in fact the simplest explanation,
especially considering that the US government is known to censor internet domain names,
including but not limited to WikiLeaks.org.

Knowing about some of what the CIA did in Europe, it being involved would at least explain the strange behaviour of the Swedish courts.

The chance that all of those things including the freezing of his assets in Switzerland coinciding coincidentally is rather small,
especially given that the next reveal had been announced just shortly before this string of strange occurrences began to be about "a big American bank", no doubt one that only recently had received large amounts of money from the government.

Occams Razor.

In the land of the free

[unity100]

..... ehh never mind. forget it.

Wikileaks supporters, beware of the vigilantes.

[elucido]

What is a target of opportunity?

The website describes it:

"This website is devoted to fighting Terrorism and forced integration of Marxist oriented ideals and values into the American mainstream.

http://www.targetofopportunity.com/

It's about to get really dirty.
http://www.nowpublic.com/world/gestapo-usa-govt-funded-vigilante-network-terrorizes-america

Re:Wikileaks supporters, beware of the vigilantes.

[myowntrueself]

Which 'way of life' is "*THE* American" one?

The top 2% of the American population that control 90% of the wealth?

Or the bottom 50% who have zero assets?

This whole thing is hilarious.

Its almost as if one can see a prequel of Snowcrash playing out in real life!

Franchise America will be here soon :) Cognitive dissonance can, in others, be highly entertaining.

Re:Wikileaks supporters, beware of the vigilantes.

[Fnkmaster]

Wow, that is some batshit crazy stuff you just posted. I know there are some bad people in government, but only a true paranoid schizophrenic thinks that there are roving bands of citizens devoted to "swarming" them as a method of government-sponsored harassment using GPS tracking of their cellphones, all with the nefarious goal of convincing the rest of us that said target is crazy.

Maybe the occam's razor answer is right here - that they *are* crazy, and they mis-perceive normal people going about their lives, walking down the street and so on as "swarming" them in part of a campaign of government harassment.

Sure, the government tracks people and FBI monitors potential domestic terrorist threats and internet crazies they think might become threats, but that doesn't mean this guy isn't paranoid and delusional.

Re:Wikileaks supporters, beware of the vigilantes.

[Anonymous Coward]

That website may be crazy, but one thing is for damn sure, and that's that communism is not the "American way." If anybody in the USA wants to be communist, they should go found a country based on those ideals. This one was not.

This refers to some of the quotes on that site, of people that explicitly have expressed support for communism.

Paranoid Schizophrenia is common.

[elucido]

And the government does what it can to encourage it.

Screw Twitter.

[__aavqan3009]

If you look to Twitter for your moral guidance you`re a twit anyway. Grow up.

Freedom costs

[elucido]

If you can't afford it you wont have it. Julian Assange is not promoting freedom, the response from the government to this cyber911 will be to crack down on all of our freedoms. Julian Assange is ruining it for us all.

Re:Freedom costs

[Anonymous Coward]

There's always an excuse for censorship. When Cuba jails a dissident, don't you think they have an excuse that rhymes with "National Security"? They call them anti-revolutionaries over there -- the equivalent of anti-american.

The US doesn't have any moral ground to criticize censorship in other countries from now on, and I really don't want to hear any of it again.

CNN: US officials deny harming wikileaks

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/12/03/wikileaks.takedown/index.html

Re:CNN: US officials deny harming wikileaks

[MRe_nl]

Washington (CNN) -- U.S. officials at the Pentagon and State Department denied Friday knowing of any efforts to take down the WikiLeaks website or asking companies to do so, and added "Please don't ask me that question again", whilst furtively looking over their shoulders.

how he leaks it

[Max_W]

39-year-old Australian supplied the Metropolitan Police with contact details upon arriving in the UK in October. Police sources confirmed that they have a telephone number for Mr Assange and are fully aware of where he is staying.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wikileaks-chief-what-will-he-do-next-2148813.html

I do not understand how he can leak information if the authorities know where he sits? Cannot they use the Echelon or NSA to block or modify his traffic?

Re:how he leaks it

[Amorymeltzer]

HE is not leaking anything. The organization he nominally heads is. He could be arrested five minutes from now, and the leaking wouldn't be affected. You can't succeed by depending solely on one CEO-esque figure.

