Wikileaks Suspends Publishing Of Cables Due To "Financial Blockade"

lee1 writes "Wikileaks has had to cease publishing classified files due to what the organization calls a 'blockade by US-based finance companies' that, according to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has 'destroyed 95% of our revenue.' Assange also opined that 'A handful of US finance companies cannot be allowed to decide how the whole world votes with its pocket.' According to Assange the group was taking 'pre-litigation action' against the financial blockade in Iceland, Denmark, the UK, Brussels, the United States, and Australia. They have also filed an anti-trust complaint with the European Commission."

Comments

Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[concealment]

Public opinion swung hard against Wikileaks after the accidental release of the un-redacted cables. That leak put many people in harm's way, including a lot of people trying to help overthrow oppressive regimes or criminal enterprises. If we are able to ask "who watchers the watchers?" we have to ask "who watches the watchers of the watchers?" and the answer is that, in Wikileaks' case, big problems of credibility exist.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Given that the financial blockade was well in place before that release, the chronology of your account seems more than a trifle suspect...

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[JoeMerchant]

Public opinion swung hard against Wikileaks after the accidental release of the un-redacted cables. That leak put many people in harm's way, including a lot of people trying to help overthrow oppressive regimes or criminal enterprises. If we are able to ask "who watchers the watchers?" we have to ask "who watches the watchers of the watchers?" and the answer is that, in Wikileaks' case, big problems of credibility exist.

And, still, his point is valid. It's not public opinion that's starving Wikileaks at the moment, it's small number of big finance companies that have cut them off. What he is asserting is that financial blockade is akin to setting up barriers at polling places - what remains to be seen is if the world will agree with him.

I suspect the majority popular vote would support Assange's assertion (financial blockade should not be used to suppress free speech), but the final decision will be against him.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Anonymous Coward]

Public opinion swung hard against Wikileaks after the accidental release of the un-redacted cables. That leak put many people in harm's way, including a lot of people trying to help overthrow oppressive regimes or criminal enterprises. If we are able to ask "who watchers the watchers?" we have to ask "who watches the watchers of the watchers?" and the answer is that, in Wikileaks' case, big problems of credibility exist.

Eh what? You affirm the info they release was accurate and that the only problem with it was that it wasn't partially censored ("redacted") to protect someone or another who's probably not so innocent themselves (gov't sponsored thugs, foreign dignitaries, informants, etc).

But what they released was true. This word "credibility" ... I don't think it means what you think it means.

Maybe you think they should have more restraint but it isn't a matter of credibility.

As for myself, I say fuck 'em. You sign up with shady organizations like the CIA or most military contractors or the Taliban or whatever, I have no sympathy when your chickens come home to roost. Next time don't associate with liars and murderers and their cloak-and-dagger bullshit and you won't be so afraid of the truth and the whole truth.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Anonymous Coward]

I've often wondered that too.....

Who does "watcher" those watchers. Who'd a thunk it?

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[erroneus]

Before people will be able to render an opinion, they need to also face an uncomfortable truth: That the people who control the world's money also have a non-impartial agenda which they will assert when it suits them to do so.

This isn't a "political" issue as much as it is a personal one. Note that the flow of money to Wikileaks was not inhibited until they decided to leak things about banks. That's when they started to choke Wikileaks' money flow.

After the people are made to recognize this fact, that's when they can make an opinion about whether this is good or bad.

The rulers of the world are exposing themselves through their actions. And the activities of late are showing who controls the government... hint: it's not the people.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you will find, your own public opinion has swung, and that opinion is yours alone. In all honesty the only "opinion" i have changed is that of the guardian's editors *cough* david leigh *cough* for breaking confidentiality agreements, and of course the Shit-Berg (whatshisname?). The two main culprits of the wikileaks-leak are not even part of the organization anymore, and have been reverting to childish interviews trying to smear julian and his colleagues, almost as if they are having tantrums over it.

In regards to the USG. If you have nothing to hide, then why try to hide information about it? Any harm done is the result of american politics. Wikileaks should have released the cables un-redacted in the first place.

As for the article, they have every right to go ahead and take legal action, by the looks of it they should win the case.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[shentino]

Considering it was a rogue newspaper bungling the encryption key and forcing their hand so that the bad guys weren't the only ones that had access, I very much doubt the egg on Wikileaks's face was truly their own.

Someone fucked up, wikileaks got blamed for making the best of a bad situation, and some secret operative somewhere in the guardian is probably giving the agency he works for a jolly laugh of "eeeeeeeeggcellent"

Intelligence networks have been trying like clockwork to get Wikileaks shut down ever since their parent governments started getting embarrassed by the leaks.

Infiltrating a news organization and spilling an already compromised key for the sole purpose of embarrassing and discrediting wikileaks would be very useful and if that's what really happened I would not be the least bit surprised.

Oh, and if I suddenly stop posting on slashdot...feel free to get even more suspicious.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Xest]

Or not, because everything you said is partisan, and your own opinion, and many of us don't see it this way.

Still, you keep asserting your world view is everyone's world view if it makes you feel better about yourself.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[anagama]

The other take on that is that it will probably save thousands upon thousands of lives. Thanks to Wikileaks, Obama's request for immunity from crimes for US troops was rejected and his desire to prolong the Iraq war thwarted, aided in part by release of a cable showing US war crimes.

That cable was released by WikiLeaks in May, 2011, and, as McClatchy put it at the time, "provides evidence that U.S. troops executed at least 10 Iraqi civilians, including a woman in her 70s and a 5-month-old infant, then called in an airstrike to destroy the evidence, during a controversial 2006 incident in the central Iraqi town of Ishaqi." The U.S. then lied and claimed the civilians were killed by the airstrike. Although this incident had been previously documented by the U.N. special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, the high-profile release of the cable by WikiLeaks generated substantial attention (and disgust) in Iraq, which made it politically unpalatable for the Iraqi government to grant the legal immunity the Obama adminstration was seeking. Indeed, it was widely reported at the time the cable was released that it made it much more difficult for Iraq to allow U.S. troops to remain beyond the deadline under any conditions.

In other words, whoever leaked that cable cast light on a heinous American war crime and, by doing so, likely played some significant role in thwarting an agreement between the Obama and Maliki governments to keep U.S. troops in Iraq and thus helped end this stage of the Iraq war (h/t Trevor Timm).

http://www.salon.com/2011/10/23/wikileaks_cables_and_the_iraq_war/singleton/

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[tangelogee]

Next time don't associate with liars and murderers and their cloak-and-dagger bullshit and you won't be so afraid of the truth and the whole truth.

One could argue that Wikileaks does the same thing...In order to obtain the truth from untruthful people, you will ultimately have to tell a few lies yourself. Assange is no better than the people and entities he is outing.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Enderandrew]

It was so accidental that Assange said in an interview that if people wanted names redacted, then they needed to give him more money. And it was so accidental that Amnesty International blasted Assange for repeated leaks where he didn't redact civilian volunteer names, leading to civilian volunteers coming under death threats.

Amnesty International calls out government corruption and human rights violations. They don't demand money from people. They act with good conscience. Assange operates with zero transparency. He has been saying for at least a year that he is sitting on tons of documents tied to Bank of America and the financial collapse, but won't release them unless you give him more money.

Let's stop treating Assange like a hero. If you just want to support the ideals of calling out government abuse, then support institutions like Amnesty International.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Anonymous Coward]

Given that the financial blockade was well in place before that release, the chronology of your account seems more than a trifle suspect...

Perhaps, but the end result is still that, with public opinion swinging against them, it's less likely some white knight will come to their rescue.

Maybe their whole idea of "piss off the companies who can do the only significant money transfers to keep us in business by leaking sensitive information about them" could have been thought out a wee bit better...

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[EnergyScholar]

This author must dispute two statements of fact in the above post:

• Incorrect statement one: "That leak put many people in harm's way, including a lot of people trying to help overthrow oppressive regimes or criminal enterprises." On what basis do you make that claim, besdies the fact that Fox news repeated it a lot? The un-redacted cables had already been widely distributed between five different journalistic outlets. This means, of course, that various intelligence agencies had also got hold of them. Thus, anyone with Intelligence Community (IC) connections, which includes large criminal organizations, ALREADY able to get to the un-redacted cables. When the un-redacted cables were generally released this only allowed regular people with no IC connections to ALSO look at them. As an example, if you were an Afghani feeding intelligence about the Taliban to the US government, and you happened to be mentioned in a Cable, you had no way to determine whether or not your name was mentioned, because you could only see the redacted cables, even though the Pakistani Intelligence Agencies, which has been thoroughly infiltrated by the Taliban, DOES have access to the cables. The release of the un-redacted cables allows you to see that you are, or are not, mentioned in the cables, and take appropriate action. The un-redacted were ALREADY available to all the big players.
• What big problems of credibility exist? Has Wikileaks ever lied, or provided demonstrably false information? On what basis do you make that assertion, besides hearing it on Fox news? Sounds to me like you are parroting Fox News ...

FYI: the un-redacted cable release came from a confluence of several events:

1. Wikileaks posted an original, encrypted version of the cable on the wikileaks site and pointed a Guardian reporter at it
2. Wikileaks privately told the Guardian reporter the secret password to decrypt the file
3. Someone else grabbed a copy of the encrypted file and it floated around on the 'net
4. The Guardian published the secret password in a book
5. The combination of the encrypted un-redacted cables file, and the guardian-published key, allowed anyone to get the entire set of cables

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Enderandrew]

Out of curiosity, what is your signature referring to?

And I'm curious how I never once before heard that the cables have evidence of murdering civilians? All the previous reports I've seen state that the big evidence was the "collateral murder" video. I've watched that repeatedly, and don't see any evidence of "murder".

A reporter is seen walking with an armed group in a DMZ. Carrying weapons in there is illegal, and asking to be shot. You see the reporter with a camera. Later someone points an RPG at the helicopter. Some claim this is the camera that is seen earlier, except the reporter wasn't the one standing there, and the RPG is much larger than the camera seen earlier.

The troops in the helicopter call and ask permission to engage before engaging. A van comes onto the scene and tries to take people away. If you drive into a situation where people are being shot and aid them, you are placing yourself in the line of fire. And while the whole incident was covered by several reporters (who love reporting on deaths of reporters), none mentioned kids being in the van, which Wikileaks claims. In fact, there is zero evidence anywhere that children were in the van. And if there were, there deaths would at the very least partially be responsible for the driver who put them in harm.

When you're in warfare in which the enemy doesn't wear a uniform, and can attack from anywhere, it is hard to determine who is the enemy. But you had armed people who pointed an RPG at the helicopter, and then a group aiding them. That supposedly was definitive proof of murder. I'm just not seeing it.

If the leak had other definitive proof of murder, I'd be curious to see it.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[sgt scrub]

Note that the flow of money to Wikileaks was not inhibited until they decided to leak things about banks.

Agreed. Bank of America, Visa, MasterCard, PayPal and Western Union == the U.S. government.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Anonymous Coward]

Next time don't associate with liars and murderers and their cloak-and-dagger bullshit and you won't be so afraid of the truth and the whole truth.

One could argue that Wikileaks does the same thing...In order to obtain the truth from untruthful people, you will ultimately have to tell a few lies yourself. Assange is no better than the people and entities he is outing.

Can you name a confirmed lie Assange has told? I do not mean that for a challenge -- I am ignorant about this and want to know if there is proof of such a thing.

And ethically .. assuming you know for sure Assange does use deception as a weapon just like those he exposes ... by turning their own machinations against them, you do not think Assange is better than those he is outing? That maybe what he does is some kind of necessary evil like government or taxes? Is he not beating them at their own game and in the process exposing what is wrong with the game and its rules? Do you view it otherwise?

The way he keeps pissing off powerful corrupt people makes me think he is part of the solution, on the side of the common man so to speak.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Scrameustache]

Amnesty International blasted Assange for repeated leaks where he didn't redact civilian volunteer names, leading to civilian volunteers coming under death threats.

THAT NEVER HAPPENED

WikiLeaks won Amnesty International 2009 Media Award. That's what the organization thinks of the other organization. What did happen, and you're misremembering it the way t was designed to be misremembered, is that one individual that worked for AI made a comment blasting Assange. That individual did not represent the organization. And the death threats were the same hypothetical threats that were U.S. official FUD all along, nothing real.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Enderandrew]

Except it did.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703428604575419580947722558.html?KEYWORDS=julian+assange+rights+groups

Amnesty International went after Assange in 2010, a year after that award when they learned how he put civilians in danger. And yet in every interview on the matter, Assange insists he did nothing wrong. In this article, he blasts others for being lazy, when he was the lazy one who didn't bother redacting names. And if you bother taking two seconds to Google such matters, you'll find several quotes where he says he won't redact civilian names unless people give him $200,000.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[BitZtream]

Has Wikileaks ever lied, or provided demonstrably false information?

Yes, they posted a video that was clearly manipulated to the point of not even being close to 'the truth'. I know, I saw both the full version and the edited version, there is no mistake.

The video showed they have an agenda and they'll manipulate facts into lies in order to further their agenda. From that point on, everything else they do and have done is tainted. If you're too stupid to start thinking for yourself, nothing we can do about that, but we're still going to point out that your a moron.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[EnergyScholar]

Factual error: the US Soldier who carried one of the wounded children away (visible in long version of the video!) later identified himself and went public with this fact.

