Mr World Press Freedom Day (Crikey)

[EFerrari]

As we were mulling over the idea of an editorial about WikiLeaks and the importance of the free flow of information, we stumbled across a media release this morning that captured the essence of the subject far better than we could put it …

New media has empowered citizens around the world to report on their circumstances, express opinions on world events, and exchange information in environments sometimes hostile to such exercises of individuals’ right to freedom of expression. At the same time, we are concerned about the determination of some governments to censor and silence individuals, and to restrict the free flow of information.

The author? Philip J. Crowley, assistant secretary, Bureau of Public Affairs, US Department of State.

The reason for the media release? An announcement that the US will host UNESCO’s World Press Freedom Day event in May 2011, in Washington, D.C.


http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/12/08/crikey-says-mr-world-press-freedom-day/

[EFerrari]

1. Amnesty International: Q&A: Wikileaks and freedom of expression

Q&A: Wikileaks and freedom of expression
9 December 2010

International controversy over the Wikileaks release of US diplomatic cables continues to rage. In recent days, Paypal, Visa and Mastercard have barred their users from donating to Wikileaks, alleging that the site may be engaged in illegal conduct. Amnesty International examines some of the human rights issues at stake.

Would prosecution of Julian Assange for releasing US government documents be a violation of the right to freedom of expression?

The US government has indicated since July 2010 that it is conducting a legal investigation into the actions of Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange for distributing secret documents. A range of US political figures have called for a criminal prosecution of Assange.

According to Amnesty International, criminal proceedings aimed at punishing a private person for communicating evidence about human rights violations can never be justified. The same is true with respect to information on a wide range of other matters of public interest.

http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?id=ENGNAU2010120919988&lang=e&rss=recentnews

[camerondel]

2. wikileaks

This certainly seems to have blown up around Wikileaks over the past few days, not sure how it all started though, it is all over the news. What is the illegal activity, does anyone know?

[EFerrari]

3. The media's authoritarianism and WikiLeaks

Friday, Dec 10, 2010 09:43 ET
The media's authoritarianism and WikiLeaks
By Glenn Greenwald

After I highlighted the multiple factual inaccuracies in Time's WikiLeaks article yesterday (see Update V) -- and then had an email exchange with its author, Michael Lindenberger -- the magazine has now appended to the article what it is calling a "correction." In reality, the "correction" is nothing of the sort; it is instead a monument to the corrupted premise at the heart of American journalism.

Initially, note that Time has refused to correct its blatantly false claim that WikiLeaks has published "thousands of classified State Department cables" and posted "thousands of secret diplomatic cables" when, in reality, they've posted only 1,269 of the more than 250,000 cables they possess: less than 1/2 of 1 %. It's true that they provided roughly 251,000 cables to five newspapers, but they have only "posted" and "published" roughly 1,200 of them. Time just decided to leave that statement standing even knowing it is factually false.

More significant is the "correction" itself. It applies to Time's clearly false claim of "a distinction between WikiLeaks' indiscriminate posting of the cables . . . and the more careful vetting evidenced by The New York Times." That is false because WikiLeaks' release of cables had not been "indiscriminate" in any sense of the word. As this AP article documents -- and as a casual review of its site independently proves -- WikiLeaks has done very little other than publish the specific cables that have been first released by newspapers around the world, including with the redactions applied by those papers.

So did Time correct its false statement by acknowledging its unquestionable falsity and pointing to the evidence disproving it? Of course not. Instead, they merely noted this at the bottom of the article: "Correction: The story has been amended to reflect the fact that Assange rejects claims that WikiLeaks has 'indiscriminately' dumped documents on its site." They also added to the body of the article a sentence noting that "claims that Assange has simply dumped the documents without reviewing them, much like a traditional editor would, have been disputed" because "Assange himself told TIME that each diplomatic cable his site has published has been vetted by his own team or by the editors of newspapers with whom he has shared the documents."

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/10/wikileaks_media/index.html?source=rss&aim=/opinion/greenwald

[Kaleko]

10. Thank you for investing so much time to stay on the ball, E.

I keep coming to DU because of people like you.

[EFerrari]

11. I thought that instead of scattering buckshot today

it might be nice to have Wikileaks stories in one thread so people could scan and choose what to read. :)

[Kaleko]

15. Good idea. I'm reading

while at work :)

[EFerrari]

4. ReadWriteWeb's Comprehensive WikiLeaks Timeline

As we mentioned before, " Wikileaks was not a story, but an ongoing continuum of stories... It's a story that is destined to keep on giving." In that short time since that post, it has indeed done just that.

