Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
newsweek.com
Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
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Re: Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
#2Therefore the only playing field left is: what do they have and what do they know?
This portrays people as something akin to a Markov process: if you know these two properties, you can make meaningful predictions about the future. Are people so memoryless? It strikes me that at a minimum, history, experience, and culture would all influence behavior and aren't so neatly stateful.
Re: Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
#3This goes to some lengths to explain why Assange is willing to publish anything, no matter how damaging in the short term it may be to particular interests.
He doesn't want to be a curator or a decision maker about what information is or is not available. He is interested in solving the architectural problem of removing the ability to having political interests or personal bias influence control what gets published. From his perspective, he is merely a cog in that system he's trying to create - an automaton who doesn't get to make decisions about the content of diplomatic cables, etc.
In this sense it's probably better to think of Assange as an engineer as opposed to a journalist, dissident or politician. It's just that this system he's been trying to create crosses those circles - when the system effects knowledge/power relations and to the degree his system is successful what's left to do is to effect Wikileaks.
Another note: I am in agreement with and happy that Assange recognizes that Wikileaks in a young and incomplete prototype. There are tons of operational questions left: Who gets Wikileaks when Assange passes away? How do you vet a new member? How do you prevent bribery? Isn't it a problem that there is any centralized control of Wikileaks to begin with? Countries have been successful in preventing journalists from partnering with Wikileaks - how does one secure that pipeline?
Re: Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
#4The parent article links to Assange's comments after meeting with Schmidt "Google is Not What it Seems" [1] which has some interesting discussion of the links between Google's senior level and politicians. Published yesterday, I don't recall seeing it linked.
[1] http://www.newsweek.com/assange-google-not-what-it-seems-279...
Re: Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
#5Therefore the only playing field left is: what do they have and what do they know? This portrays people as something akin to a Markov process: if you know these two properties, you can make meaningful predictions about the future. Are people so memoryless? It strikes me that at a minimum, history, experience, and culture would all influence behavior and aren't so neatly stateful.
> Are people so memoryless? It strikes me that at a minimum, history, experience, and culture would all influence behavior and aren't so neatly stateful.
Problem is all of this can be reduced to a single dimension - health and energy. No matter what information is going on in your head, your body requires energy to move and to think, thereby limiting the possible future states out of sheer necessity.
Re: Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
#6Therefore the only playing field left is: what do they have and what do they know? This portrays people as something akin to a Markov process: if you know these two properties, you can make meaningful predictions about the future. Are people so memoryless? It strikes me that at a minimum, history, experience, and culture would all influence behavior and aren't so neatly stateful.
>>> It strikes me that at a minimum, history, experience, and culture would all influence behavior and aren't so neatly stateful.
At least in the US, clearly history has taught us nothing. Our leaders continually make the same errors in regards to foreign policy, military intervention, and myriad of other things.
Re: Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
#7The parent article links to Assange's comments after meeting with Schmidt "Google is Not What it Seems" [1] which has some interesting discussion of the links between Google's senior level and politicians. Published yesterday, I don't recall seeing it linked. [1] http://www.newsweek.com/assange-google-not-what-it-seems-279...
Re: Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
#8This goes to some lengths to explain why Assange is willing to publish anything, no matter how damaging in the short term it may be to particular interests. He doesn't want to be a curator or a decision maker about what information is or is not available. He is interested in solving the architectural problem of removing the ability to having political interests or personal bias influence control what gets published.…
Nonsense. Assange goes to great lengths to spin his political agenda. For example the "Collateral Murder" video. He did not publish raw source material, he published his narrative:
http://www.collateralmurder.com/
He is no Snowden. Snowden was upfront and honest from the start about what he was trying to achieve.
I used to admire Assange, now Assange is caught up in his own myth and he seems desperate to keep that myth alive.
The world needs a WikiLeaks 3.0, one that looks like the original 1.0 (the actual wiki before the cable leaks). For those of you that forgot what it was originally:
https://web.archive.org/web/20080102184708/http://www.wikile...
Re: Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
#9Therefore the only playing field left is: what do they have and what do they know? This portrays people as something akin to a Markov process: if you know these two properties, you can make meaningful predictions about the future. Are people so memoryless? It strikes me that at a minimum, history, experience, and culture would all influence behavior and aren't so neatly stateful.
>>> It strikes me that at a minimum, history, experience, and culture would all influence behavior and aren't so neatly stateful. At least in the US, clearly history has taught us nothing. Our leaders continually make the same errors in regards to foreign policy, military intervention, and myriad of other things.
Those are not mistakes, they [the leaders] benefit directly from that.
Re: Julian Assange: Why I Founded WikiLeaks
#10The parent article links to Assange's comments after meeting with Schmidt "Google is Not What it Seems" [1] which has some interesting discussion of the links between Google's senior level and politicians. Published yesterday, I don't recall seeing it linked. [1] http://www.newsweek.com/assange-google-not-what-it-seems-279...
https://wikileaks.org/google-is-not-what-it-seems/
The article makes many assertions of connections, without really backing up those assertions.