Now, a theoretical situation: You are a father, with two children in you van, in your home city, which happens to occupied by a foreign army. You come upon a scene of death and mayhem in the middle of your home city, and see a wounded man (you don't know he's a reporter) crawling from the scene. Do you A.) Drive away and not render aid, because it's too dangerous ? or B.) Decide to risk yourself and your children to render first aid to the wounded? In the event you choose B, do you think it is acceptable for the occupying army to then kill you? That's what happened ...

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[tangelogee]

I am not saying Assange in particular, but Wikileaks as an organization. Did they disclose the people that are leaking the information to them, such as Manning? How is that any different than a government refusing to release the sources of their information? a lie by omission is still a lie.

I would argue that Assange is not doing this so much for the good of the people, but for the good of his ego.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[EnergyScholar]

Agreed, that never happened. Poster was repeating a Fox News falsehood.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Enderandrew]

Can you provide a link to the soldier carrying kids away? Because all the news stories when the incident occurred said there were no kids.

And as a parent, I wouldn't endanger the lives of my kids to aid a stranger.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[ladoga]

Later someone points an RPG at the helicopter. Some claim this is the camera that is seen earlier, except the reporter wasn't the one standing there, and the RPG is much larger than the camera seen earlier.

The lens pointed at helicopter around the corner looks like Canon 500mm F4. Google it out if you can't tell the differrence between RPG and Canons gray/white professional lenses. (Hint: RPGs are thin, long and have very distinctive conical shaped charge at the end)

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[darjen]

I haven't heard of one single death coming as a direct result of Wikileaks revelations. However, they have brought to light a whole heap of corruption and cover ups. They have done WAY more good than harm (if any harm at all). Personally, I think the people who like power and war just enjoy using that as an excuse to bash Wikileaks. Those in power and money also control the media and try to portray Wikileaks in the worst light possible. Things like Wikileaks just might be the only thing that will save democracy from collapsing on itself.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[wisnoskij]

But their objective has never been to make as much money as possible, so it is wrong to say that they have made mistakes because something did not turn out as financially good for them.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[shentino]

Here's a hint:

If the people aren't really in charge, then it's not really a democracy.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Dunbal]

"Public opinion" is bought and sold by the media. Guess who controls the media.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Enderandrew]

In the first pass, you can see the reporter with the camera in question. And he isn't at the front of the group. They pass around a building and you lose sight of the group for a moment. But before then, you can see it is someone else who reaches the corner of the building first. He is the one who points the object at the helicopter. And what he points is considerably larger than the camera that you see seconds before.

There was only one reporter on the scene. Everyone else in the group was carrying weapons. When the group is shot, the reporter is in the back (not in the front where this object in question was being pointed at the helicopter). No one else was carrying a camera.

When Assange himself was questioned on the matter, he said the object could have in fact been an RPG. Even he didn't dispute that point. His argument was more that the American troops didn't have the right to fire on the van. And while I would agree that is questionable, I don't know you can easily chalk that up to outright murder. The troops didn't open fire without permission. They didn't randomly fire on just anyone. There were armed troops that pointed a weapon at them. If you're seen as aiding the enemy, then you're placing yourselves in danger. It isn't unreasonable for troops to react that way. This is a questionable decision that I'm not sure I'm qualified to judge. But I certainly wouldn't call it murder.

I haven't served in combat. I don't claim to know what it is like. I was in the Marine Corps though. During boot camp they ran us through a fake drill where we were issued orders and told we were shipping off for war. An entire company of Marines (6 platoons of 60-70) sat in a room. Every single one was saying that they didn't want to go to combat. I didn't hear a single voice saying, "man, I just want to kill people!"

Is it possible that individuals sign up during wartime because they do want to shoot people? Certainly. But I don't assume all soldiers are evil, nor that they want to kill people. But I have been told several times over again that all US soldiers are blood-thirsty killers. And I give these guys a little leeway because I don't think most people are asking themselves what they'd really do in a combat situation. Most people here have never had to lay their life on the line for others and don't know what it is to make such decisions.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Kagura]

Note that the flow of money to Wikileaks was not inhibited until they decided to leak things about banks. That's when they started to choke Wikileaks' money flow.

Sorry, can you show me what Wikileaks decided to leak about the banks? I'm pretty sure Wikileaks has not released anything like you think. You are probably getting caught up in the five-month-long claims from Julian Assange that there was going to be a bombshell Wikileaks release about Bank of America, and then......... nothing. If I'm wrong, then mod me down... but otherwise, don't let that guy sit at Score:4, Insightful for a silly conspiracy post.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is9sxRfU-ik&t=17m10s

If the link doesn't take you to the right time, go to 17:10 in the video. They discuss a wounded child several times over the next 5 minutes or so. I'm not sure if there's actual video of the soldier carrying the child (didn't watch the whole thing, just skimmed looking for this), but I think that's enough to prove there was at least one child injured (the video annotations indicate 2 children, so I'm not sure what happened to that supposed second child)

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[microbox]

The video showed they have an agenda

Woopty-do-dah

Prey-tell who doesn't have an agenda? Yourself?

Somehow I think that you believe that the world would have been better off without wikileaks, because they have an agenda.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Anonymous Coward]

The point here is that Wikileaks and friends aren't disinterested seekers of truth.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[SirGarlon]

Wikileaks privately told the Guardian reporter the secret password to decrypt the file

Please explain the ethical and practical difference between giving the encryption key to a REPORTER, and publishing the clear text. Because I don't see it.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Lunix Nutcase]

WAAAAAAH! Someone broke our confidentiality agreement on information we were only able to obtain through someone else breaking a confidentiality agreement! Poor us!

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[FrankHS]

I am not saying Assange in particular, but Wikileaks as an organization. Did they disclose the people that are leaking the information to them, such as Manning? How is that any different than a government refusing to release the sources of their information? a lie by omission is still a lie.

You are missing the whole point. Wikileaks has to keep the leaker's identity secret so that they will be free to reveal what they know. This used to be the job of the press in this country but unfortunately they are in bed with the government and the corporations.

The purpose of all this is so that we, the voters, can know what is going on. How can we vote intelligently when all we are fed is propaganda?

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[darjen]

If you know of a way for a democracy to continue operating without corruption, while supposedly keeping the people in charge, I would like to hear it.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[tangelogee]

The purpose of all this is so that we, the voters, can know what is going on. How can we vote intelligently when all we are fed is propaganda?

And how do we know what Wikileaks releases is not propaganda to further their own agenda? I am by no means saying that the governments and/or financial institutions are not guilty, but Wikileaks is no less blameless than the ones it is "reporting on." Their methods of obtaining information is no better than those they claim to be informaing against.

The media has never been truthful. Remember Yellow journalism? That had more to do with heads of the media trying to sell more papers than it ever did with being in bed with the government. The media has had a long history of self-serving motives.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Anonymous Coward]

If the goal of Wikileaks is merely to leak information to the public because they feel that the public deserves to see it, a financial blockade shouldn't really matter that much. Wikileaks could pursue a decentralized model where their own operational costs are relatively small and they rely on a network of donated mirrors to disseminate information.

Unfortunately, it appears that the goal of Wikileaks was to make a huge splash, get a lot of publicity and then cash in on it. This stance is consistent with their complaints about having lost access to tens of millions of dollars. And it's positions like this that most strain their credibility in my eyes. An organization like Wikileaks needs to be operating with the primary goal of representing the public, not trying to get rich. They've positioned themselves as an idealistic organization and they need to act like one.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[shentino]

Human nature being what it is I don't think such a thing is possible.

I would boldy state that humans are NOT capable of governing themselves.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[anagama]

Out of curiosity, what is your signature referring to?

5th Amendment provides in part, "no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law."

Obama ordered the execution of an American citizen based solely on allegations by the Executive branch that he was a bad guy. That is not due process. That is summary execution by the President. That should terrify anyone who values American principals. It will be comforting to those who wish we had an authoritarian dictatorship.

What's worse, is that like the Bush Administration's reliance on secret laws, i.e., secret legal memos justifying its own brand of 5th amendment violation, the deprivation of liberty, Obama is following the same practice. So we have secret laws now that allow the president to kill anyone he thinks is a bad guy, without having to justify himself. That's jaw dropping.

And of course, to show the duplicity of the "two" party system, Obama's secret memo author lambasted the Bush administration for its secret laws:

http://www.salon.com/2011/10/09/the_awlaki_memo_and_marty_lederman/singleton/

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[hairyfeet]

You are kinda leaving out a KEY fact there buddy, and that fact is this: Assange said if you want names redacted it will cost $200,000 to hire the staff to do the job otherwise the men who committed those warcrimes would be dead of old age before anything got released.

If YOU were handed more than a half a million REPORTS, not pages, reports, sometimes hundreds of pages long, and it was only you and a couple of volunteers do YOU think you could actually get the work done before dying of old age?

So if you are gonna make a statement at least make it a true one. Assange said he didn't have the staffing required to redact such a huge number, he even asked for help, and he simply didn't get it, so he released. in his shoes looking at Obama wanting to escalate again? i'd have done the same thing. in a perfect world he would have been able to redact the docs in a week because he would never be short staffed but the world ain't perfect friend and as many of us know sometimes you just gotta do the best you can with what you got.

There are many things you can legitimately nail Assange on, big ego, not really a people person (most geeky types aren't I've found), likes the spotlight, but I'd argue not redacting ain't one of them. Would you have rather had Obama get his "all troops have a get out of Iraq free card' when it comes to warcrimes? Just the fact that he had the balls to want that made me sick, it was an insult to all the guys like my grandfather that fought in WWII and did their damnedest to follow the rules.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Enderandrew]

Thanks. That is a good read.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Calibax]

It was an open secret that Wikileaks had a large amount of data on Bank of America and were close to publishing it. However, Daniel Domscheit-Berg and others left Wikileaks last year and took the Bank of America data with them. According to Reuters News Service, DDB later admitted this and claimed to have destroyed the BoA data and 3,000 other submissions to Wikileaks.

There's a great deal more about this subject in various places, and there's a tremendously useful service that can help you find it - it's called Google. I daresay Bing and Yahoo would do nicely also. In the time you took to write your comment you could have easily found the extensive basis for the remarks that you claim are totally false and a silly conspiracy.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, considering who is answering the question, I'm going to guess that the answer you're looking for is "George Soros and the liberals."

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[EnergyScholar]

The whole point of the transaction was that The Guardian was to get full access to the non-redacted cables, but was not going to publish them. The Guardian insisted on this. Publishing the password to encrypted sensitive information is tantamount to publishing the sensitive information. If there is blame for publishing the clear text of the cables it mostly falls on The Guardian, but the story was spun differently. The Guardian reporters in question can achieve plausible deniability only by claiming ignorance and stupidity.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[EnergyScholar]

Here is an interview with the soldier in question, Ethan McCord. I continue to be amazed at the bad journalism and outright lies surrounding this incident. There has been an active disinformation campaign surrounding this entire issue, of which Fox News is only the most blatant participant.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[EnergyScholar]

I also watched both videos. The manipulation of the video scaled down the time and posted captions, it did not substantively alter the story told. The longer, non-edited video is MUCH harder to follow, and requires a larger time investment to understand. This is a journalistic judgement call. Also, they published BOTH versions of the video, so that anyone who did not trust the edited version, and wished to see the original evidence, could do so. I call 'troll' on you! Are you a sock puppet?

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

While wikileaks certainly does have a few histrionic personalities, they have an additional expense: In the service of being "responsible" in shedding light on dark places, they do their own editorial work on material that comes to hand, so that "List of undercover informants working in $DUSTY_HELLHOLE" doesn't get the same release as "Redacted to avoid embarrassing $AGENCY".

If you just want to move leaked docs into public distribution like shit through a goose, that's a comparatively simple and cheap problem(with the only real difficulty being on the collection end). Shove it on bittorrent, possibly spiced with some porn so people will download and seed, and call it a day.

If you want to run an operation that seeks to maximize transparency, on the other hand, you have to assure would-be-whistleblowers and leakers that legitimate(or at least proximately legitimate: you might have issues with the CIA fucking around in hellhole X with complete lack of public oversight; but you probably don't want undercover agents X,Y, and Z getting their heads hacked off) secrecy will be preserved, while illegitimate secrecy-in-the-service-of-impunity will be lifted. That part gets slow and comparatively expensive...

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Magic5Ball]

Intelligence networks have been trying like clockwork to get Wikileaks shut down ever since their parent governments started getting embarrassed by the leaks.

If this were the case, the best way to shut down WL would not have been through a protracted series of half-blunders through the media and courts over three years across a dozen jurisdictions. A commercial off the shelf solution to cleanly eliminate all crucial members of the WL organization can be hand for well under 10,000 euro per head. Heck, hundreds of supposedly embarrassed rich and powerful, or simply angry, individuals who would have had a beef with WL could have ordered similar services online in the time elapsed.

I think you overestimate the importance of WL and its activities.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[darjen]

If humans are not capable of governing themselves, they sure as hell aren't capable of governing others.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Thing 1]

And I give these guys a little leeway because I don't think most people are asking themselves what they'd really do in a combat situation. Most people here have never had to lay their life on the line for others and don't know what it is to make such decisions.