WikiLeaks -- its actions and the reactions to them, the implications of what has happened around the whistle-blowing site -- has given birth to an extremely complex and ever-changing situation. In lieu of summing up a situation that has not come to a tidy conclusion, we have put together a full timeline of WikiLeaks news and analysis from our site. Read through from our earliest coverage (February, 2008) to our most recent (today) and you should have a reasonably complete sense of why WikiLeaks is important.

_________

WikiLeaks, Censorship and the Watchdog Web February 18, 2008

“A very interesting site for whistle blowers called WikiLeaks is facing government censorship as today a California judge reportedly ruled that the company in control of the site’s domain name must shut down public access to the entire site.”

Wikileaks Calls for Help in Taking Whistle Blower Site to the Next Level November 28, 2008.

“Wikileaks.org, a website that publishes classified, confidential, censored or otherwise secret documents for anyone to see, put out a call last night for help in advancing the site beyond its remarkable early success. Just a week after publishing one of its most high profile documents yet, the organization sent an email to subscribers last night asking them to “tell us your most radical ideas for our vision of justice and how they might be economically, politically, legally, technically and socially sustained.”

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/readwritewebs_wikileaks_timeline.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+readwriteweb+%28ReadWriteWeb%29

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

5. Kinda like Sarah Palin hosting "Adopt a Caribou Day".

[EFerrari]

7. LOL. Today is International Human Rights Day

-- comedians, get out your note pads. :)

[EFerrari]

6. Dec 10: Greg Mitchell blogs Wikileaks Day 13

As I've done for the previous 12 days, god help me, I will be updating news & views on all things WikiLeaks all day. All times added at top are ET. For more follow me at Twitter. Read about my latest book here.

11:15 Is today the day Wiki fever finally ebbs? NYT has published revelations from cables only one day in past three. The Guardian's vital blog just shut down for the day (it usually goes into the night) possibly for the weekend. Perhaps just a lull as Assange awaits next legal move, cyber warriors plot next moves, and fresh cables seek light of day.

11:10 Great Guardian summary here of how Wiki cable revelations have played out, country-by-country.

11:05 Wiki site's running count shows still only 1,269 cables released—out of a quarter million.

10:55 Fresh from Colbert appearance, Dan Ellsberg re-visits Democracy Now!, continues to defend Assange and Manning.

http://www.thenation.com/blog/157028/blogging-wikileaks-friday-day-13

(This is a great compilation!)

[EFerrari]

8. WikiLeaks' payment processor to sue card companies

WikiLeaks' payment processor to sue card companies
By RAPHAEL G. SATTER, Associated Press Raphael G. Satter, Associated Press – Thu Dec 9, 5:02 am ET

LONDON – WikiLeaks' payment processor said Thursday that it was preparing to sue credit card companies Visa and MasterCard over their refusal to process donations to the secret-spilling website.

Andreas Fink, the CEO of Iceland's DataCell ehf, told The Associated Press that he would seek damages from the American financial companies over their decision to block WikiLeaks funds.

"It's difficult to believe that such a large company as Visa can make a political decision," Fink said in a telephone interview from Switzerland. In an earlier statement, his company had defended the WikiLeaks, saying that "it is simply ridiculous to think WikiLeaks has done anything criminal."

WikiLeaks has been under intense pressure since it began publishing some 250,000 U.S. State Department cables, with attacks on its websites and threats against its founder, Julian Assange, who is now in a British jail fighting extradition to Sweden on sex crime allegations.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101209/ap_on_hi_te/wikileaks_21

[EFerrari]

9. Pentagon Whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg: Julian Assange is Not a Terrorist

Pentagon Whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg: Julian Assange is Not a Terrorist

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange will remain in a London prison until a British court takes up a Swedish request for extradition for questioning on sexual crime allegations. An international group of former intelligence officers and ex-government officials have released a statement in support of Assange. We speak to one of the signatories, Daniel Ellsberg, the famous whistleblower who leaked the Pentagon Papers about the Vietnam War in 1971. "If I released the Pentagon Papers today, the same rhetoric and calls would be made about me," Ellsberg says. "I would be called not only a trader—which I was then, which was false and slanderous—but I would called a terrorist. … Bradley Manning and Julian Assange are no more of a terrorist than I am."

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/12/10/whistleblower_daniel_ellsberg_julian_assange_is

Video: transcript soon.

[EFerrari]

12. WikiLeaks Congressional Hearing Set for Dec. 16

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4653463

[EFerrari]

13. U.S. says did not pressure companies on WikiLeaks

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=4653098&mesg_id=4653098

[EFerrari]

14. WikiLeaks founder's lawyer claims U.S. prosecutors are poised to charge him

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4653283

[bobthedrummer]

16. K&R n/t

:thumbsup: