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He very clearly explained his motives for not doing so in the AMA, and he gave an alternate POL by reading from the blockchain. This whole narrative of Wikilea

by ismay 10y ago

He very clearly explained his motives for not doing so in the AMA, and he gave an alternate POL by reading from the blockchain. This whole narrative of Wikileaks not being neutral is a very weird story, because they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true. Since that's something they can't be attacked on, it seems that the strategy for discrediting Wikileaks has now become to accuse them of association with the Russians. Assange touches on this in the AMA as well. Beyond that, only speculation remains. So why even give a shit? As long as what they're publishing is true, which it has always been so far. Let them fight each other with the truth and the people will be better off. Nothing you've said changes the validity of this article, in fact, it only distracts from it. So I'd say you're doing us a disservice by distracting from the real story here.

decisiveness 10y ago
Truth or not, I'm curious to know how the high probability that all content is curated doesn't bother you? I can't find one leak that's been damaging to Putin's agenda. That doesn't prove Russia is in control of the site, but it's curious that every single leak has been either damaging to the United States, other parties that have not had good relations with Russia or relatively inconsequential to either. The fact that Assange cannot verify he produces the content of his site only furthers the probability of Russia having seized possession of it, given there exists no damaging information to Putin's regime. Would it not be better if those leaks were exposed along with everything else?
raverbashing 10y ago
You can publish only true facts and still push a narrative
- freyr 10y ago
  > You can publish only true facts Can we go back to just calling them "facts"? A statement can be true or false, but a fact is true. You're playing into the idea that there are "false facts" or "alternative facts." There aren't. Those are lies or errors.
  - jMyles 10y ago
    It's useful to be able to talk about "facts" - including a fact pattern which is inaccurate - as distinct from opinion or assessment. From WikiPedia: > Alternatively, fact may also indicate an allegation or stipulation of something that may or may not be a true fact, (e.g., "the author's facts are not trustworthy"). This alternate usage, although contested by some, has a long history in standard English.
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  - cjfont 10y ago
    A statement can also be an opinion, I think the intention was to differentiate from statements that are meant to appear to be facts but are false.
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  - chillwaves 10y ago
    Because context matters? And people with any level of sophistication in their thinking can understand that. I don't even know how to respond to some folks here. You really think it's impossible to use facts to construct a narrative that is untrue? https://hbr.org/2016/10/theres-a-word-for-using-truthful-facts-to-deceive-paltering https://hbr.org/2016/10/theres-a-word-for-using-truthful-fac... Come on now. We're better than this.
alpha_squared 10y ago
For the purpose of devil's advocate in this, I think it's possible to state truths and still be misleading and/or distracting from another narrative. Just because something is true doesn't necessarily explain what the motive is for releasing that information. It's certainly healthy to have at least a shadow of a doubt as to what WikiLeaks's motivations are when it's already shown that it can either restrain itself from leaks or that it can falsify the existence of leaks.[0] [0] In 2010, WikiLeaks declared to the public the intent to publish docs alleging significant Russian corruption. It was also picked up by a Russian newspaper that reported to be working with WikiLeaks. However, nothing happened and the topic has been untouched since.
- tlow 10y ago
  "In fact, the Devil's Advocate may be the biggest innovation killer in America today. "[1] [1] Tom Kelley, co-founder of Ideo as in '10 Faces of Innovation'
  - xapata 10y ago
    Perhaps I'm confused, but this seems like a non-sequitur. We're not discussing innovation.
    - guest 10y ago
      I think the point being made is that the devil's advocate brought out the norm to mobilise for every contingency (not that innovation won't suffer, which is obvious as misstrust rises) and that it can be used to rhetorically balance two points of view that are not equal (or two questionable actions). In general: Ownership of information and facts are key points in the overall discussion here, if something is known it can be manipulated (just as they discuss above). Defensive patenting could be achieved, or releasing news of something to knock away at funding for its continuation... One example how it could be relevant in particular to the general discussion is how the software and partially hardware has been kept by CIA to formally avoid reprecussions from good honest people.