Alternately: most people have no idea what they would do if thrust into a life-or-death situation by their corporate masters. They'd probably just shoot the nearest strangers. Funny, how this seems to happen repeatedly.

Re:Wikileaks done in by its own leak

[Scrameustache]

No, don't give me the fucking wall street journal's opinion on the matter.

If you say that Amnesty International has a beef with Wikileaks, give me a link to an Amnesty website, not to a pro-war propaganda outfit.

I don't want your spin, I want facts.

The world is recoiling from centralization

[Anonymous Coward]

Since all the major credit card companies are based in the United States, they are free to push their national interests through financial attacks. Let's not forget the numerous and notorious failures of Paypal. There is a slow but steady drive to decentralize everything that has become concentrated enough to control these aspects of our lives.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[Anonymous Coward]

Both credit card companies and Palpal are criminals, peddling cards to freshmen on school companies, freezing accounts out of purely political motivation, etc. They should just keep things simple and use Bitcoin - its exchange rate may have declined over time but that doesn't matter if you stay within the currency. It is simple to use and has become immensely popular.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[Anonymous Coward]

The solution to all of this is very simple, but sadly the general population, and many of the journalists who are paid to corral their thoughts, is even more simple. If half of all the people who follow the Wikileaks account adopted Bitcoin, even to the level of five dollars, and then sent that five dollars to them, the problem of banks, PayPal, credit cards and other organizations blocking the flow of money to them would disappear.

Instead, you have people who line up to say that the dollar is money, that Bitcoin is crashing, etc etc, all the while ignoring the fact that the power to spend is being consolidated into the hands of a small number of companies that can and will cut you off from the world for no reason other than that they receive a phone call, or that you buy and sell laptops.

Until people decide that enough is enough, understand what money is and how money services like Bitcoin need to work, i.e. without any interference from the State whatsoever, this stifling situation is going to get worse and worse until you cannot spend a penny without the consent and knowledge of the state.

Hmmm that sounds familiar doesn't it?

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[beltsbear]

I just did two bitcoins to them. Let's see if Visa, MC, Paypal can stop that! They seriously need to let out those B of A leaks, those are the ones that I want to see.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed!:

a.) There should be legislation against peddling credit cards to freshmen on school campuses. This is simple irresponsible - kids should learn that they can't spend money they don't have.

b.) Yes, Bitcoin is awesome! Now people finally start treating it not as a vehicle for speculation anymore but are actually using it to buy things. I use quite often now and got some excellent deals on various goods. For buying/selling things on craigslist it seems to become also very popular. Also, I'd assume that a good number of those who want to donate to Wikileaks are already familiar with Bitcoin.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[shentino]

As far as I'm concerned bitcoin has been swamped by hackers and techies that swooped in after the feds swooped out.

I trust my bank only because the FDIC and FED are watching it like a hawk. I know human nature.

But I would not trust a bitcoin bank, because as far as being regulated goes it's about as trustworthy as a corporation in EVE Online.

When bitcoins can be protected just as effectively as real cash, give me a call.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[Khyber]

"I trust my bank only because the FDIC and FED are watching it like a hawk."

That's going to do nothing with over 70 trillion in toxic assets being moved by banks into FDIC-backed stuff.

Your account is about to become non-existent once those banks default on all those toxic assets. You won't even have a place to stand in line to get a few paltry dollars - the banks get first dibs on payback.

Which means you need to pull your money out now.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[Truekaiser]

When that one person left to form openleaks he deleted them off wiki-leaks servers.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[shentino]

Even if I were inclined to pull my money out where would I put it?

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[beltsbear]

Can I have my bitcoins back? :)

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[jgtg32a]

peddling cards to freshmen on school companies

AKA adults

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[shentino]

Bitcoin requires electrical power from electric companies that do business in dollars or whatever fiat currency.

Considering that they are usually natural monopolies that find themselves with heavy government regulation.

Aha I think I just found bitcoin's achilles heel.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[witherstaff]

Did anyone else lose all respect for wikileaks when they heard that? I like the idea of a watchdog keeping things honest. But when you have data that supposedly showed corruption for a megabank and allowed it to be deleted is simply bullshit. They obviously can't handle the tech side. Or was this all simply a front? Play out a little 'bad press' to keep the really ugly things hidden.... It's hard not to wear a tinfoil hat around this sort of thing.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[KhazadDum]

When that one person left to form openleaks he deleted them off wiki-leaks servers.

Mr. Open Leaks was trusted and early Wikileaks still (and probably does) depended on some form of personal trust at the higher levels. That being said, incompetence paired with a malicious actor happens. I propose we crucify Mr. Open Leaks for his kind gift to us all.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[Anonymous Coward]

I trust my bank only because the FDIC and FED are watching it like a hawk.

Jeez, what happened to your hawk's eyes? Can it still fly without them?

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[Khyber]

Where all smart people put it.

Under your mattress or in your books.

Re:The world is recoiling from centralization

[jonwil]

Find an institution that didnt get involved in all the high-risk assets. Maybe a credit union.

BoA Leaks

[AdamJS]

Publish them already. I simply cannot believe that in all of the Wikileaks organization, not a single copy or backup had been made. There's got to be something, especially with a bundle of files so damaging that they managed to turn one of your own against you. I just can't handle the idea of that level of competence in a modern internet organization tasked with anonymizing its sources. It's too scary.

Re:BoA Leaks

[ohnocitizen]

Mod parent up - Now is the time to publish any and all of the leaks they have on financial institutions. Fight back!

Re:BoA Leaks

[Anonymous Coward]

Backup policy changes somewhat when the data in question turns every machine it touches into a felony.

Re:BoA Leaks

[Anonymous Coward]

Mod parent up - Now is the time to publish any and all of the leaks they have on financial institutions. Fight back!

He can't. His stash of information is like a gun with one bullet. He can shoot, but if he doesn't kill his enemy dead then he's finished--and he's facing multiple enemies. So he's dangerous only as long as he doesn't pull the trigger and I seriously doubt that he's got any information that could neutralize his opponents. Embarrass, yes; neutralize, no. But then the banks would just be even more pissed off and, with no fear of further embarassment, would strangle him and Wikileaks financially until he's homeless and living under a bridge (or in jail). So he's in a very poor strategic position and won't be getting out of it unless he can find some major ally who will come to his defense. And he's pissed off just about everyone with enough power to really help him.

No, they've got Assange right where they want him. He's isolated, effectively muzzled, trapped in a corner, and the financial institutions can wait him out indefinitely without ever facing any serious negative backlash.

Re:BoA Leaks

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a trade off between making information widely available within your organization so you don't lose information, and then restricting information within your information as tightly as possible so you don't have leaks. If Wikileaks is losing information, that indicates that they are more serious about protecting their sources than they are about not losing information. Doesn't sound like a bad decision to me.

Re:BoA Leaks

[Yvanhoe]

It is suspected that these data are not in their possession any more and were deleted when Daniel Domscheit-Berg defected from wikileaks with a copy :

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/08/22/wikileaks_data_lost/

He was #2 in the organization and was heavily trusted. When manipulating non-anonymized data, you have to find a balance between redundancy of backups and protection of sources. Keeping this balance when #1 is in jail and #2 is a traitor is really difficult.

What we should all do in light of this is to give some love to bitcoin. That's the only solution to prevent this kind of attack.

Re:BoA Leaks

[AdamJS]

That's my point. An organization like this really should have had a large number of redundancies - even ones known only at certain levels, high and low - for a leak of data of such magnitude. It's possible that Daniel really was knowledgeable and smart enough to get to all copies. But I'd sooner believe they were just incompetent. Both ideas show a scary lack of foresight for an organization like this.

Re:BoA Leaks

[john82]

... Keeping this balance when #1 is in jail and #2 is a traitor is really difficult.

Sorry, I don't have my scorecard in front of me. One of these two is a traitor... to whom, WikiLeaks? And the other is a paragon of virtue? The phrase "honor among thieves" comes to mind.

Re:BoA Leaks

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, but that's not the way Wikileaks operates. They do maintain backups and distributed them widely throughout the world after Assange was arrested and the admin team began to fragment. But the operating priniciple was always to verify the accuracy of the information BEFORE publishing the leaks so that there would be no question as to their authenticity. The sheer volume of files involved in the Cablegate stuff makes this a very time-consuming project, and one for which the current Wikileaks team is woefully unprepared. Anonymous did publish the BofA email information (see http://bankofamericasuck.com), and while somewhat slimy and disgusting, wasn't earthshaking enough to have anyone arrested. Anonymous has now taken the helm of this operation, and is doing more than Wikileaks could ever have done, due to Wikileaks' mode of operation as a journalistic resource, rather than a direct action kind of organization. So stop bitching and do your own part and grab the Wikileaks Insurance document off of that internet thing there and join the effort to make sure governments and corporations operate with full transparency.

Re:BoA Leaks

[RobinEggs]

He can't. His stash of information is like a gun with one bullet. He can shoot, but if he doesn't kill his enemy dead then he's finished--and he's facing multiple enemies. So he's dangerous only as long as he doesn't pull the trigger

He was finished as soon as he started pulling shit like 'insurance policies' and scheduled weekly leaks out of his ass. Rather than being a paragon of honesty and open deliberation he's chosen to showboat, counter-extort, obfuscate, and generally do everything possible to start a personal Cold War between him and the entire western world.

In fact, the Cold War is an extremely apt analogy. He's basically saying exactly what the US and Soviets said about each other: "If I'm doing anything bad it's because I absolutely have to or they'll annihilate me in an instant, and anyway they started it and they're doing ten times worse!"

It may be perfectly true that wikileaks can't survive any other way, but if this is how they're going to operate then they're effectively no more than an independent intelligence agency, minus the torturing. The CIA isn't exactly a wonderful, admirable organization, even if you believe it has to exist, and neither is wikileaks.

Put another way, a necessary evil is still evil.

Re:BoA Leaks

[cavreader]

Yeah I am going to put my trust in a group called "Anonymous" to help bring transparency to government and corporation activities. Most of the documents released have been rather less than earth shaking. And there is nothing stopping the counter intelligence agencies (government or corporate) from creating documents that when examined in depth turn up to be false. In other words it is easy raise the level of doubt in the information released. The Internet in general is not the harbinger of truth and justice it is the most effective tool ever devised for creating and managing dis-information to the masses. The great information age is creating an environment of nothing but distrust, conspiracy theories, and revisionist proclamations that are leading to nothing but confusion and anger.

Re:BoA Leaks

[udoschuermann]

If "they" have made it too difficult to be responsible about the cable releases, then do what they obviously want from you: Spend no more time and effort, and release the cables in raw form, instead.

Re:BoA Leaks

[Anonymous Coward]

Can't happen. In a post months ago, Assange admitted Domshitberg, or however its spelled, deleted the records...

Re:BoA Leaks

[Yvanhoe]

Well, just use the same scorecard as the one you would use for any scoop-hunting journalist : one brought to light many sensitive informations that were kept secret despite their interest for the general public, while another has willingly destroyed informations that could have led to successful criminal investigations.

I'll let you do the sort.

Re:BoA Leaks

[Calibax]

Except that it appears they don't have the BoA data anymore. Remember when when Daniel Domscheit-Berg and others left Wikileaks to form Openleaks? According to several news services and some tweets from DDB, he claimed that he took the BoA data and some 3,000 other submissions and he later destroyed them.

It seems Domscheit-Berg was so pissed with Wikileaks that he was happy to steal the data and destroy it, thus forsaking all the whistleblowers who had risked a great deal to send the data to Wikileaks in the first place. Doesn't look like Openleaks is going anywhere anyway - not surprising really - who would trust a guy who would do that.

Re:BoA Leaks

[Anonymous Coward]

Wikileaks said a while back that the only copy of those documents where in the hand of Daniel Domscheit-Berg, the documents Daniel deleted a few months ago. I do not think anyone will ever see the those documents again, or for that matter the leaked no-fly list.

Re:BoA Leaks

[mmcuh]

The Guardian already did that months ago.

Re:BoA Leaks

[ElizabethGreene]

According to Mr. Assange, that material was lost when Daniel left the organization. My personal guess is that Mr. Domscheit-Berg, probably got a fat deposit to a numbered account and destroyed the other copies. In this type of organization having a large number of distributed copies would be a security risk. A trusted principal could, in all likelihood, get them all.

Re:BoA Leaks

[Kaenneth]

Tax money paying for child prostitutes was pretty 'earth shaking' for me... what do you want, proof that the NSA's secret sub-sonic earthquake machine accidently hit Turkey instead of Iran?

Re:BoA Leaks

[cavebison]

Heard about this on the news, and can't believe the main story is "how this is affecting Wikileaks" as opposed to "how democracy is rigged".

I mean conservatives and other free-market enthusiasts will scream "Let the Market Decide!" from the rooftops, then as soon as people freely fund something undesirable, they say "no, we didn't mean *that* kind of free market" and clock transactions.

The free market is like a god to many people, yet this.. this is allowed to happen without so much as a peep of public discussion. I'm not a conspiracy nut, but it's times like this I really wonder if there is some global consensus on how to run things.

The "Occupy" movement should have concentrated on one specific huge issue - *money in politics* - as it's at the root of so many other issues.