Re:how he leaks it

[Anonymous Coward]

39-year-old Australian supplied the Metropolitan Police with contact details upon arriving in the UK in October. Police sources confirmed that they have a telephone number for Mr Assange and are fully aware of where he is staying.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wikileaks-chief-what-will-he-do-next-2148813.html

I do not understand how he can leak information if the authorities know where he sits? Cannot they use the Echelon or NSA to block or modify his traffic?

The irony. All of these awful accusations against the US, the West, etc, etc, comparing those countries / regions to Iran and China and Russia - and yet, the supposed object of all of this "targeting" is allowed to go free. If the government of the US were as nasty as you all think it is, he would not be around at this point.

Re:how he leaks it

[Max_W]

Come to think about it, I remember how Alexander Solzhenitsyn or Andrei Sakharov were hated in the USSR by authorities. Still they could not kill them. They could do it with others, but for some reason not with these two. It always puzzled me.

Maybe it is like to kill a mockingbird?

starting to get a little worried

[Anonymous Coward]

You know this is the reaction that I would expect. There is always a deal to be made. Its a lot easier for these sites to duck and cover instead of making a stand. I don't really blame them, but I do blame us collectively. We are standing by while the future turns into 1984. Truth is most people are too ignorant/preoccupied to realize or care. I'm becoming sooo pessimistic about the future of online rights. Here is what I think will happen:
All online activity is tracked and retained - just like speed cameras always watching so that in the end you get fined
We will all be forced to run some kinda spy program (think the warden from WoW) in order to be connected to the internet - you can try to fool it and you might get away with it for awhile but it'll get you eventually
Won't be long and there will be cameras that can identify you based on your facial features and the way you walk - these records will be retained for your safety
Before long most of these services will be privatized if they weren't from the start to save money and increase efficiency
The data will then no longer be collected by the government but a private agency - kinda like your phone/internet/mail/parking meters - and thus are under a completely different set of rules then a government run agency and those rules can be changed at any time for any reason. When at&t makes sure that their network routes US calls through non-US territory where the nsa intercepts them this doesn't apparently break the word of the law - but you've murdered the spirit. Fourth amendment free areas are popping up everywhere! Apparently it doesn't break the law if you can make good cause for it. Think DUI checkpoints. Border Patrol Checkpoints up to what like 50 miles from the border? Am I going crazy or does all this sound like bad things that are more then likely going to happen? Maybe there is a support group for people like me? A forum perhaps?

Is wikileak a top topic?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is the twitter topic data-plot from yesterday, courtesy of bubloy
http://bubbloy.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/trending.jpg?w=640&h=224

Yesterday, wikileaks has 7 times as much traffic as the second most popular topic.

Re:Is wikileak a top topic?

[Anonymous Coward]

That graph looks like it plots total volume, not trending. It is my understanding that trending should plot changes in volume, not total volume.
Do you have a link directly to twitter, so we can check out the parameters of this graph?

You must be watching a different Fox News

[SmallFurryCreature]

Or is Fox News not mainstream?

Since when does Glen Beck run interference for the Democrats?

I bet you are a teabagger, you got their talent for twisting the universe.

This may be the first ever cyberwar.

[elucido]

Did you read the sites?

Re:This may be the first ever cyberwar.

[myowntrueself]

Yep, fascinating insights into cognitive dissonance. Very cool. Thanks for the links.

Why Only One Twitter?

[Doc Ruby]

By this time in Twitter's huge rise, previous services like IM had already spawned several competing networks inspired by the original pioneer. Twitter is even easier to duplicate. How come Twitter still has a monopoly on the service? After a few years of millions of people using it, the "Twitter" protocol should be either standard or have big gateways for other networks of users to all intercommunicate with it.

I'm surprised Google doesn't offer a competitor, or Yahoo, or Microsoft, or Disney.

Are you naive? Cyberwarfare is dirty.

[elucido]

There will be unlimited fronts opened up against Wikileaks and their supporters. Vigilantes around the world will be involved in shutting Wikileaks down and in stopping the individuals associated with it.

How did the USA respond after the 911 attacks?

How do you think the USA will respond after the cyber 911?

The Cyber Command probably has been waiting for this moment for a while now.

Re:Are you naive? Cyberwarfare is dirty.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Cyber Command probably has been waiting for this moment for a while now.

So they can prove they bought the 'cyber war' theory hook line and sinker? They should have paid attention back in acquisitions when eyebrows were being raised and 50 year old data protection practices were being modernized.