noobermin 10y ago
While what they are publishing is true and should not be ignored, they certainly appear to be choosing their targets and not choosing others, for example, they claimed to have information from the RNC, but they did not publish it claiming it was already published in other sources. The timing of the leaks was rather suspect too. In interviews, Assange insinuated months before during the primary that he had the emails that would eventually become the DNC leaks, but they waiting until after HRC was the sure nominee, during the DNC meeting, to release them. Procedurally, this made it so the Dems could not nominate another candidate before the general. It may have been a coincidence, but they couldn't have been released at a politically more opportune time (for the R's) than then. In fact, during that interview, I recall Assange saying he was waiting for the right moment to release it. They aren't lying, and shinning light on wrong-doing is great, but the choice of when to do so and possibly sitting on information on the others who stand to benefit is suspicious.
- x1798DE 10y ago
  > While what they are publishing is true and should not be ignored Why does this matter? I feel like the reason people are worried about bias is that it means the source is not trustworthy. If Wikileaks is publishing true information, they should be trustworthy, even if their choice of targets is not unbiased.
  - legulere 10y ago
    It's kind of the effect we have with BPA. As soon as the idea got widespread that it might be unhealthy it was replaced with other chemicals we know less about and that might be even worse. Intelligence Agencies often use information to push their agenda. I don't see why it is different for Wikileaks which sees itself as one.
  - Cookingboy 10y ago
    "I feel like the reason people are worried about bias is that it means the source is not trustworthy No, people are worried about bias because the source could be selectively publishing truth with an ulterior motive, such as pushing a predefined agenda. Propaganda is even more dangerous when it's true, but only tell people half the story.
oxide 10y ago
Facts, stats and even graphs can all be used to push a narrative. Context is pretty key. To my eyes, Wikileaks seems to be cherrypicking and giving passes to others. The timing of the leaks has been nothing short of convenient, which makes me suspicious. That's my opinion, though. I have nothing to back it up and I wouldn't even try to prove it. But, hey, we're speculating here.
- kahnpro 10y ago
  The thing is, wikileaks publishes info that is given to them. What we could interpret as cherry picking, could just be that most of wikileaks' information is coming from particular interested actors. In other words, the bias isn't in wikileaks, but before wikileaks.
  - atumakin 10y ago
    We cannot know that. WikiLeaks is a proverbial black box. Julian himself is sort of trapped in a box, too. Funny how for so many people he's conveniently become an acceptable Ministry of Truth. If you could work his levers, whether it be by compromising him with threats of violence/incarceration/family/use imagination. There's this mythology of "never publishing a falsehood" that's repeated in a meme-like din within the WikiLeaks context, but even if it is correct, it does not preclude selective publishing of the truth, or political timing, misdirection. Anyways, having watched the output of this black box over many years, even if I believe that black box were built with the best of intentions, I can no longer trust that the machine is altogether acting in good faith. The editorial discretion of a mere two billion dollars in Russia-Syrian transactions, for example, omitted completely by Assange as reported by The Daily Dot, make the man highly suspect as an objective purveyor of leaked materials received. As the US intelligence community seeks to investigate Trump, the Trump-aligned WL begins dumping on the CIA. Trump will begin whining about the "Deep State" even more. Prepare for another week of whataboutism.
swombat 10y ago
Journalism classes in Romania a few decades ago included exercises like: "Take this footage of snow in Bucharest and use it to tell a variety of different stories, e.g. 'Bucharest is paralysed by snow' or 'Bucharest enjoys fresh snowfall' or 'Bucharest efficiently deals with snow storm', etc". If we think that just because something is factually true no one is trying to fool us, we're quite the fools.
- schoen 10y ago
  I'm reminded of the replies to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13445190 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13445190 (about the Guardian story on WhatsApp). There Maciej, for example, said > I think the vaccine analogy is really helpful here. You can make true statements, like "vaccines can kill you", that cause massive public harm if they're not correctly contextualized.