Re:BoA Leaks

[cavreader]

"NSA's secret sub-sonic earthquake machine accidently hit Turkey instead of Iran" Thanks for the perfect example of conspiracy driven assertion. I really hope you are just joking about the secret earthquake machine.

Re:BoA Leaks

[Uberbah]

He was finished as soon as he started pulling shit like 'insurance policies' and scheduled weekly leaks out of his ass. Rather than being a paragon of honesty and open deliberation he's chosen to showboat, counter-extort, obfuscate, and generally do everything possible to start a personal Cold War between him and the entire western world.

What a pile of horseshit. They already tried the "releasing everything" model, and rather than dig though the information, the media yawned. So now the release a few cables at a time to a few media sources which now have a "valuable" resource and the information might get some of the attention it deserves.

Which, if you've been following this at. all., you already knew. So what's your actual agenda here?

Re:BoA Leaks

[MarkvW]

You inadvertently said it. It is all about getting attention. It is not about making information available; it is all about getting attention for Assange. His own people left because it wasn't about leaking--it all became about Assange. It's not like Asssange is some indispensable man. It doesn't take a "media presence" to leak information.

You can still have Wikileaks without Assange (unless he's trademarked the name--you'll have to call it something else).

$3.5 million?

[Spy Handler]

Reuters:

WikiLeaks would need $3.5 mln over the next 12 months to maintain its current levels of operations, he said.

Either they've signed up for the world's most expensive hosting plan, or Assange and his friends are running up quite a nightclub tab.

Re:$3.5 million?

[JTsyo]

yea, if they can't keep the site going might as well just release a torrent.

Re:$3.5 million?

[xMrFishx]

I don't know, that'd be about 80-odd people at $40k. It's not impossible to think he has a small workforce and overheads to run an office or something similar. $3.5M really isn't that much money if you have a few employees too.

Re:$3.5 million?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm fairly certain the bulk of expenses would be related to legal fees

Re:$3.5 million?

[captainpanic]

$3.5 million is a lot of money if you live in your mom's basement and pay no rent.

Re:$3.5 million?

[shentino]

It's not cheap hosting a site so politically incorrect that every government and corporation with its reputation on the line will fight by fair or foul to get it shut down.

Re:$3.5 million?

[sgt scrub]

I'd bet the staff is more like 4 lawyers at 800k and 2 employees working pro bono.

Re:$3.5 million?

[Anonymous Coward]

I doubt he is in his moms basement....

Re:$3.5 million?

[tangelogee]

Funny how that's not open to the public. Why don't they practice what they preach, and let everyone see everything about Wikileaks?

Re:$3.5 million?

[BitZtream]

Except for a few government parties that are willing to host it free of charge for you ...

Re:$3.5 million?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm fairly certain the bulk of expenses would be related to legal fees

Corporate or personal? Perhaps that's why Assange wanted to connect his personal troubles to the organization, so that donations could be directed to his personal defense?

Re:$3.5 million?

[Gideon Wells]

Isn't that part of the reason Open Leaks formed?

Re:$3.5 million?

[blair1q]

Because with Assange, hypocrisy is a lifestyle.

Re:$3.5 million?

[Anonymous Coward]

They are not a tax-funded public institution with guns. Why should they?

Re:$3.5 million?

[tangelogee]

Neither are the banks...

Re:$3.5 million?

[Bucky24]

Seconded. Last I heard he was in jail.....

Re:$3.5 million?

[mmcuh]

The banks are certainly tax-funded, and I'm sure they have security guards with guns somehere.

Re:$3.5 million?

[Anonymous Coward]

I love it when young low-rung employees talk about running businesses. How much do you think this leaked information costs? People don't give Assange corporation damning evidence just because it is the right thing to do they want compensation.

Re:$3.5 million?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but we weren't talking about you. :-P

Re:$3.5 million?

[ElizabethGreene]

I think 3.5 million is rather low to open legal cases against major corporations with practically limitless resources in a half-dozen different states. Don't you?

Re:$3.5 million?

[Anonymous Coward]

Reuters:

WikiLeaks would need $3.5 mln over the next 12 months to maintain its current levels of operations, he said.

Either they've signed up for the world's most expensive hosting plan, or Assange and his friends are running up quite a nightclub tab.

lol so true, I don't understand how a website can cost so much money.

Re:$3.5 million?

[Builder]

Then that disqualifies you from having an opinion, if you can't even keep track of where he is. He's not in prison.

Re:$3.5 million?

[Anonymous Coward]

They have to hire lawyers, staff and have an office... You're pretty fucking stupid if you think it's just for "website expenses."

Re:$3.5 million?

[Bucky24]

Maybe in your country. Not where I'm from. Where is he then? Didn't he get arrested?

If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[elrous0]

With the U.S. government now controlling all the major credit card companies and banks, I guess they really are the world emperors and overlords. And I, for one, would like to welcome our new Yank overlords.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

What financial institution would EVER support a group like this????

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

Would you rather have the UN control it all? You fucking statist imbecile.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[AdamJS]

False dichotomy. It does not have to be all or nothing.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

to be AC 3...

1. the finacial institutions don't have to support wikileaks... they just have to do their job in a legal manner. unwarranted financial blockade is illegal. but then i'm sure there are those who would be happy not to receive their paychecks SOLELY because the bank decideds it doesn't like you. get real.

2. if the US is to controll it all you better be sure i'd rather the UN did. or, you know, we could just keep political issues in the political realm and financial issues in the finanicial realm and not fuck everything up... i guess i should call you an imbecile now...

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[shentino]

It does if a powerful government with guns that wants to fight over it says it does.

There's a reason you don't piss off 800 pound gorillas you know.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[poity]

I thought it was the corporations that control the government? I guess we can switch narratives whenever it's convenient.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[sgt scrub]

You having a lysdexic moment?

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[cheekyjohnson]

I think it mostly is. But that isn't to say that the corporations don't sometimes cooperate with the government.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[socrplayr813]

I've also heard many times that the Chinese now own all our major banks or some such.

As always, the truth lies somewhere in between the extremes...

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[king neckbeard]

The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Oligonicella]

"... SOLELY because the bank decideds it doesn't like you. get real."

That "solely" you refer to is illegal activity, which they would be complicit in if they funded or even allowed funding, knowing its illegality. It has nothing to do with 'liking'.

It's a lot like asking mom and dad for some money and then not telling them you're buying pot. If they find out, they'll quit.

"i guess i should call you an imbecile now..."

You might want to reconsider.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

News at ten: there exists more than one person with an opinion on Slashdot, and these opinions may not all be identical.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[AdamJS]

The point is that you don't need to have ALL AND ONLY UN or ALL AND ONLY US control of all major cc companies and banks. There can be a mix between governmental bodies in terms of control, if any.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

No, corporations ARE people, silly.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

Its the corporations that control the government (not the other way around). When the US Government arrested Bradley Manning, they were acting in their own best interests, when the financial companies squeezed Wikileaks, they are acting in their own best interests. Its in things like when the government passes a law that extends copyright to a million years (like the mickey mouse protection act), that the government is acting on behalf of corporations for their economic gain (forever).

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[IgnoramusMaximus]

I thought it was the corporations that control the government? I guess we can switch narratives whenever it's convenient.

Well, look at the actual people of whom the "government" is composed: corporate lawyers, corporate executives, wannabe corporate executives etc.

It is not that the governments are controlled by mega-corporations or vice versa, its is that they have effectively merged into one extended entity, where it is near impossible to tell where the "government" ends and the "too big to fail" corporations start.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the rich and powerful that control congress, and congress that make the laws to control the industries, so It looks like the politicians are behind it all when they really are not. However, it is the politicians that have the jobs to regulate things and keep them fair, so they are the ones truely to be blamed.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[RobinEggs]

Oh my God....an accurate and applicable quotation of Orwell.

I don't think I've ever seen such a think on slashdot. I tip my hat to you, sir.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[shentino]

I think the question is rather...

What financial institution would dare refuse to?

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

You should quote quotes.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

It's all in the taste, with a little apple sauce human is delicious.

The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

And then they ate both. They were equally delicious, easy to breed and docile enough to stay in their walled gardens.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

How did this parent get Scored at 4? Insightful? Seriously? Who the fuck would mod this garbage up?

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless you an convince one gorilla to go after another.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[mjwx]

The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.

I was going to use "we are at war with Eurasia, we have always been at war with Eurasia" but sir, I submit to your superior quoting powers.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, starve 'em

[Thing 1]

Thanks for that! I read this book when i was in high school. (I wonder how many high schoolers read it these days?)

The bullies win

[kentrel]

For now. Speech is only free as in beer, where the beer is made from hops grown on Pandora.

Re:The bullies win

[jellomizer]

No the Liberal Idiots loss.
You miss the point. They are dealing with classified information. Every country has classified information. The reason why a lot of it is classified is to protect the people who give them the information. Wikileaks probably would have gotten away without the US putting much pressure on them if it wasn't for all the uncensored information about the war. But the fact that they released all the names of the personal involved in the information, it put these people at risks of death.
Most of the other information wouldn't be that big of a deal. And not worth the US trying to stop it.
   

Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[captainpanic]

It's weird that the financial companies can control the media in such a way.

I thought that credit card companies had some legal obligation to transfer money from A to B, unless the money was actually criminal money? But last time I checked, Assange was accused (not convicted) of rape. And the Wikileaks organization as a whole wasn't accused of anything in a legal court. Or am I missing something?

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[ksd1337]

I thought that credit card companies had some legal obligation to transfer money from A to B, unless the money was actually criminal money? But last time I checked, Assange was accused (not convicted) of rape. And the Wikileaks organization as a whole wasn't accused of anything in a legal court. Or am I missing something?

Yeah, you're missing the part where the corporations have an obligation to transfer money to lawmakers for the sake of "national security".

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[MarkvW]

It is weird. What is stopping Wikileaks from publishing? All it takes is an Internet connection somewhere.

This isn't about principle or money. It's about Assange fighting for the Wikileaks brand name.

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[HereIAmJH]

This isn't about principle or money. It's about Assange fighting for the Wikileaks brand name.

No, it's about money. It's Assange saying "if you want to see the leaked documents from xxxx, I need my pound of flesh." It's how they do fund raising.

If it was about getting the information to the public, they'd simply post a torrent. If it was about Wikileaks getting credit they could just put banner files in the archives like the warez groups do. But that doesn't give Assange money to fly around the world or support his agendas.

This is Assange promoting Assange.

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[Anonymous Coward]

It was never about publishing leaks for the sake of disclosure. The entire purpose of wikileaks is to solicit donations. They experience spikes in donations when they release things, so it is unprofitable for them to continue releasing information while cut off from their source of funding.

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[Anonymous Coward]

MEDIA!? You call Wikileaks MEDIA!?

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[Anrego]

Much as I think the guy is an ass, I think the whole high profile self promotion thing is somewhat necessary, along with the sensationalism and "we'll be releasing this stuff in x months" stuff. The profile makes it hard to get rid of, the sensationalism ensures it gets some attention (whether this is a good thing or not is largely a personal opinion). The profile also serves to let people know they have a place to send their stuff.. versus the guy posting torrents.. how do you get in touch with him?

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[elsurexiste]

...last time I checked, Assange was accused (not convicted) of rape.

He was accused and then acquitted. The extradition is for interrogation purposes.

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[Anonymous Coward]

You're also missing the part where you can't force a private sector company to do business with people they don't want to associate with. Slavery was outlawed in the US in the 1860s.

It's in the fine print of every legal agreement you ever signed with a bank--they can terminate your accounts at any time for any reason at their discretion. The only thing that prevents them from exercising that option more often is greed and fear that they'll lose business to competitors.

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[Anonymous Coward]

> This is Assange promoting Assange.

Unfortunately all evidence is pointing that way, yes. He seems to have a rather expensive lifestyle, and I would not be surprised if funding that is a reasonable part of the sum.

Now I have to give him credit for coming up with a revolutionary idea and seeing it through. Well done. But a lot of the side-stories are much less flattering for him.

I really hope somebody else can take the idea forward, and do it properly. You have to be transparent in your operation, but confidential when it is required to protect your source and innocent bystanders, such as under-cover agents identified in the cables. It is not an easy path, but I hope someone else can do better.

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[Anonymous Coward]

That is exactly right. That is proof of the corruption.

Mythbusters was going to do test the myth of being able to track somebody via R F 1 D chips, but the credit card companies lawyers had a meeting with them and Discover Channel and blocked the episode.

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[shentino]

Assange is probably on a terrorst watch list of some sort.

9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11!

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[shentino]

You can't leak TO them if they don't survive.

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you seriously not know what you are missing? LOL

Take a WILD guess what Wikileaks did to cause the blockade. I bet if you think hard enough you can come up with it!

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[The Immutable]

I'm inclined to agree. Assange is protecting his own ass. As long as there is villainy afoot that he refuses to publicize, he is no hero. If you're staring down an army, and you have one bullet, you don't say "leave me alone or I'll shoot". You fire that bullet. Because if you don't, you won't get the chance to.

Re:Finance companies shouldn't run the media

[Anonymous Coward]

It's weird that the financial companies can control the media in such a way.