Data war is the war they are fighting now - the exact same war Intel communities have been fighting for a couple thousand years. When the U.S. bought the 'cyber' line they lost the data war.

I take this as proof that the people claiming to be the Intel agencies shouldn't be.

Why would you say that?

[elucido]

If there is this kind of heavy handed crap going on at companies we are supposed to trust, we all know where to send the evidence. I know that not everyone agrees, but somehow I feel better in the world knowing that Wikileaks is on call, doing its thing.

You are going to have them thinking you are a Wikileaks supporter. Then their heavy handed tactics will be directed at you.

No I don't think anyone wants to mess with the government. If you had any idea of just how heavy the tactics are...

Read the article

Re:Why would you say that?

[Anonymous Coward]

If there is this kind of heavy handed crap going on at companies we are supposed to trust, we all know where to send the evidence. I know that not everyone agrees, but somehow I feel better in the world knowing that Wikileaks is on call, doing its thing.

You are going to have them thinking you are a Wikileaks supporter. Then their heavy handed tactics will be directed at you.

No I don't think anyone wants to mess with the government. If you had any idea of just how heavy the tactics are...

Read the article

...fear itself.

Re:Why would you say that?

[dissy]

You are going to have them thinking you are a Wikileaks supporter.

And it is pretty obvious you are very very against the idea of anyone wanting to support or help wikileaks.

In the last thread alone, due to the fact you are 'Friend of a Friend', I saw 18 posts from you that I counted that had the exact same content. Pretty much the same content as this post. After the first 5 it became annoying trying to skip so many dupes in a row which was the only reason i noticed.

It's one thing to warn others of the dangers you might perceive to be true, but it's another for what you have been doing, which is being actively against any wikileaks support.

You can clearly do as you wish, but I highly suspect your motives of 'just warning others' at this point.

Re:Why would you say that?

[elucido]

You are going to have them thinking you are a Wikileaks supporter.

And it is pretty obvious you are very very against the idea of anyone wanting to support or help wikileaks.

In the last thread alone, due to the fact you are 'Friend of a Friend', I saw 18 posts from you that I counted that had the exact same content. Pretty much the same content as this post. After the first 5 it became annoying trying to skip so many dupes in a row which was the only reason i noticed.

It's one thing to warn others of the dangers you might perceive to be true, but it's another for what you have been doing, which is being actively against any wikileaks support.

You can clearly do as you wish, but I highly suspect your motives of 'just warning others' at this point.

Wikileaks is run by the maniac man Julian Assange, thats why.

Re:Why would you say that?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wikileaks is run by the maniac man Julian Assange, thats why.

Grow up, there's always some one better looking and smarter than you. Even if you and your-wanna-be-warrior-mates kill 'em - you still won't get laid.

All your posts are of one of two flavours:-

• Julian is a maniac/madman/arrogant/prideful/terrorist
• Please don't support Julian - it'll get you all killed - fear the opposition

Then you give links to pages like "Target of Opportunity" - hello, seems the opposition to Wikileaks we should all fear is, you! Not only do you know the fringe sites - seems it's where you frequently post to your weekend warrior mates, you know - the White Supremacist Troll Collective.

With the vitriolic outrage of the disenfranchised and the single-brain-cell patriotism of trailer park trash. No one wants you - that's why you hate everyone.

Go back to posting on Youtube arseclown.

elucido mi culo, ciego adiós

Twitter should distance itself from Assange

[Anonymous Coward]

If my company had any connection with Assange, I would sever all ties and distance myself, and my company, from him.

Anyone guilty of or under investigation of violating the U.S. 1917 Espionage Act would not be good to associate with.

Re:Twitter should distance itself from Assange

[Magada]

Assange is neither, at this point in time.

You want a reference?

[MikeRT]

Do a Google search. A decent looking search result shows up on the first page for "Obama Twitter connections."

Unless you are citing a specific study, in this day and age of good search engines, demanding "citations" for general topics is a form of trolling. It says "I'm too fucky lazy to do a 5 sec Google search."

Re:You want a reference?

[rchh]

Actually I did. And I did not find ANY reliable and trustworthy link between the two. Between somebody who makes grandiose claims and somebody who asks some proof of the claims, who is the bigger troll?

Re:You want a reference?

[speroni]

It would seem to me the burden of evidence rests with the person making the claim.

Re:You want a reference?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously. Go get some meds, you're fucking nuts.