  - jwtadvice 10y ago
    This is perfect. Much of the US media narrative about its overseas interventions likewise fall into this category. Much of the war propaganda consumed by the US population is based on truth. The problem is that US citizens don't have the appropriate context to understand that truth. The fallout is incredible damage to people and lives overseas caught up in great power struggle that could be a different way if there we a systemic commitment toward building a real basis toward international security (over, say, unipolar control).
  - guest 10y ago
    Regarding the vaccine analogy I think the problem is opposite, that the positive sides to vaccines have always been accounted for but as soon as negative attributes are brought forward they're met with ad hominem or ad absurdum. [Small rant] There are huge economical incentives to scold those who question medicines with high amounts of side effects. Do people really believe that big pharma doesn't account for a good share of the astroturfers online? To give one example: In Sweden a vaccine for the pigflue caused narcolepsy in completely healthy young individuals. [End rant] The problem here is not truth or how it's used to effect but foremost the missinformation that is blocking out all traces of it. Truth helps any discussion and creates trust - which the vast majority of societies are built on (or used to be).
anigbrowl 10y ago
This whole narrative of Wikileaks not being neutral is a very weird story, because they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true. What does the one thing have to do with the other? Just because you're truthful doesn't mean you're neutral, and nobody is seriously denying the authenticity of these files. What, exactly, have we learned here other than a spy agency knows interesting methods of spying? I mean, of course it's interesting to see they use this or that vector, but that this technology exists isn't surprising in itself. I see two possibilities: either this has caught the CIA on the hop, in which case everyone else will harden their security and the CIA will be less effective at gathering intelligence for a while, or the CIA has already moved onto better tools and is dumping details of its older ones to see who reacts and raise the technological stakes. There's no sure way for me to know if it's compromised or not, and the only predictable outcome is another leap in the diversity and capability of malware and another round of the cybersecurity arms race.
- rfrank 10y ago
  > What, exactly, have we learned here other than a spy agency knows interesting methods of spying? That the US government pays software companies to keep their products insecure [1]. Why do you believe that they aren't spying on American citizens? 1. https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/839168025517522944 https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/839168025517522944
  - anigbrowl 10y ago
    Government is always asking technology companies for backdoors so that doesn't seem like news to me, but you may well be right that it's never been documented before. To me this doesn't seem any different from the Chubb lock company teaching spooks how its locks are put together or somesuch. I have no opinion on whether they're spying on American citizens, I have always assumed they would do so sometimes in the course of spying on other countries' citizens. Foreign spies seek agents and unknowing assets in their country of posting so that just seems inevitable. So what? I have to say that a lot of the response here seems very theatrical, albeit unwittingly so. Going back to the lock analogy, I'm sure the CIA has some of the world's best lock pickers and burglars on their payroll, but doesn't mean the CIA are trying to break into your house, does it? They could break into your house, if you embarked on an affair with a beautiful spy (or even a sort of frumpy one) they maybe would break into your house, but realistically they probably have zero incentive to do so right now. It's really hard for me to give a shit about the CIA possibly-in-theory-maybe spying on people when you have government organizations like ICE actually plucking ordinary people off the street and putting them in detention centers where the normal rules of arrest and imprisonment don't apply.
anarazel 10y ago
> This whole narrative of Wikileaks not being neutral is a very weird story, because they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true. First off, I have no opinion on whether they are neutral. That said, your argument imo doesn't hold much sway - not publishing something wrong, doesn't at all imply that they're not selectively publishing. And while I agree that there's some interest as describing them as partisan, I also think that some of Assanges public statements make that really really easy.
chillwaves 10y ago
> So why even give a shit? As long as what they're publishing is true Guess the phrase "lie by omission" doesn't mean much to you.