I thought that credit card companies had some legal obligation to transfer money from A to B, unless the money was actually criminal money? But last time I checked, Assange was accused (not convicted) of rape. And the Wikileaks organization as a whole wasn't accused of anything in a legal court. Or am I missing something?

Welcome to reality. What else did you use to believe?

Brussels is not a country

[Anonymous Coward]

FYI

Re:Brussels is not a country

[blair1q]

Nor is it a sprout.

Discuss.

not yet

[mapkinase]

I have got an impression that Wikileaks haven't reach yet the status of al-Qa'ida, Taliban or al-Shabaab, but they pretty close to that in the ranks of Iran and Syria.

If I were Julian I would keep my movements to heavily populated areas avoiding shires of England.

F Wiki Leaks!

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't support wikileaks but what's stopping them from publishing what they have? SO much for information being free. It's free as long as they get their pockets lined. F wiki leaks!

Re:F Wiki Leaks!

[blair1q]

what's stopping them from publishing what they have?

The inabilty to monetize it.

They published too much

[Hentes]

The original goal of Wikileaks was to publish documents where secrecy were misused to hide criminal acts. By releasing everything indiscriminately they took upon themselves a load they can not bear.

Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

You threaten to publish the secret, evil, nefarious ways of financial institutions, claim to have a hard drive full of incriminating information, and now these same financial institutions now won't deal with you?

Why... I never. How demonic indeed!

Re:Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

They might not be the same financial institutions. I suspect far more it's government pressure.

Re:Wait a second....

[ciderbrew]

A few points here.
- One) Yes you're right. Why should they deal with him?!?!
- Two) I'm worried that secret, evil, nefarious people are in control. If only we had a way to undermine them and make it a better world.
- Three) Why are there no NON-secret, evil, nefarious people in power that he can turn to?

Re:Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

So ...
You threaten to publish the secret, evil, nefarious ways of gov institutions, claim to have a hard drive full of incriminating information, and now these same gov institutions now won't deal with you?

Why... I never. How demonic indeed!

Re:Wait a second....

[dkleinsc]

The 'financial blockade' predates the threat to publish stuff about Bank of America. When the leaks about Iraq were published, the US government, with Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT) leading the way, worked with PayPal, Visa, Mastercard, and other financial institutions to cut off funding that went through any US-based corporation.

Note that Wikileaks had not (and still hasn't) done anything illegal in the United States: Publishing classified information that was handed to you is protected under the First Amendment, as decided in the Pentagon Papers case.

Re:Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

Your argument is factually correct and fundamentally flawed.

The banks did not bite the hand that feeds them, and wikileaks did.

Re:Wait a second....

[BitZtream]

Note that Wikileaks had not (and still hasn't) done anything illegal in the United States

Well, good for them that legality is all that matters and public opinion has nothing to do with it.

Their behavior is what fucked them over, not any government. They made it clear they wanted attention and money, not to show the injustices done in the world. What they are doing is nothing like the Pentagon Papers.

Re:Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

The first amendment only applys to US citizens, a club that i do not beleive he belongs to.

Re:Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, this is a good idea. Nobody should be able to say or learn anything the banks disagree with.

Re:Wait a second....

[dkleinsc]

Well, good for them that legality is all that matters and public opinion has nothing to do with it.

When it comes to the actions of the US government, legality is supposed to be what matters.

They made it clear they wanted attention and money, not to show the injustices done in the world.

If I had information that suggested that powerful people were committing heinous crimes and getting away with it, I'd want that information spread far and wide. That would necessarily entail having attention, and would require funding. This is all regardless of whether Julian Assange is a jerk who two-timed a couple of Swedish gals.

Re:Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

This, all the way. Assange is a fucking toolbag, and has about as much credibility when he speaks about truth and justice as any other politician has when talking about those things.

Re:Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1z6o1GIEsQE&feature=related

Re:Wait a second....

[blair1q]

I'm tired of explaining this, but I keep having to:

You don't have to be in the US, nor an American, to break American law.

(Now will follow a flood of naive counterclaims about how law works, all of which will be wrong if they try to contradict that statement.)

Re:Wait a second....

[babblefrog]

This is a common misconception. The first amendment to the US constitution applies to the government of the United States. The 14th Amendment then extended that to the state governments also. One doesn't have to be a US citizen to benefit from this.

Re:Wait a second....

[Bucky24]

I am not saying that you're wrong, but I am curious as to why you say this. My understanding was that American law stops at our borders (at least legally, illegally is of course an entirely different thing). Could you explain in further depth please?

Re:Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm sounds like you have something to hide. You don't use encryption by the way do you?

Anonymous Coward I am!

Re:Wait a second....

[blair1q]

Our ability to apprehend lawbreakers nominally stops at our borders. Our law, like everyone else's, applies to everyone, everywhere. If anyone commits a crime, as defined by American law, anywhere in the world that harms America or Americans, then America has the right to request extradition. Now, in many cases the country harboring the criminal will simply say "we don't agree with that law or the punishment you set for it. Go away." In fact, it's usually so obvious we don't even ask. But in the case of an incident in which American foreign policy and security are put at grave risk, other countries are likely to pay a little more heed to the request. Especially if they expect reciprocal courtesy for similar acts committed against them when we happen to find the perp in our jurisdiction.

Re:Wait a second....

[Anonymous Coward]

My understanding was that American law stops at our borders

In the past, the US has arrested, tried, convicted and imprisoned a Canadian businessman for doing business with Cuba, from Canada, while resident in Canada.

In the past, the US has arrested a Russian programmer because the company which employed him made software which it is not legal to sell in the USA. The programmer did not work on that particular application, and the company did not sell the software in the United States.

The US has kidnapped an Italian citizen in Italy, to have him taken to a totalitarian country to be “interrogated”.

The US has assassinated many people in many countries.

I really wish the US would stop its “law” at its borders.

Re:Wait a second....

[Kaenneth]

reguarding point three, I was think he should get support from North Korea.

Re:Wait a second....

[Pecisk]

About which crimes are you talking about? :)

Re:Wait a second....

[Uberbah]

Their behavior is what fucked them over, not any government. They made it clear they wanted attention and money, not to show the injustices done in the world. What they are doing is nothing like the Pentagon Papers.

What they are doing costs money, fucktard. Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers and was done with it - if he wanted to keep leaking evidence of government corruption, you bet your dumb ass he would have been raising money. But no, it's better to go back to that comfy ignorant cocoon where you wont have to worry about your tax dollars being used to slaughter a family in Iraq, then calling in an airstrike to cover up the crime.

this is how the market works

[tizan]

No ?
The market has no want for truth ...thus not financed !

Re:this is how the market works

[Anonymous Coward]

are you retarded?

Re:this is how the market works

[Anonymous Coward]

appears the mod is also retarded

mod parent UP

[Anonymous Coward]

How I wish I had mod points...

BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[vlm]

Take bitcoins to transfer cash. Doesn't seem overly complicated. I can turn $50 into BTC without much time or effort, send it to them, and they can turn it into euros or whatever they need with little effort.
Don't they have a postal mail address where they can accept innumerable forms of psuedo-currency like gift cards, postal stamps, etc?
Handling $3.5 million might be a bit labor intensive, maybe they need a slightly smaller budget?

not a free market however

[peter303]

The governments pressured the bank cards not to transfer funds. In the modern age you cant run an internet enterprise on physical cash.

Finance companies control legislation.

[Anonymous Coward]

When a powerful multinational corporation does something that's not legal, it will be made legal afterwards.

Example #1: Citibank bought Travelers, knowingly violating the Glass-Steagal act. Result, Glass-Steagal was repealed (Joe Biden voting against, oddly enough) with the current, totally predictable results.

Example #2: Telcos performed warrantless wiretaps for the Bush administration without proper authorization. They (hilariously) claimed to be doing so out of patriotism, but when the FBI missed a billing cycle the telcos suddenly stopped having this vaunted "patriotism" that somehow justified trampling US laws. Result, congress granted telcos immunity from prosecution (both McCain and Obama rushing back to DC from the campaign trail to cast votes in favor).

They do what they want, and then they buy enough government to make it legal. The only time there is any issue is when two zaibatsus have conflicting goals - the people don't matter any more, which is what OWS is about.

Re:Finance companies control legislation.

[Sentrion]

Which is exactly why the Constitution protects the right of citizens to bear arms. Otherwise all you have are foxes and coyotes negotiating over the rights of rabbits. Anyone who says hunting rifles and handguns can't stop tanks and jets should visit Libya. Syria is next.

I'm not suggesting we need an insurrection in the USA, but people need to protect their right to bear arms to make sure it never gets that bad.

Re:Finance companies control legislation.

[fredrated]

It's that bad, but as long as we are the most manipulated and lied-to people on the face of the planet your revolution will never start, making the 2nd ammendment just a sop to people that think they are ultimately in control

Re:Finance companies control legislation.

[shutdown -p now]

Anyone who says hunting rifles and handguns can't stop tanks and jets should visit Libya

You mean, the country where people with assault rifles and mortars (not just hunting rifles and handguns!) couldn't stop tanks and jets, and were consistently pushed back, until foreign governments with more tanks and more jets and a stake in the conflict intervened on their behalf?

Re:Finance companies control legislation.

[Uberbah]

Which is exactly why the Constitution protects the right of citizens to bear arms. Otherwise all you have are foxes and coyotes negotiating over the rights of rabbits. Anyone who says hunting rifles and handguns can't stop tanks and jets should visit Libya. Syria is next.

Did you go home, dig out your copy of Red Dawn and fondle yourself after writing that?

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[TheSpoom]

I think this may be the first relevant BitCoin post I've seen here.

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, you can turn $50 into BTC today, and on Wednesday they can easily cash it in for $25 :)

Easy solution

[93 Escort Wagon]

Pay 'em in Bitcoins.

Torrents?

[poity]

Isn't that pretty much free?

Re:Torrents?

[Anonymous Coward]

Then poor Julian wouldn't be able to see his face in this newspapers and make millions off of the effort. *tear*

It is not so simple

[bussdriver]

The corporate media and the fickle public will NEVER digest a huge leak -- it has to be slowly leaked out over time so if we hear anything we hear the SAME bit of leak information at the same time everywhere and not too much that it gets skipped over.

If you dump it all out on a friday, you'll only hear about some diplomat screwing some presidents wife for the next few weeks and maybe a couple things the station doesn't mind reporting. Then the whole thing dies down and they don't talk about the rest of it anymore. Something like that happens all the time; especially on friday media dumps. (most people don't read the paper; tv, radio are not watched friday night or much on the weekend either.)

Re:It is not so simple

[BitZtream]

So basically what you're saying is they have to manipulate it into something other than what it is for people to care?

Re:It is not so simple

[Anonymous Coward]

The corporate media and the fickle public will NEVER digest a huge leak

Maybe not, but the press will get there at some point. Someone will pick up something of note, post it on a blog or local newspaper feedback, if worthy, the information will snowball until the mass media machine picks up on it.

That's assuming there's something in the docs. These should have been out at the start of the year, or maybe it was at the end of the last year. Nothing yet, suggesting there's nothing there.

Re:It is not so simple

[VGPowerlord]

The corporate media and the fickle public will NEVER digest a huge leak -- it has to be slowly leaked out over time so if we hear anything we hear the SAME bit of leak information at the same time everywhere and not too much that it gets skipped over.

The West Wing TV show even had an episode called "Take Out The Trash Day" 11 years ago about dumping a bunch of stories out at the same time so reporters have less "column inches" for them.

While "column inches" is now antiquated, it still translates into reporting hours.

Re:It is not so simple

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure it's very simple, Mr. Assange's and Wikileaks' business plan failed.

Mr. Assange and Wikileaks' plan is that if you dumped all the data (it's not information, information is organized data in an easily retrivable and understandable format) he and his orginzation would be killing the golden goose.

Mr. Assange and the other Wikileak's staff thought by slowly leaking the data just like, and I don't believe I'm using this example, Kim Kardisians Wedding (PLEASE DON"T HATE ME FOR THIS, but hopfully we will know this by flipping through the TV's channel selection page, that some channel(s) is/are airing this every hour for the next 5 years, so just don't watch, and it will go away), it would make them lots of money. Where as if they dumped it all on the web news orginzations likeNBC, CBS, ABC, Neww York Times, etc would dig over this stuff for the next year and whenever there was a slow news day they would profit, and Wikileaks would have done all of the dirty work.

Re:It is not so simple

[FingerSoup]

Not exactly... What he's saying is, bring the information to public over the same amount of time for the inappropriate transgressions to occur, so their impact isn't minimized by the short release time. Hearing the methodical nature and time consuming preparation that a serial killer takes, and showing the pain he caused over years of activity, will have more of an impact on readers than stating "Hey look, this guy killed 30 people. Here's a list of his victims". Both sound bad, but saying "This guy killed 30 people. This is his first victim" today, and a week later, stating "This is his second victim", until the killer is caught... Its still a conveyance of the facts, and by putting a spotlight on the victims, it shows how heinous his crimes were.

Manipulating the speed of release to match the nature of the crime, is not wrong... It keeps it to the forefront, so people give as much a damn about it as if it were happening in front of them. It keeps the issue relevant.