Re:You want a reference?

[speroni]

Its seems to me the burden of evidence rests with the party making the claim.

Who gives a shit?

[the_raptor]

Seriously. Twitter is a company and will censor shit as all communication/media companies do from time to time. Twitter isn't "the voice of the people" or any shit like that. It is an inane website for mostly inane people to display their inanity in 140 characters and track the other inane peoples reactions. The only thing Twitter added to the systems that came before it was easy mobile access and popularity tracking, and no one actually seems to use the mobile version any more.

It is killing me that our already dumb society is trying to dumb itself down to thoughts that can fit in 140 characters.

P.S. Someone should invent a social media symbolic language. I bet you could cover the majority of posts with very few symbols.

Re:Who gives a shit?

[MRe_nl]

: )

Re:Who gives a shit?

[Isaac Remuant]

I'm going to blow your mind. I'll run a website that will allow for 145 characters. 160 if you upgrade. Progress is coming.

Re:Who gives a shit?

[Anonymous Coward]

"society" isn't doing anything, individual people are. Many of them are posting inane drivel, but is that really a loss? Before twitter the same people communicated with as little intelligence, just using other media. Back then you didn't have to listen to their communication, and surprisingly the same is true now... If you are seeing stupid posts on twitter, maybe you should get smarter friends?

Re:Who gives a shit?

[ahodgkinson]

P.S. Someone should invent a social media symbolic language. I bet you could cover the majority of posts with very few symbols.

The have. It's called emoticon. And you're right, 95% of all forum conversations can be expressed in emoticon with just two words :) and :(

Re:Who gives a shit?

[Anonymous Coward]

They did... http://beta.gabble.com/

Re:Who gives a shit?

[dotar]

They already have, it's called English. Out of 42 total characters, you used less than 30 to make your entire point!

What will they think of next?

Re:Who gives a shit?

[neminem]

Lies. I'm pretty sure if I had to replace all my forum posts with emoticons, the majority would be replaced with either :p, :/, or >.>.

oh geee

[unity100]

so you are saying that, if assange didnt use the freedom, noone would censor it ?

oh gee. i didnt think it that way ! so, its ok as long as we dont use our freedoms - we wont risk losing them !!!

Re:oh geee

[Duradin]

"so you are saying that, if assange didnt ABuse, for his own personal aggrandizement, the freedom, noone would censor it ?"

Fixed that for you.

That’s not censorship.

[clone52431]

You would expect the trends to generally reflect the highest-profile topics, true enough. If they don’t, though, that isn’t censorship. They’re like a news network. You expect them to tell you what’s hot. They don’t always. It’s certainly a bias, but it isn’t censorship.

Censorship would be telling you that you can’t post that Twitter update because you tagged it #wikileaks.

Censorship would be mysteriously long page loads and 404 errors on feeds of users who posted wikileaks-related tweets.

Censorship would be banning users who posted about wikileaks.

Yet another wikileaks discussion on /. ?

[formfeed]

Yes, another wikileaks discussion on /.

And it belongs on /.

For the last few years, things have been moving into the cloud. Somehow decentralized systems like irc have been replaced with centralized social media platforms. Nice cheap hosting and sharing services with some teeny, tiny clauses in their tos have become widely available.
Wikileaks is the perfect storm that tests just how much we can trust the life in the cloud.

Maybe RMS, that guy who looks and talks like Jesus was right all along.

Re:Yet another wikileaks discussion on /. ?

[bipbop]

Ah, yes. Jesus was known for talking about his nasal sex with plants.

Regarding the Iranian comparison

[sustik]

The summary mentions the role of twitter during the Iranian unrest following the election.

Let me point out the obvious:
* Twitter is a company based in the US. Iran is a non-friendly regime to the US.
* If there were a twitter equivalent based in Iran, you can be sure it would have been busy about the cable leaks.

Got it?
In general, pretending that the parallel with the Iranian incident has any merit can be thought of as a lame effort at sarcasm at best and to be ignorant/uneducated at worst.

Re:Regarding the Iranian comparison

[Nidi62]

Wasn't the thing about the Iran incident was that most of the tweets (god, I really hate using that word) about it came from outside Iran? Most of the people inside Iran had bigger concerns like non-uniformed, irregular agents of the Iranian government taking pot-shots at people, mass arrests, kidnappings, and so on. Not to say it didn't help spread awareness of the issue. It was just being utilized outside of where it would have done the most good.