redahs 10y ago
> because they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true Mr Assange repeatedly claimed that Podesta's gmail password was 'password' in interviews, which was false: http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2017/jan/06/jesse-watters/claim-john-podestas-email-password-was-password-la/ http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2017/jan/06/...
- mdashx 10y ago
  right... so it was something like `p@SSw0Rd`, what's the difference?
  - redahs 10y ago
    We don't know the email password was something like `p@SSw0Rd`, only that a staffer temporarily set a Windows 8 password to a variant of password. This does not mean that the gmail password was a variant of password. It was disingenuous of Mr Assange to claim his email password was password, as the only indication we had of a password being a variant of password was for a Windows 8 account and not the email account.
- jwtadvice 10y ago
  This is a far, far cry from the kinds of quality journalism that Wikileaks does. It appears that the claim the password was 'password' wasn't a story in and of itself but an anecdote relating to the weakness of Podesta's password (which is true). Compare that to Clapper, Director of National Intelligence stating for the record under oath that national intelligence does not have a surveillance operation targeting Americans in the homeland. That was a lie and one intended for testimony. Assange here is just saying: Podesta's password is weak. It's hard for him to qualify that it was spelled "p@ssw0rd" rather than "password" during an interview. The fact that you think saying "password" rather than "p@ssw0rd" disqualifies Assange as a lier goes to the heart of the anti-body reaction that nationalists have about hearing news that doesn't validate pre-existing opinions that they have about the nobility of their nation and its leadership. The difference between "password" and "p@ssw0rd", while technically true, it is so pedantic it does not apply to the spirit of the conversation.
fastball 10y ago
Let's say hypothetically that the Russian government has a Cyber Defense arm that has nearly the scope and capability as the US (the DNC/Hillary stuff seems to indicate this). Let's say this is true for many world powers (US, UK, China, and Russia for starters). However, it seems like Wikileaks, while claiming to be a neutral source that "just wants to make powerful people accountable", they only seem to be releasing damaging information about systems in place in the US. I think the issue here is that many (most?) of us assume that all global powers have this capability, yet a Wikileaks is trying to paint the US as the scary one, and so people are questioning their motives. Is what the US is doing morally wrong on a few levels? Undoubtedly. Can the US afford to stop doing these things when some arguably less moral actors are going to continue regardless? That is up for debate. Assange to me seems irrationally anti-America. Has the US done many reprehensible things now and in the past? Absolutely. But that is true for every powerful nation ever. And if you're looking at America's competition, you'd need to be blind to think that Russia is somehow more benevolent than the US.
- jwtadvice 10y ago
  Wikileaks published the internal communications of the Erdogan Administration in Turkey, indicating among other things (corruption) the administrations back channel to the Assad Administration in Syria (an enemy of the United States). The fallout of these disclosures potentially contributed to a building coup attempt in Turkey by forces loyal to the US (which the US tacitly supported) that burst just a week after the disclosures. Wikileaks does not only publish "against" America. When it does, it's closer to home for the Americans and we hear more news coverage about it. In any case, wouldn't it okay that there are outlets that produce true news focused on negative aspects of the United States, keeping it accountable? That seems like a positive thing to me - though I don't think Wikileaks is "it".
  - joshuamorton 10y ago
    >The fallout of these disclosures potentially contributed to a building coup attempt in Turkey by forces loyal to the US (which the US tacitly supported) that burst just a week after the disclosures. I thought the conclusion was that that coup attempt was more or less theater by Erdogan. Organized with his approval and prior knowledge, destined to fail, and used to enact martial law.
rubyfan 10y ago
This is the approach used by both left and right parties in the U.S. The parties and their surrogates attempt to taint sources as biased and by proxy all content from the source invalid.
- mhneu 10y ago