Having said that, it also gives the opportunity for the transgressor to come clean, and own up to what's been going on. Slow release can help or hinder the organization based off how they respond. If they own up to more than what was leaked, and show that these actions have led to reform, then whistle blowers have done their job, and they can stop releasing information. If the transgressors LIE to the public, then the whistle blowers can lay the smack-down on them.

Re:It is not so simple

[IgnoramusMaximus]

So basically what you're saying is they have to manipulate it into something other than what it is for people to care?

That is why I say Western "democracies" are doomed. A combination of carefully nurtured apathy and misdirection onto utter nonsense (sporting events, "reality" shows etc) and a coordinared effort by the oligarchy-controlled "free press" has pretty much irreversibly poisoned the whole thing to the point that only a major shock would snap the populace out of it. And the powers that be are doing everything possible to make sure that even by then it will be too late.

And if you do not believe me, just look at the blatant violations of the most basic clauses of the US Constitution (the ones that got the Founding Fathers incited to revolution in the first place) by the US government and the accompanying lack of any reaction whatsoever from the dazed public....

In Jefferson's time blood would be flowing in the streets if such a thing was tried. Today there is some twitching about to find the remote and change the channel ... ooh, the Bumville Asshats are playing the Barnburg Jackasses for the Stupid Cup! Who cares about all that concentration of money and power thing!

Better yet, not only there is near total apathy but a slew of apologists come out sneering dismissively to defend the indefensible as "necessary measures" or "its all not so bad compared to North Korea" etc.

Re:It is not so simple

[Crock23A]

There was a whole episode of The West Wing that revolved around this idea. They called it sending it out with the trash.

Re:It is not so simple

[blair1q]

You mean it translates to source counts on Google News.

The stories with the most active sources get on the front page.

But people who habitually read the news see them all anyway.

People who don't are noise in the democracy.

Re:It is not so simple

[dpilot]

And it's obvious that since his business plan has failed, the data he was peddling is worthless, and no possible good could be done by releasing it. In fact, it discredits the entire idea of reporting on evil by Established Power.

So therefore, from here on out, we should trust our Leaders and what they say.

I'm glad we've figured this out, finally. Some of the things I was hearing from Wikileaks were kind of worrisome.

Re:It is not so simple

[mgblst]

Yeah, only if you are retarded could you ever get that from what he is saying. congratulations.

Re:It is not so simple

[Webz]

What viable solutions are there to address said apathy?

Re:It is not so simple

[rapidreload]

Woah. Sounds more like you prefer to wallow in pity at the state of humanity instead of just accepting that humans are who they are (greedy bastards) and actually ENJOY things like the sporting events you decry as "nonsence".

Accept it and move on - too late to make it any better (you can't convince millions of people all to realize what you know), so no reason to whine about it when this is all we've got. Otherwise you'll go through like grumpy and angry, and that's no way to live life son.

Re:It is not so simple

[Anonymous Coward]

Which is exactly why certain nations are rapidly becoming more fucked up, as larger than 51% of their overall populations are noise rather than signal, but they still vote. This is also why political tactics these days tend to focus around statements and actions that will draw the attention of exactly the demographic you're dismissing.

Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large numbers. Especially when they can be convinced that they should want to remain stupid.

Re:It is not so simple

[Anonymous Coward]

The corporate media and the fickle public will NEVER digest a huge leak -- it has to be slowly leaked out over time so if we hear anything we hear the SAME bit of leak information at the same time everywhere and not too much that it gets skipped over.

The West Wing TV show even had an episode called "Take Out The Trash Day" 11 years ago about dumping a bunch of stories out at the same time so reporters have less "column inches" for them.

While "column inches" is now antiquated, it still translates into reporting hours.

If anybody wants a perfect example, look back at the Clinton/Monica Lewinski episode. Nobody was reporting about how Clinton was launching cruise missiles at training camps run by some upstart organization that nobody had heard of. Al-Qaeda, they were called, lead by some random guy nobody cared about called Osama Bin Laden, who had been issuing threats about blowing up our embassies and naval vessels. Well, to be fair I did see it mentioned casually, buried in the back pages of the paper, while the Blue Dress took the headlines.

Re:It is not so simple

[Skuld-Chan]

Major failure of society - not at all unlike what the Romans, Germans and Japanese went through.

Re:It is not so simple

[bussdriver]

I agree 110%. Its the nature of democracies to end in despotism at their own hands. Ben Franklin ended the constitutional convention by pointing this out and how our nation will die a similar fate.
It can't be made perfect so it lasts forever. The better it does the sooner the apathy sets in. The hope of the system is to create relatively civil revolutions to the up/down cycle all human civilizations have; to replace revolutionary wars with political ones.

The problem isn't sports themselves; its the HUGE distractions and promotion of them along with ALL other forms of escapism and civic irresponsibility ("individuality".)

The information age also is a HUGE problem and probably the only new part of the history repeat we are experiencing (except maybe some modern applied psychology tricks.) Everybody reads now and most have internet access and many other sources of media to access-- MORE INFORMATION available than at any point in human history. There is TOO much junk information it takes more effort to find the decent parts or even the true stuff.

Media Campaign

[mrops]

Seems the Media campaign against got to you, puppet!

Quite. This is how politics is shaped.

[unity100]

A handful of companies can make sure that you get the media attention, or not. a handful of other companies can decide whether you get the funds to be able to get the media attention, or not. So it goes.

This is why all the representative democracies on the planet are failing. Because the only ones that can be seen and elected, are those that the powerful few private interests allow people to see.

Wikileaks has been a prime example that exhibited how crooked our media/finance system, and how they are able to limit everyone's alleged liberties at their private whim - You are only as free as the size of your wallet, and then again only if you are compatible with those who would allow/bar you from using your wallet.

Re:Quite. This is how politics is shaped.

[BitZtream]

A handful of companies can make sure that you get the media attention, or not. a handful of other companies can decide whether you get the funds to be able to get the media attention, or not. So it goes.

Yea, that was true right up until the Internet got popular. No longer is it true, you can find safe harbor somewhere to post just about anything, and with a little effort you can probably even find someone else to pay for it.

Wikileaks has been a prime example that exhibited how crooked people can be while flying a flag of good intentions. Do you REALLY think they couldn't publish all this shit in a torrent and solve all of their hosting problems? If you do, you're a moron ... oh wait, too late, already flagged you for that one.

They did massive amounts of work with 0 funding, now they need $3.5 million? Why is it the less they accomplish the more resources they require.

You've been ripped off and just aren't smart enough to see it yet.

Re:Quite. This is how politics is shaped.

[gknoy]

you can find safe harbor somewhere to post just about anything, and with a little effort you can probably even find someone else to pay for it.

You can? It seems like TPB's had a relatively hard time finding a safe harbor. I'm amazed that Wikileaks has been able to maintain a net connection.

what public opinion ?

[unity100]

Probably only those who are in usa ? i dont see public opinion swinging against them anywhere in europe, or middle east, china or japan ...

noone

[unity100]

for, these watchers are not the kind of watchers that can destroy cities like in the movie.

these are not watchers, these are observers, and talkers. and what they are talking, is what they are finding that we are specifically and nefariously prevented from finding out - what is done against us behind our backs by powerful corporations and governments.

in this filth-ridden, corrupt times, it is a dire necessity to have such a function in society. and that does not need to be 'watched', but encouraged.

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[elewton]

That's why anyone using Bitcoin seriously at the moment should use an exchange to instant sell their Coins for a more stable currency, and buy Bitcoins only exactly when they want to transfer them.

Holding Bitcoins is for speculators.

No one can operate at the level without allies

[AmElder]

Wikileaks has taken on the two most powerful kinds of organisations in the world, the pillars of the international political system and the global marketplace. It directly damaged the interests of the government of the world most powerful sovereign state (still the USA) and made noises about hurting corporate financial institutions. That's a tall order for any organisation.

Wikileaks put itself in a particularly hard spot because it hasn't played well with others. It took an 'our way or the highway' approach to disclosure. It also released information that no one was asking for, so it didn't make allies with its disclosures. Moreover, it didn't support or enable calls for specific kinds of disclosure from existing organisation. Now it's isolated and atrophying because no one can operate at that level without allies for long.

Re:No one can operate at the level without allies

[Anonymous Coward]

They have many allies, but they have been cut off from helping wikileaks. Is there some way to route around the damage? We could ship cash or even bullion if we had to ;-)

Re:No one can operate at the level without allies

[martin-boundary]

Wikileaks should split itself into two BabyWikileaks. The first one can get funded by the Chinese, as long as it leaks information exclusively about the West. The second one leaks information only about China, and they'll be funded by ...

Don't worry if they win

[plopez]

the "Conservative" SCOTUS will strike it down.

Further proof

[Anonymous Coward]

that Assange is only in it for his own interests.

i dont understand

[Anonymous Coward]

can someone explain what this financial blockade is? I can't figure it out. I read both articles and its so vague that it doesn't make any sense. All I hear is a 'financial blockade' is hurting our donations. I am lost. What are these companies supposedly doing to prevent people from giving him money. I am lost. Are they block fund transfers? They can pay with a cashiers check.

Poor Books Sales are the actual problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Mr Assange has become a complete spin doctor. His actual problem is that he planned to bank roll Wikileaks with the profits from his book sales, and truthfully the book isn't selling. Also, Mr Assange and the other leaders of Wikileaks believe that their would be a ground swell of donation after leaking bank records. Which also has not happened.

Mr Assange your actual problem is that your business model failed. Donations and books sales are not what you projected, and now you're attacking the banks for freezing your assets (approximately 100,000 Euros in total), and PayPal for canceling your PayPal account for "violation of the PayPal Acceptable Use Policy, which states that our payment service cannot be used for any activities that encourage, promote, facilitate or instruct others to engage in illegal activity." This is due to PayPal not wanting to be indited on United States RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act of 1961) changes.This has nothing to due with the banks, but the illegal activity that Wikileaks promotes.

So, are Wikileaks admitting defeat or greed?

[Rogerborg]

The Man cut the money hose to stop us leaking, so we'll show him... why, by golly, we'll not leak anything until we get more money in our pockets.

Yes, well done, very convincing.

Re:So, are Wikileaks admitting defeat or greed?

[paperdiesel]

Mod parent up, please! This is perhaps the most maddening aspect of the whole ordeal, and the parent nailed it.

Re:So, are Wikileaks admitting defeat or greed?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Man cut the money hose to stop us leaking, so we'll show him... why, by golly, we'll not leak anything until we get more money in our pockets.

Yes, well done, very convincing.

this way the terrorists win!

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[jandrese]

Given that there is a $5000/day limit on the Bitcoin exchange, I don't think that's going to be a viable way to launder the money. The whole point of that limit is to prevent people from moving money too fast and showing people the inevitable crash (and why it's crashing veeerrry sloooowly) so the early "investors" get a steady paycheck until the money runs out. If Assange were to try to use it, he would end up losing a fairly hefty percentage of every dollar/euro/pound he put in it due to the constant downward pressure on the coin and the overhead from the various middlemen all trying to prop up their own bank accounts.

Action

[Oligonicella]

According to Assange the group was taking 'pre-litigation action'....

We call that voting with your money. Perfectly moral and legal.

obviously it can, and it probably should

[Anonymous Coward]

'A handful of US finance companies cannot be allowed to decide how the whole world votes with its pocket

I have no problem with Assange publishing Wikileaks. But the US government has a right to interfere with Assange's financial transactions through US banks until the case against him is resolved. He is welcome to use non-US institutions if he likes.

Re:obviously it can, and it probably should

[king neckbeard]

no they don't. The relevant Congressional power is to regulate interstate and international commerce. This doesn't fall within regulation.

Re:obviously it can, and it probably should

[shentino]

How does the US government have the right to interfere?

Didn't we just get a supreme court ruling that donations are freedom of speech?

I'd call supporting wikileaks a political activity.

The feds can't have it both ways.

the heavy stones of moral blindness

[epine]

Cause and effect proclamations about cloak and dagger are mostly just a Rorschach over eigenvalues of paranoia.

You're effectively asserting that if he hadn't pissed off the banks, the money would not have been choked off, which is by no means clear. I think major banks, as institutions founded on secrecy and power, would be remarkably obtuse to take no alarm long before the BoA cross-hairs made them front line participants.

I will concede that anger does tend to cut through institutional inertia. When the threat is less overt, your adversaries might wish to not be seen wielding their power directly.

Banks are extremely reluctant to suggest that criminality or public disfavour of the recipient is grounds for non-payment: it's their least favorite publicity to admit they have a list of reasons for taking your money then not giving it back. Trust in reciprocity is their entire business model for accumulating their bankroll. Banks pretty much go to the wall, a very thick and heavy wall, before conceding in public that conveyance of funds is an act of discretion.

Re:the heavy stones of moral blindness

[erroneus]

The whole world is waking up to the control and influence relationship that the banks and wall street have over government. Happen to notice the occupy movement is going global, not just US nation-wide?

You're talking bollocks, kid

[Anonymous Coward]

And you're imagining what you want to see.

Financial Mismanagement?

[perpenso]

Since all the major credit card companies are based in the United States, they are free to push their national interests through financial attacks.

However this seems an inconvenience, not a death sentence for a political organization. People could send paper checks. Some other group could aggregate online donations and deliver a paper check. Independent groups raise money for a cause and then donate to organizations supporting that cause all the time.