Wikileaks and Assange are corrupt too

[Anonymous Coward]

The former member of Wikileaks Board of Directors has criticism about Wikileaks:

http://cryptome.org/0001/wikileaks-funds.htm

It seems Assange is using funds to his own personal gain.

What I'm waiting is that Wikileaks leaks itself and:

1) Publishes use of (donated) funds and how much wikileaks profits when providing early access of documents to news corporations?
2) Publishes its own internal emails and name of its members.
3) Where is Sunshine Press/Wikileaks (foundation?) registered and where you can get accounting information?

It may be that Assange is in a process of transferring Wikileaks-funds to his own offshore (Swiss?) bank accounts..

 

Re:Wikileaks and Assange are corrupt too

[makomk]

Someone claiming to be a former member of the Board of Directors of Wikileaks claims Assange is using funds for his own personal gains, via an e-mail sent through an anonymous remailer with no substantiating details. Looks like an attempt to discredit Wikileaks, and not even a very good one - I'd guess some random kook rather than any kind of government-sanctioned activity.

Jesus Christ

[kevinNCSU]

Twitter's trends are based off growth, not volume. This conspiracy shit is getting ridiculous. If this keeps up we're going to log into slashdot and see a story titled: "Assange orders extra hot Skim Vente Pumpkin Spice Latte at Starbucks but given NON-SKIM MILK INSTEAD in Starbuck/Government conspiracy to SLOWLY KILL HIM!!!`1!"

Re:Jesus Christ

[makomk]

Except that's clearly not the answer either. Someone in an earlier thread linked this interesting blog post which shows that there was, in fact, an absolutely huge spike in the use of the #wikileaks tag - far bigger than for any of the other tranding topics.

Post it on wikileaks

[satuon]

> One of Twitter's engineers has chimed in over the weekend
This whistle-blower should post the evidence that twitter is censoring wikileaks on wikileaks.

Test it yourself!

[David Gerard]

As a commenter suggests in the story:

"A game for Tweetdeck users.

Start two new columns, one for "wikileaks" one for any of the subjects on twitter's worldwide trend list (there's some guy called Mike Ashley who is top trending on two different versions of his name right now).

Now, which column is moving fastest?

That's why nobody believes Twitter isn't censoring."

The Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted.

[Beelzebud]

Iran proved that.

Re:The Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted.

[eriqk]

Instead, the revolution may be twatted.

Cryptome

[Magic5Ball]

If there is something topical to be leaked, Cryptome will post it in minutes, instead of weeks or years later.

Is there any doubt that we have free speech?

[jaypaulw]

For all of the conspiracy stuff out there - and I happen to be opposed to the public release (especially the poison pill encrypted, unredacted torrent - holding others hostage because you are too cowardly to stand up for what you believe) it is pretty remarkable that this has all been released.

So the current government is speaking out against the leaks - and using *legal* powers to defend itself - I just am not that incensed.

JP

main problem

[GregNorc]

Usernames can't be trending topics, and a ton of people use the tag #wikileaks.

Re:main problem

[sperxios10]

Not true!

The http://twitter.com/#!/followfriday is a user and a frequent-trending trend.

The same with: http://twitter.com/TheWalkingDead

New arrest warrent

[Martin Spamer]

Julian Assange (new) arrest warrant arrives in UK

justifications.

[unity100]

shitty moronic justifications. self-fooling. delusive.

it doesnt matter what freedom is used. freedom is freedom. 'you are using freedom for ....' is not a valid excuse for censorship.

people can use their freedom for whatever they want. THAT IS WHY IT IS CALLED FREEDOM.

as long as morons like you around, who use various justifications and add prefixes to concept of freedom to allow/disallow it conditionally, there can be no freedom.

the FREE part in the word freedom, apparently, eludes you.

Re:justifications.

[Duradin]

Rights go hand in hand with responsibilities. Rights without responsibility is nothing more than anarchy.

Assange's personal bank account frozen

[Martin Spamer]

Swiss bank freezes Julian Assange's (personal) account

ok.

[unity100]

show me the place where it says 'freedoms are conditional', anywhere in bill of rights, or human rights declaration. show me the place it says 'there is freedom of speech BUT'.

if you cant, dont bullshit from your butt. what you are doing is just justifying repression. doesnt matter what your excuse or reason is.

Re:ok.