  No, this is not true. We now have data showing that the left tends to read both mainstream and left sources. While the right tends to live in their own little Fox-Breitbart bubble. This means that the right gets news from extremely biased sources with no anchor in reality. While the left tends to read and share a wider variety of media. http://www.cjr.org/analysis/breitbart-media-trump-harvard-study.php http://www.cjr.org/analysis/breitbart-media-trump-harvard-st... It's also been shown that the right is more likely than the left to distrust the fact-bearing mainstream media [1], because a strategy of the right, as in some authoritarian countries, is to generate distrust in media that they do not control. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/04/opinion/sunday/why-nobody-cares-the-president-is-lying.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/04/opinion/sunday/why-nobody... So no, both sides do NOT do it equally. The right does way more to taint real sources like the NYT as biased. [1] within mainstream I'd tend to separate profit-seeking and independent/family-owned media. But you can lump them together for purposes of contrast with GOP-donor-funded conservative media.
  - rubyfan 10y ago
    What part of what I said is not true? Are you asserting both parties are not guilty or one is more guilty than the other. In any case I don't think what I said is untrue or was an attempt to mislead.
  - pottersbasilisk 10y ago
    I think this last election showed there is a coastal elite bubble and a clear cnn-msnbc bubble as well.
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latj 10y ago
I agree with you that if the info is true that's good enough to use that infor. But it is still worth knowing the motivations of the people providing your information. The truth is the most common source of bias in media is not telling out right lies but in deciding which truths to tell you. Its hard to believe that now given how much false information is being spread. But its still true. Propaganda is in the editing- choosing which stories get focus, which voices get amplified.
quakeguy 10y ago
You are right, the whole POL is a way to distract from WL and their releases. There are national actors trying to stir confusion, of course. But Assange remained cool, so should we.
whatdiditsay88 10y ago
Recently there was a discussion about a poet not able to answer questions about her poem, presented by some instructor. The most insightful comment I read online was that while the original author may have an idea of what it means, someone else may see a new metaphor via some phrasing, due to a different reading pace perhaps, who knows why. The point is that while Wikileaks may release only that which is true within it's own context, that still leaves other contexts to question from. Like why today? Why not next month or after Trump is out of office, whenever that may be?
_jal 10y ago
There is no such thing as 'neutral' where humans and politics intersect. Many others have made the point that it is perfectly possible to lie with a collection of true statements. It is also possible to be used in this context; that's where the phrase 'useful idiot' comes from. So Assange should be pure as the driven snow and be laundering manipulated documents, thereby giving them the imprimatur that you, among others, appear to grant great value. In fact, this is what I and others believe to at least occasionally happen with WL. > which it has always been so far. How do you know this? How do you know that 'truth' hasn't been shaded by blending observable facts with unverifiable ones or by omitting documents, or parts of documents? How do you know that everyone outside of WL insiders (loosely defined) is granted access to documents at the same time? I think there are still questions about Stone's access to the Clinton dumps. > distracting from the real story here Please. Everyone gets to pick "the real story" for themselves.
pmarreck 10y ago
If I hacked two people's private emails who were in some popularity contest, and they both contained severely incriminating things, and I only release 1 of those to the public, then I believe it is arguable that I have gone beyond mere truth-disclosure and on to outright manipulation.
- xenotb 10y ago
  I'm out of the loop; whose emails did they not release? Trump's?
  - pmarreck 10y ago
    This was more on principle, but there is some evidence that parts of the RNC were also hacked and the information never released: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2017/jan/11/donald-trump/trump-says-russians-were-unable-hack-republican-na/ http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2017/jan/...
hourislate 10y ago
Assange will be leaving the Ecuadorean Embassy soon. I have a feeling he tries to get to the Russian Embassy or Russia itself? You can bet GCHQ and NSA know something and could tell you exactly if Assange is working with Russia or anyone else for that matter. At this point they have people inside the Embassy cleaning his bathroom and vacuuming the carpets.
marmot777 10y ago
They are not neutral. I don't think it's even controversial to say they're working against the United States. They clearly are. It's an observation not a political statement to point this out. If they were neutral you'd see big releases of Russian secrets, etc.
- matthewbauer 10y ago