I think Occam's razor would suggest that Wikileaks was financially mismanaged (as in things like the above not embezzlement) or that the Wikileaks organization has been discredited and the donations don't exist at the required level. Blaming a lack of credit card processing seems a little bit like the wall street CEOs blaming the weather. Maybe is was really how the organization was managed?

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think Occam's razor would suggest that Wikileaks was financially mismanaged (as in things like the above not embezzlement) or that the Wikileaks organization has been discredited and the donations don't exist at the required level. Blaming a lack of credit card processing seems a little bit like the wall street CEOs blaming the weather. Maybe is was really how the organization was managed?

Occam's razor doesn't mean simplifying things to such a ludicrous level of dichotomies. Yes, mismanagement must be considered, and bad publicity too would have an impact. It's asinine though, as you did in your analogy, to dismiss the loss of credit card processing as being a trivial thing. Raising funds online isn't terribly easy, even with a fairly well engaged community. Credit card processing allows for a nice and quick donation. Relying on people to mail cheques is nowhere near as reliable as catching people with a "donate now" button on the website. There are workarounds, none of which comes close to replacing the loss of the drive-by donations they'd have received. This is demonstrably a pretty serious loss - not something to which one would say "Oh well" before switching to a workaround that'll be anywhere near as effective.

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[FsG]

Unfortunately, paper checks don't travel well outside the country. This is because they generally clear through the nation's central bank. International wire transfers are expensive and troublesome, so much so that 99% of potential donors will change their minds about donating.

When Visa, MC, and PayPal block you, moving money internationally becomes reeeealy hard.

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[perpenso]

Unfortunately, paper checks don't travel well outside the country. This is because they generally clear through the nation's central bank. International wire transfers are expensive and troublesome, so much so that 99% of potential donors will change their minds about donating.

Again, independent groups seem to have no problem collecting donations for a cause and donating these funds as a single aggregate sum. Wire transfer expenses are inconsequential in such cases. Think of a U.S. on-campus group that collected for tsunami relief and then sent what they raised to the Red Cross of Japan.

I can't help but wonder if the current situation is a result of fund raising naivety or if the credit card processing issue was seen as a publicity/marketing tool. In the later case perhaps there was an expectation of big checks from celebrities or lots of local proxy organizations doing fund raising.

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[perpenso]

I think Occam's razor would suggest that Wikileaks was financially mismanaged (as in things like the above not embezzlement) or that the Wikileaks organization has been discredited and the donations don't exist at the required level. Blaming a lack of credit card processing seems a little bit like the wall street CEOs blaming the weather. Maybe is was really how the organization was managed?

Occam's razor doesn't mean simplifying things to such a ludicrous level of dichotomies. Yes, mismanagement must be considered, and bad publicity too would have an impact. It's asinine though, as you did in your analogy, to dismiss the loss of credit card processing as being a trivial thing. Raising funds online isn't terribly easy, even with a fairly well engaged community. Credit card processing allows for a nice and quick donation. Relying on people to mail cheques is nowhere near as reliable as catching people with a "donate now" button on the website. There are workarounds, none of which comes close to replacing the loss of the drive-by donations they'd have received. This is demonstrably a pretty serious loss - not something to which one would say "Oh well" before switching to a workaround that'll be anywhere near as effective.

I think you overestimate the issue. For example consider the ease at which various U.S. based groups collected money on behalf of tsunami relief and then delivered the proceeds to the Red Cross of Japan. Web surfers could click on a "donate now" button that went to a local organization and that organization could eventually write a single check. Again, it seems more of an issue of organization and management.

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[Joce640k]

When Visa, MC, and PayPal block you, moving money internationally becomes reeeealy hard.

Western union?

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[LunaticTippy]

Postal money orders are pretty versatile. They're one of the cheapest ways to send money, cheaper than paypal or credit cards. If the recipient can't swing a US bank to deposit them, the post office sells international money orders for US$4.25.

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[fredmosby]

Web surfers could click on a "donate now" button that went to a local organization and that organization could eventually write a single check.

Wikileaks had systems like that, the US government just shut down payments to the organizations that were accepting money for Wikileaks.

Why would the government go through the trouble of shutting down payments to wikileaks if it wouldn't hurt wikileaks financially?

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[reason]

Again, much more hassle for individual donators than a simple online transaction. And perhaps most of their donations originally came from individuals sending $5 or $10 at a time, in which case $4.25 plus postage is big.

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[perpenso]

Web surfers could click on a "donate now" button that went to a local organization and that organization could eventually write a single check.

Wikileaks had systems like that, the US government just shut down payments to the organizations that were accepting money for Wikileaks.

Citation?

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[fredmosby]

Here you go.

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[perpenso]

Here you go.

"PayPal turned off donations". It sounds as if the foundation aggregated $1.2M worth of small web based donations before being "turned off". Once "turned off" they could have written a check and a new organization could have taken over. PayPal is most likely being reactive not proactive so Wikileaks, or their friends, could have constructed a series of proxies. These fundraising efforts were after all a violation of corporate policy and not any law?

Re:Financial Mismanagement?

[Builder]

Western Union blocked them too.

Technology is not always the answer

[perpenso]

The solution to all of this is very simple, but sadly the general population, and many of the journalists who are paid to corral their thoughts, is even more simple. If half of all the people who follow the Wikileaks account adopted Bitcoin ...

Technology is not always the answer. A far simpler solution is to mail a paper check, either as an individual or a group that raised money (possibly aggregating online donations) for a cause.

Wait

[Dunbal]

So you can't get credit card deposits. What is stopping you from doing it the old way, you know, with cheques, money orders and wire transfers?

Cause and Effect

[VGPowerlord]

It's called cause and effect.

Note that these are paraphrases:

Assange 2010: "I've got secret documents from two US-based financial organizations that I may give to the press."

Assange 2011: "We don't have enough money to release any more documented due to a blockade by US-based financial organizations."

Duh, what did you think would happen?

Here's the REAL story:

[MrWin2kMan]

Julian has all these documents ready to go to blow the lid off the financial crisis, the conduct of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the sexual proclivities of one nominal political figure or another, and yet because he's not getting enough money donated to his 'cause' he can't publish them? Sounds more like to me that he's strictly in it for the shakedown, if not of the people who are the objects of the leaks, then the sheeples who think they'll learn something by reading them. I guess he needs to try and maintain his undeserved high profile lifestyle somehow...

Sounds like whinging but at least it's something

[jago25_98]

Wikileaks wikileaks, is this all people hear can they consider any other method? If I was cynical I'd say that Wikileaks was setup or subverted to discourage people leaking, to change people's perception online. It sounds like whinging but it's good to see attention given to the financial system and to have it so clear.

There's Freenet, eepsites, tor hosted sites and Bitcoin. No need for Wikileaks, post direct and then leak.

Perhaps this can help OccupyWallstreet people to stop whinging and start doing, starting by takening a long hard look inside ones own wallet.

Our Moral Police

[Anonymous Coward]

VISA, Matercard, et al, are acting as our "moral police" and are preventing money from being fed to organisations that they believe do not benefit the greater good of society.

They *will* do the same for paedophiles, etc, without informing them if they become aware that cards, accounts, etc, are being used to support such activities without any request from the police.

The significant problem with all of this "moral policing" is that we have no means for recourse if we are wrongly accused or *they* make a choice that is in *their* best interests and not ours.

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[zachie]

$5000/day makes almost 2 million per year, am I vastly underestimating the amount of money WikiLeaks needs? Also, how many bones did you break last time you crashed veeeerrry slooooowly?

Nonsense

[afabbro]

People manage to distribute petabytes of illegal material daily on bittorrent. Assange can't find a way to distribute megabytes?

The real story is that Assange can't make a dime off seeding a few torrents, and so he's not interested.

Re:Nonsense

[Anonymous Coward]

Rather, the media has the attention-span of a goldfish, and needs a steady stream of information instead beinh nuked with a torrent. They'll sift through the torrent for the juiciest bit, report that bit in synchrony and cast the small fries away, cut to commercial, and then back to reporting on washed out hollywood-stars. That is what they're trying to accomplish.

Only a fool would think the whole torrent (or rather the password for the encrypted torrent already out there) wont hit the net if there are no alternatives.

Re:Nonsense

[Anonymous Coward]

This, this, so much this. Assange is a righteous little prick of a man. He can't believe the world doesn't love him, and he's far more interested in grand standing then in actually DOING anything.
 
3.5 million over 12 months to operate a website with hardly any traffic at all? You are joking right? Lets see a budget, itemized. Until then, I don't really care that Assange is getting his funding cut off. He's apparently been using it for hookers and blow anyway.
 
I support the concept behind Wikileaks. I utterly hate the PEOPLE behind it. I'll bet you Anonymous would be happy to do the job, for FREE.

Re:Nonsense

[Anonymous Coward]

The real story is people 'like you', have had your day, and now it's time for us, to finish up taking names.

So keep talking.. while you can.

-- The InterNet.. it's a terribly thing to waist... Let's arrest Bill Gates, and shut down MicroSoft immediatly.

Re:Nonsense

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you an idiot? Where do you think the material comes from? Do you expect all the people work for no money at all? How do you pay rent and the lawyers? I bet they have some other expenses besides hosting some material online.

If you have some actual dirt, show the evidence! And when you don't, shut the fuck up and stop providing comfort for the enemy.

Re:Nonsense

[Anonymous Coward]

People manage to distribute petabytes of illegal material daily on bittorrent. Assange can't find a way to distribute megabytes?

The real story is that Assange can't make a dime off seeding a few torrents, and so he's not interested.

So then again, how can you fight against money when you need money? Doesn't make too much sense to me. I don't know about the lawyers or about the protection costs, but usually whenever there are large amounts of money something is just not what it looks like. And for the average citizen this IS a fairly large amount of money, everywhere on Earth. Anyway, watching bits of the real story with real persons was cute and informative.

Re:Nonsense

[Anonymous Coward]

People manage to distribute petabytes of illegal material daily on bittorrent. Assange can't find a way to distribute megabytes?

The real story is that Assange can't make a dime off seeding a few torrents, and so he's not interested.

This means the financial blockage is working. Sad.

I'd like to see Assange "suspended"

[WCMI92]

By a sniper rifle.

This man and his cohorts are enemies of the United States and should be treated accordingly.

Re:I'd like to see Assange "suspended"

[wierd_w]

As a fellow american, I wholeheartedly disagree with you.

The united states was founded on the core principles of liberty, justice, freedom, and the soverignty of its people.

The current us government pays halfassed lipservice to half of that, and blatantly flaunts the other half.

Assange can be a dickhead, that it his perogative. I don't mind that he is a dickhead. However, the sanitizing light he shines on the canerous boils of our ntion ARE in our nation's best interest. Jingoism, and blind adoration are what turned an innocent germany into a stage of obscene abuses of power. This can, has, and always will happen where money, power, corruption hide beneath a gleaming vaneer of propaganda and nationalistic fervor. (Be it ancient rome, with senators gobbling up resources and lands, making the whole population destitute, or us senators doing the same using BoA as a proxy to illegally forclose on people in good credit standing as a common practice.)

While I might see assange, the man, as a foolish platinum haired egotist, there is no law against being an asshole. Wikileaks, the organization, has done wonders to upset the consolodation of power that has been trending away from common citizens like you or I. Personally, I feel that if our soldiers are commiting attrocities, the people they have victimized under the guise of war deserve the justice they demand. Our armed forces are not magical just because they are american in origin. Calling out our government for covering up attrocities, either foriegn or domestic, militarily or financially, DOES tarnish the veneer of golden splenor that was painted on by the propganda machine, but in doing so it permits us to see the horrible rot going on beneath.

If the appearance of that rot angers you, the action to take is to destroy the rot, not to shoot the messenger and ostridge-plant your face in the dirt and shout about libel so as to shoot the messenger. It is only libel when it is untrue, and so far, as far as I know, the leaked cables and documents have panned out legitimate every time.

You are right, something does reek of treachery, but it isn't assange or wikileaks. It is our cocksucjing beholdenness to the choad of multinational interests, banks, and domestic corruptions that they thrive in.

America has sucked on that diseased organ, and now our nation has ghonorrhea of the mouth. No amount of breathmint is going to make it stop stinking and being inflamed. To do that, we have to stopb giving BJs to multinationals, and use heavy use of antibiotics in the form of radical transparancy. The quaint notions of our country as a fragile virgin are long past. The expose' of our nation as a crackwhore sucking dick to curry favor is not a surprise to anyone but our own deluded populace.

Again, if this angers you, the correct action is to solve the problem, and not to accuse the messenger of libel, especially when said messenger has the equivalent of the clinic's pathology report on hand to prove the charge.

America is no longer a great country, and has not been for quite awhile, and the reason it has ceased to be so is because we have allowed our leaders to sell it into prostitution.

Get over yourself, and get off your self riteous ass, and do something about the actual problem, and stop pretending that if we all just ignore the problem, that the blisters in our mouths will go away on their own.

Re:I'd like to see Assange "suspended"

[Anonymous Coward]

You know. . . .

If not for whistle blowers, you would never have known the Telcos were handing a feed of all that data directly to the NSA.
If not for whistle blowers, the Pentagon Papers do not exist.

Or Watergate. . . . or Israel's Nuclear Program. The Olympic Bid Scandal, Bernard Madoff, Worldcom, Enron, the lack of
action done prior to 9/11, TSA's plan to secretly remove Fed Air Marshalls from flights due to hotel expenses, man. . . .

The list goes on and ON.

Go here ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_whistleblowers )

Go read that page then sit there and tell me we don't need folks who have the SPINE to stand up against what they consider
to be illegal or immoral actions that would otherwise remain hidden from the general public.

DO NOT HIDE YOUR ILLEGAL ACTIONS BEHIND A BUREAUCRATIC CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM.

In my opinion, doing so is far more treasonous than disclosing valid secrets as the officials in charge are supposed to
be trustworthy enough to refrain from engaging in the practice to begin with.

If you're willing to use violence to deal with Assange, then you damn well better be ready to do the same for the officials
who use the system to hide their illegal activities. The problem is, we would have to replace the entire government
afterwards. Too few would remain behind to run it.

Re:I'd like to see Assange "suspended"

[robinsonne]

By a sniper rifle. This man and his cohorts are enemies of the United States and should be treated accordingly.

This is one of the saddest comments I've ever seen on Slashdot while I've been here. What kind of world does the parent live in where anyone who disagrees with people in power should be murdered?

One of the entire points of the United States and democracies/republics/non-dictatorships in general is in the rule of law, and not just arbitrary death for "enemies of the state."

Re:I'd like to see Assange "suspended"

[Anonymous Coward]

And it exactly because of that type of attitude that US has such a great image out there. Congratulations.

Re:I'd like to see Assange "suspended"

[Nom du Keyboard]

By a sniper rifle. This man and his cohorts are enemies of the United States and should be treated accordingly.

This is one of the saddest comments I've ever seen on Slashdot while I've been here.

I agree with the man with the sniper rifle. How many people have to die because of Assange's leaks before the immediate parent of this post will decide that he is a danger to too many people? The financial boycott has finally taken down Wikileaks -- for now.

Turning blue.

[Anonymous Coward]

... And until you unblock delivery of our finances, we'll hold our breath until we turn BLUE!!!

SO THERE!!!!!

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[jandrese]

According to TFA, 3.5 Million a year. So you are short by about half, especially when you consider just how much money you would lose through continuous use of BTC.

Bitcoins and Forex

[Anonymous Coward]

There's nothing, AFAIK, to prevent a Real World scenario of BTC being used in monetary transactions.

All it would takes is to be given BTC the same treatment as Forex ("foreign exchange") trading.

Due to the apparent number of people (mostly, the tech avant-gard) interested in it, and being the coins of today fiduciary objects (based on trust), I don't see why some quant/financial geek couldn't establish some calculations in order to establish some force conversion rates.

However, I'm not an economist or trader, so I might be wrong.

Anarchy

[jbolden]

I like what wikileaks did in the cables situation. It actually improved my attitude about the US was doing in demonstrating that US diplomats were in fact acting the way they had claimed to be. I like their other leaks...

But wikileaks has constantly been an anti-establishment, essentially criminal enterprise which is anarchist. Why would they expect governments to intervene against US banks on their behalf?

no, your way off.

[bussdriver]

People to care? people are ignorant. You can't care if you do not know. The whole issue is INFORMING people in a system which fails time after time to properly inform the public. WTF? How can you think that gaming the system to INFORM is turning it into something other than what it is??

Often it requires DEPTH to understand it and get properly upset about it. If the corruption leaks for Tunisia were simple short headlines about US corrupting their government, it may not be enough to motivate people already fed up-- it wasn't new; they knew the system was broken already; what was needed was enough to push past a threshold so something would be done about it--- it contributed to the outrage and possibly wouldn't have met the threshold to get a sustainable democracy movement. It had an international focus put upon it. I don't know jack about Tunisia but when the leak came out I heard mention of it; it had coverage -- when I'd probably not have heard about it otherwise. Hell, in many places the news is limited or restricted so getting outside coverage is the best way to reach some people.

There's no outrage for the reasons I mentioned

[concealment]

It's not public opinion that's starving Wikileaks at the moment

If public opinion were in favor of Wikileaks, there would be a massive outcry against this financial starvation.

However, since Wikileaks accidentally leaked information that put innocent people in harm's way, public opinion has swung against them and as a result, we're not seeing much opposition to this financial starvation.

Had Assange and Co. behaved perfectly ethically, you would have seen much more defense of them throughout the time Wikileaks has been in the news.

Re:There's no outrage for the reasons I mentioned

[JoeMerchant]

Had Assange and Co. behaved perfectly ethically, you would have seen much more defense of them throughout the time Wikileaks has been in the news.

Had Assange and Co. behaved perfectly ethically, you would not have seen them in the news.

So,

[WindBourne]

Assange who has operated as a fence for stolen property (as opposed to journalists who make intelligent discussions but do not release information that can and will get others murdered ), is gripping that American companies is destroying him. Yet, he points to a number of western nations. Well, there is an alternative. He should consider moving to China, Iran, north Korea, Venezuela, or even Somalia. There, he will be able to continue wikileaks. And I am sure that the host gov will not mind if he receives stolen property about that gov. and simply dumps on the net.

Re:So,

[Anonymous Coward]

not wanting to release information that can and will get others murdered, might be the reason wikileaks needs money, they can't just release it in bulk someone needs to read through all of it and redact the parts that may cause unnecessary harm, that takes time and money

Bitcoin is the solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would they still want to use Paypal or credit cards at all? If they simply encourage donations in bitcoins, this will solve many problems. Also, as long as they use bitcoins for their own purchases they wouldn't even be affected by any fluctuations in exchange rate towards some other currency. In the meantime I use bitcoins for most of my online business - its becoming pretty popular and since there are no transaction fees, I find it surprisingly easy to get local businesses to start accepting it.

Calendar matters too

[ThatsNotPudding]

As stupid as it sounds, don't do it during the US holiday months (November, December) or during March Madness. First week of January might be good, as people will be pissed off about the weather and their Christmas bills.

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[Stormalong]

No, they have all been relevant. This is just the first time you realized WHY.

This sort of thing is EXACTLY what the bitcoin creator was thinking about when it was being developed. Its *my* money. No one else should get to decide who I can send it to.

Brussels

[arnodf]

So Brussels is a country now or am I missing something?

obvious things to try

[Anonymous Coward]

they need to learn about 2 things:
1. use bitcoins to accept donations. after receiving, immediately sell them on some exchange and you got the money. some 3rd person can get the money who is not under surveillance.
2. use TOR to provide the information. can't be tracked so no one will know where exactly the servers are so gov't can't make the provider to close access. even if they found one location, just resume from another one - no need to change addresses, no matter where you are, all the users can see you via old address..

Ha! Convenient?

[HalAtWork]

It's inconvenient either way...

no.

[unity100]

Wikileaks has been a prime example that exhibited how crooked people can be while flying a flag of good intentions. Do you REALLY think they couldn't publish all this shit in a torrent and solve all of their hosting problems? If you do, you're a moron ... oh wait, too late, already flagged you for that one.

it doesnt. there is no way to reach these people, who actually constitute the majority of voters who decide things, than through the media monopoly that has their tv screens.

and to do that, you need to romp up so much controversy that they WILL have to broadcast news about you. else, you'd remain as a ghost, like how some presidential candidates in current u.s. elections are apparently being made into.

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[TheSpoom]

No, not really. I know what BitCoin is, there's been no big epiphany here. It has been massively overposted on Slashdot as a solution for all of the world's ills. But yes, it's good as an anonymous payment method.

Nonsense

[kaizendojo]

I heard the true culprit was LemmiWinks.

Assange is Going Bonkers

[Nom du Keyboard]

Assange showed how out of touch he is when he blamed the problem today on right-wing Washington.

Yes, you heard that right: right-wing Washington. I almost drove off of the road laughing at that.

And, of course, he remains totally oblivious to the actual damage Wikileaks does. People die from his leaks and he doesn't even give it a second thought. With his form of thinking, I can believe that he actually did rape those Swedish women as they maintain.

Re:Assange is Going Bonkers

[shutdown -p now]

Well, Assange is a European, so on his political scale Washington should be somewhere centre-right, yes.

Re:Assange is Going Bonkers

[ZigMonty]

Assange is an Australian. But your point is still valid.

Re:Assange is Going Bonkers

[The Immutable]

The censorship capital of the first world is considered more left than leftist America? Do I have some kind of political dyslexia?

Re:Assange is Going Bonkers

[ZigMonty]

Censorship is orthogonal to left-right. Case in point Soviet Russia. It's only confusing if you think left == all that is good, and right == evil.

Also... it's a little rich calling Australia the censorship capital of the world. You must be very sheltered. In terms of freedom of the press, Australia is consistently ranked *higher* than the US.

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, let's send them virtual fake money, that will solve the problem.

Sounds familiar

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps they have been put on the OFAC list, thereby making it illegal for those financial institutions to do any transactions for them. It would also make them trap any incoming funds.

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[vlm]

the Bitcoin exchange

What in the world are you talking about? The ecosystem is a lot bigger than one exchange. Multiple exchanges, and anyone can accept private transactions. I'm not entirely certain what Julian plans to do with 3.5 million but presumably at least some small amount can be directly paid for via BTC. Certainly webhosting, stuff like that.

Also most activity is quite psuedo-anonymous. Thought experiment: Julian decides to exchange 3.5 million per day, with a 5000 limit, thats a perl script running 700 times creating a new BTC address, sending $5000 to each new address from the main addrs, and then each of the 700 new addrs sending $5000 to separate new exchange accounts to cash them in or exchange or whatever. We're talking about something a small desktop and an IT tech school kid can handle, we don't need a computing cluster or PHD for this.

If Assange were to try to use it, he would end up losing a fairly hefty percentage of every dollar/euro/pound he put in it

Its a bitCOIN not a bitBANK. I can turn $ into BTC practically instantly. I can send his address the BTC, and he can turn "his" BTC into someone elses BTC in exchange for "whatever". It takes maybe about an hour of work from I say go to he has "something". I have never sent Julian money but I have given friends gifts and its pretty straightforward.

People who are used to paypal via checking account payment going to ibanpal.eu or whatever are always horrifically confused with how fast BTC works. It doesn't take three weeks to clear and have three 5% commissions along the way. It takes about, eh, an hour, and the exchange rate simply doesn't change that fast. Frankly Julian can sleep all night (or whatever it is he does all night) and he will still lose far less on average than the current crop of international money changers charge...

Money buys power, power attracts money

[Anonymous Coward]

Do customers or suppliers control the relationship?

Both have control of each other, of course. Relatively benign control in the case of customers and suppliers, most of the time.

Entirely malevolent in the case of gov and entities with money.

They lost support

[Jazari]

They lost the support of a lot of people when they started naming names of innocent people and putting them in danger (eg: people who spoke out against Hezbollah in confidence). These people were risking a lot by speaking to US officials and had their lives put in danger for no good reason.

You can't really think America is run by the left

[WiiVault]

Umm... other than Obama, who is somewhat centrist, who controls the rest of Washington-- including the Supreme Court? Right-wingers. Heck most of them would tell you that (with pride), well except the Obama part. To most of the world calling Obama a centrist is kinda pushing it even, perhaps right leaning centrist would be a better definition? As for real liberal/lefties I'd say Dennis Kucinich is one of the few that springs to mind. The US has always been a pretty right-wing conservative country. I say this as a left-wing American because I think its pretty much the agreed upon reality from the perspective of the vast majority civilized society. Not that its a bad thing per se-- its our right to govern as we want. But lets not pretend that we live in a leftist society, or under some liberal government.

Good riddence.

[toddmbloom]

Julian Assange is a delusional egomaniac any way.

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[ShakaUVM]

>>According to TFA, 3.5 Million a year. So you are short by about half, especially when you consider just how much money you would lose through continuous use of BTC.

To be fair, 3 of the $3.5 million goes to Assange's travel budget, hookers, and blow, so the Bitcoin exchange ought to be sufficient for their actual hosting needs.

Starcraft!

[splerdu]

Even the most robust, most de-centralized organization will fall against a good drop on their mineral line.

kekekekekek

Release it, stop empire building.

[Anonymous Coward]

Just release the information and you don't need hosting - other people will host it for you.

What WikiLeaks is doing is self aggrandizement - dripping it out slowly so as to build fame and money for themselves. Just what they are complaining about

Re:BTC? Stamps? Gift Cards?

[Anonymous Coward]

If $3.5 million would be transferred using bitcoin, these would likely turn out to be more in the end. Because pumping $3.5 millions onto bitcoin/fiat exchange markets would most likely start a rally at some point. Coins bought before the rally would therefore be worth more.

Now for a more interesting question to ask: What services/goods can wikileaks buy directly with bitcoins?

Skimming orver this list: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Trade, I can think of the following:

  * VPS and other network services (also anonymous)
  * Coffee, Tee, Tobacco
  * something from silkroad (?)
  * Consulting
  * Web Design
  * Legal Services
  * ...

Complete transparency and honesty are lies

[wye43]

The human creatures are fundamentally based on hiding, lying and manipulating. Not just some, not the majority, but every.single.person on this entire planet.

Wikileaks is a travesty. A PR stunt. A joke. A play.