[Duradin]

The second amendment allows one to have a firearm. Murdering someone with that firearm is illegal. Are laws on murders with a firearm unconstitutional because they put a limit on the second amendment?

Re:ok.

[unity100]

the idiocy here is that, murdering someone doesnt make that firearm illegal. what is illegal is MURDERING someone. not the firearm.

even if you murder someone with a firearm, firearm still stays legal. it just becomes an evidence for the murder.

your logic is faulty.

Pareidolia

[Huckabees]

I'm not sure what news you're watching but I can recall months ago every major news channel ranting about the republican rally and the variables that lead up to it including the debt, economy, health care, and unemployment. The only people claiming any real media bias are extreme left or right media groups who are more concerned with getting their viewers all rattled up for ratings than anything else.

I tested it

[Mysteray]

Later on in the day Saturday, I opened a browser tab with #wikileaks #imwikileaks and all of the global trending tags. The way the Twitter web UI works is that it will change the title to the count of new tweets since you clicked to view them. I left it up for about an hour.

• #wikileaks was the number one most frequently tweeted tag for that hour.
• The number two tag was close in frequency and was listed as 'trending'.
• #imwikileaks was in the top 3 or 4 in frequency IIRC.
• Most other tags marked as trending were being tweeted at 5 or 6 times less the rate of #wikileaks.

The leaks THEMSELVES are the point, not contents

[Wraithlyn]

That's because the content of the leaks is not the point.

It's the leaks themselves that are the point.

Wikileaks' goal is to make secretive regimes so paranoid about leaks, that it impairs their ability to operate efficiently.

This is a great read: https://zunguzungu.wordpress.com/2010/11/29/julian-assange-and-the-computer-conspiracy-%E2%80%9Cto-destroy-this-invisible-government%E2%80%9D/

The more secretive or unjust an organization is, the more leaks induce fear and paranoia in its leadership and planning coterie. This must result in minimization of efficient internal communications mechanisms (an increase in cognitive “secrecy tax”) and consequent system-wide cognitive decline resulting in decreased ability to hold onto power as the environment demands adaption. Hence in a world where leaking is easy, secretive or unjust systems are nonlinearly hit relative to open, just systems.

Twitter's not a government

[Anonymous Coward]

Only governments can censor. Twitter isn't a government entity.

I care, I care a lot, IITEOTWAWKI

[Gla'funk]

The cable leaks have almost no worthy information. They don't show cover-ups, torture or anything else we didn't already know about. It's the equivalent on getting caught passing a note at primary school.

The Yanks have little to worry about.

I love America but now I also hate and despise the government of the United States of America, I used to be a strong and vocal friend but they've become an enemy. If I am representative for others similar to myself on the European right (and that might well be the case) then the government "Yanks" should shit their pants because it means they have extremely few friends left.

Yes the cables have contained little new although it has been a source of confirmation and embellishment --at least to this anti-idiotarian. However for this "rightist" the US federal government response to the cable leaks gave the most important information of all: the government of the United States of America is now unequivocally the enemy of freedom.

It's the same as with this year's Nobel Peace Prize; when I first heard who had gotten it I was somewhat surprisingly (at least to myself) lukewarm and skeptical, I was unsure if it was a move that would help rather than hinder increased freedom for the Chinese people. Then the Chinese government removed any and all doubt I had with their reaction.

I'm highly skeptical of the "leftism" and editorial mischief and propaganda that Wikileaks have previously done. I'm skeptical of Assange's personal character. These things remain, however the false accusation of rape and the massive public censorship taking place (DNS, Amazon, PayPal, PostFinance) makes those issues completely irrelevant and insignificant in comparison. It is the current actions of the United States government that has convinced me that as of right now the United States of America is a totalitarian enemy of freedom.

So for now I download and seed the insurance file http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5723136/b9f0899e6537431b462ffcb16d9398ad

Not much but I know two things:
1. This "neo-con" "far right" freedom lover - me - is no longer a friend or ally of the totalitarian government of the United States of America.
2. Other European "rightist" freedom lovers are taking notice, some publicly under full names in national newspapers.

What about #wookieleaks?

[Anonymous Coward]

They're not censoring #wookieleaks, though, right?

G-man to twitter:

[Anonymous Coward]

"That's a nice domain you've got there. It'd be a shame if something were to happen to it."

That's called plausible deniability. Now you can't tell the difference between censorship and bias.