  It's possible there just aren't Russian leakers though. Russia can do some shady things to retaliate against leakers US not so much.
  - mirimir 10y ago
    People with leaks about Russia don't need Wikileaks. They just go to establishment media. Also, US responses to Manning and Snowden seemed rather shady.
    - marmot777 10y ago
      Huh? Could you give some examples of Russian leaks that got legs through talking to the establishment media? And by the way, who are the establishment media you're talking about in this context? It can't be Russian State Media such as RT so you must be talking about U.S. media such as the NYT and Wahington Post though I'm not sure. Also, wasn't it this same establishment media that worked with WL to leak Snowden's documents? So why was WL needed at all since the media ultimately did the publishing that people saw in that case? People might forget that WL depended on "media" to actually publish the documents as WL has not always been the sort of household name it is now. They were just the agent now they're a publisher and a PR agent all in one.
      - mirimir 10y ago
        Please see my other comment about the Panama Papers. That went to German media. I occasionally see leaks about Russia in NY Times etc. But they generally aren't styled as "leaks", just reporting. Also, Snowden specifically didn't work through Wikileaks, because he didn't want a mass leak, but rather substantive and "responsible" reporting. Wikileaks just helped him find refuge in Russia.
unityByFreedom 10y ago
> they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true Says the 21 day old account with this single, highly upvoted comment. There are millions of documents on Wikileaks. I highly doubt everything there is verified.
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Buge 10y ago
Does this look neutral to you? https://twitter.com/i/web/status/788059864832602112 https://twitter.com/i/web/status/788059864832602112
MichaelMoser123 10y ago
> it seems that the strategy for discrediting Wikileaks has now become to accuse them of association with the Russians. I don't know if this would be in the Russian interest to publish all these expensive zero day vulnerabilities, it would be in their interest to (continue to) use this stuff too. these vulnerabilities will have to be fixed within some time (now that they are known). I wonder how long it will take for the spooks to get a new stash like this, this must be very damaging. I fear for Assange, the spooks will have a clear motive for demanding retribution against him.
eksemplar 10y ago
I get what you're trying to say, I'm even inclined to agree, but how can "they" fight each other with the truth if only one of the sides fighting gets it's dirty secrets outed? During the elections I kind of wrote it off as them being prepared for Hillary and unprepared for Trump, but I have to wonder why they haven't run any leaks on Trump by now, considering how willing people seem to be to leak information. Where is his taxes? Where is the truth about his Russian ties? I mean, take a stroll through the front page of Wikileaks and then tell me you don't wonder about the lack of Russian stories. Does Russia not have leakers?
ptaipale 10y ago
>This whole narrative of Wikileaks not being neutral is a very weird story, because they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true. Note that "being neutral" is not at all the same as "publishing only things that are verified to be true". What you choose to publish still has a lot of impact on whether you are neutral or not. Even some of the worst propaganda sites publish true things. The propaganda is in which part of the truth they publish and which not. In Russian, the truth is "Pravda" and you know what it was. It was propaganda. Mostly it was quite true, just with a very specific view on truth.
iopuy 10y ago
This account was created 3 weeks ago and this is the only comment with no submissions or other favorites stories. This is not a lot of info to go off but i'd be willing to bet it is a schill.
- iopuy 10y ago
  https://drboolean.gitbooks.io/mostly-adequate-guide/content/ch4.html#cant-live-if-livin-is-without-you https://drboolean.gitbooks.io/mostly-adequate-guide/content/...
  - iopuy 10y ago
    https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/5yyq27/what_items_do_you_think_everyone_regardless_of/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/5yyq27/what_item...
    - iopuy 10y ago
      https://dougblack.io/words/a-good-vimrc.html https://dougblack.io/words/a-good-vimrc.html
      - iopuy 10y ago
        https://blog.silentsignal.eu/2014/02/09/jdb-tricks-hacking-java-debug-wire/ https://blog.silentsignal.eu/2014/02/09/jdb-tricks-hacking-j...
        iopuy 10y ago
        https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/611ici/what_small_100_general_upgrades_to_your_home_or/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/611ici/what_smal...
        iopuy 10y ago
        http://imgur.com/gallery/XgEb8 http://imgur.com/gallery/XgEb8

