At times it feels that they should be called american-govmnt-leaks.org. Where are all the juicy leaks from Russian, Chinease, French, Mexican, Brazilian, Egyptian, or other nation states. Where are the leaks from mafia, drug cartels, or other criminal organizations. Records from financial institutions, law firms, drug companies. Records from catholic church and other religious organizations. There is so much corruption in the world, that it seems incredible that Wikileaks so much focuses on the US. Maybe leak some information on people that stole $18B from republic of Moldova. Or how tobacco, big oil, pharma or others are using their profits to gain even more profits. Where is all that?
Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
31–40 of 182 posts
Re: Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are saying we should ignore the abuses of our ruling power because some foreign ruling power is rumored to expose them? I don't want to live in fascism just so the communists don't win, that doesn't seem like a worthwhile tradeoff.
I don't want to live in fascism Right, I forgot exposing Hillary's emails prevented the rise of fascism.
As much as it supported communism. No worries, you can read up on it here:
Re: Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
#33"Some have accused us of being pawns of the Russian government, but this misrepresents our principles and basic operations. ...We prefer not to know who our sources are; we do not want to.." So they prefer to be unwitting pawns? Transparency is great, freedom of information is great, but is there some point at which you have to step back and acknowledge that you're being used by a foreign power? Doesn't that undermin…
I believe strongly in transparency as a way to prevent corruption, but spreading misinformation doesn't stop corruption, it furthers it. It doesn't 'shine a light', it creates shadows where a brutal dictator can hide while he hurts others. Look up "useful idiots" to understand the role they played.
It's too easy to cite principle such as "transparency" in order to ignore the difficult questions of responsibility and consequences. If Wikileaks wants to help the world and 'shine a light' - well that sounds like what journalists do; why shouldn't Wikileaks also verify and corroborate information before giving it to the public?
Why would I trust any of the information if they don't? In a way, Wikileaks is the epitome of the propaganda and fake online news that influenced the U.S. campaign.
Re: Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
#34A friendly reminder that there has been no proof that Julian Assange is alive, for quite a while. Also their 'insurance' file hashes no longer match the files. And the latest messages are not digitally signed. Also there was a set of moderators added all over related subreddits to suppress this.
LOL, he was questioned just two days ago by Swedish lawyers: http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/14/europe/julian-assange-question...
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Re: Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
#35I'm not really sure what high and mighty role wikileaks can claim. Most major journalism outlets have ways for submitting information online anonymously. With their editorial standards they can avoid many of the (in some cases deadly) mistakes wikileaks has done by publishing blindly.
> (in some cases deadly)
Prove it. I have never seen any credible claim that wikileaks has had deadly mistakes.
Re: Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
#36Wikileaks has released some important things, but they should be embarrassed that they thought the personal emails of Hillary's campaign staff saying sometimes silly things to each other was at all newsworthy. It was sensational, sure, but it revealed nothing important or even interesting. Anyone who spends a moment considering the question would expect campaign operatives to gripe about their opponents in over the t…
It's really bizarre how your comment has made it to the top of this thread, considering that it seems that the prevailing opinion here on HN is supportive of wikileaks.
Your claim that the leaks are not newsworthy is absurd in the extreme, and your judgement is in question. There are hundreds of items of greater interest and importance in those mails than in a good portion of news stories published by most major news outlets. You are either grossly misinformed or purposefully misleading readers.
Re: Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
#37Wikileaks has released some important things, but they should be embarrassed that they thought the personal emails of Hillary's campaign staff saying sometimes silly things to each other was at all newsworthy. It was sensational, sure, but it revealed nothing important or even interesting. Anyone who spends a moment considering the question would expect campaign operatives to gripe about their opponents in over the t…
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Re: Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
#38Wikileaks has released some important things, but they should be embarrassed that they thought the personal emails of Hillary's campaign staff saying sometimes silly things to each other was at all newsworthy. It was sensational, sure, but it revealed nothing important or even interesting. Anyone who spends a moment considering the question would expect campaign operatives to gripe about their opponents in over the t…
I'm not sure if this is the same group of emails you talked about, but at the very least they admitted to a conspiracy to try to incite a "revolution" within the Catholic Church using pseudo-Catholic lay organizations with morally progressive agendas. That doesn't seem like a small thing.
Re: Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
#39Wikileaks has released some important things, but they should be embarrassed that they thought the personal emails of Hillary's campaign staff saying sometimes silly things to each other was at all newsworthy. It was sensational, sure, but it revealed nothing important or even interesting. Anyone who spends a moment considering the question would expect campaign operatives to gripe about their opponents in over the t…
Regardless of how (in)significant you think the material they release is, there's no such thing as too much transparency.
This 100x. Either the US is a democracy or it isn't.
Re: Why the World Needs WikiLeaks
#40"Some have accused us of being pawns of the Russian government, but this misrepresents our principles and basic operations. ...We prefer not to know who our sources are; we do not want to.." So they prefer to be unwitting pawns? Transparency is great, freedom of information is great, but is there some point at which you have to step back and acknowledge that you're being used by a foreign power? Doesn't that undermin…
What would have happened to Hillary's emails if WikiLeaks would not have existed? Russia (probably?) still would have released them. WikiLeaks is merely a tool for entities wishing to release secret information and documents. Personally, I prefer WikiLeaks to be indiscriminate towards the secret documents they are entrusted with. If they weren't, another service would probably pop up doing exactly that.
> What would have happened to Hillary's emails if WikiLeaks would not have existed?
You mean the alleged (never verified) DNC emails. Hillary's emails were released by the FBI and in response to a lawsuit.