by ismay 10y ago

decisiveness 10y ago

Truth or not, I'm curious to know how the high probability that all content is curated doesn't bother you? I can't find one leak that's been damaging to Putin's agenda. That doesn't prove Russia is in control of the site, but it's curious that every single leak has been either damaging to the United States, other parties that have not had good relations with Russia or relatively inconsequential to either. The fact that Assange cannot verify he produces the content of his site only furthers the probability of Russia having seized possession of it, given there exists no damaging information to Putin's regime. Would it not be better if those leaks were exposed along with everything else?

raverbashing 10y ago

You can publish only true facts and still push a narrative

freyr 10y ago
> You can publish only true facts Can we go back to just calling them "facts"? A statement can be true or false, but a fact is true. You're playing into the idea that there are "false facts" or "alternative facts." There aren't. Those are lies or errors.
- jMyles 10y ago
  It's useful to be able to talk about "facts" - including a fact pattern which is inaccurate - as distinct from opinion or assessment. From WikiPedia: > Alternatively, fact may also indicate an allegation or stipulation of something that may or may not be a true fact, (e.g., "the author's facts are not trustworthy"). This alternate usage, although contested by some, has a long history in standard English.
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- cjfont 10y ago
  A statement can also be an opinion, I think the intention was to differentiate from statements that are meant to appear to be facts but are false.
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- chillwaves 10y ago
  Because context matters? And people with any level of sophistication in their thinking can understand that. I don't even know how to respond to some folks here. You really think it's impossible to use facts to construct a narrative that is untrue? https://hbr.org/2016/10/theres-a-word-for-using-truthful-facts-to-deceive-paltering https://hbr.org/2016/10/theres-a-word-for-using-truthful-fac... Come on now. We're better than this.

alpha_squared 10y ago

For the purpose of devil's advocate in this, I think it's possible to state truths and still be misleading and/or distracting from another narrative. Just because something is true doesn't necessarily explain what the motive is for releasing that information. It's certainly healthy to have at least a shadow of a doubt as to what WikiLeaks's motivations are when it's already shown that it can either restrain itself from leaks or that it can falsify the existence of leaks.[0] [0] In 2010, WikiLeaks declared to the public the intent to publish docs alleging significant Russian corruption. It was also picked up by a Russian newspaper that reported to be working with WikiLeaks. However, nothing happened and the topic has been untouched since.

tlow 10y ago
"In fact, the Devil's Advocate may be the biggest innovation killer in America today. "[1] [1] Tom Kelley, co-founder of Ideo as in '10 Faces of Innovation'
- xapata 10y ago
  Perhaps I'm confused, but this seems like a non-sequitur. We're not discussing innovation.
  - guest 10y ago
    I think the point being made is that the devil's advocate brought out the norm to mobilise for every contingency (not that innovation won't suffer, which is obvious as misstrust rises) and that it can be used to rhetorically balance two points of view that are not equal (or two questionable actions). In general: Ownership of information and facts are key points in the overall discussion here, if something is known it can be manipulated (just as they discuss above). Defensive patenting could be achieved, or releasing news of something to knock away at funding for its continuation... One example how it could be relevant in particular to the general discussion is how the software and partially hardware has been kept by CIA to formally avoid reprecussions from good honest people.

noobermin 10y ago

While what they are publishing is true and should not be ignored, they certainly appear to be choosing their targets and not choosing others, for example, they claimed to have information from the RNC, but they did not publish it claiming it was already published in other sources. The timing of the leaks was rather suspect too. In interviews, Assange insinuated months before during the primary that he had the emails that would eventually become the DNC leaks, but they waiting until after HRC was the sure nominee, during the DNC meeting, to release them. Procedurally, this made it so the Dems could not nominate another candidate before the general. It may have been a coincidence, but they couldn't have been released at a politically more opportune time (for the R's) than then. In fact, during that interview, I recall Assange saying he was waiting for the right moment to release it. They aren't lying, and shinning light on wrong-doing is great, but the choice of when to do so and possibly sitting on information on the others who stand to benefit is suspicious.

x1798DE 10y ago
> While what they are publishing is true and should not be ignored Why does this matter? I feel like the reason people are worried about bias is that it means the source is not trustworthy. If Wikileaks is publishing true information, they should be trustworthy, even if their choice of targets is not unbiased.
- legulere 10y ago
  It's kind of the effect we have with BPA. As soon as the idea got widespread that it might be unhealthy it was replaced with other chemicals we know less about and that might be even worse. Intelligence Agencies often use information to push their agenda. I don't see why it is different for Wikileaks which sees itself as one.
- Cookingboy 10y ago
  "I feel like the reason people are worried about bias is that it means the source is not trustworthy No, people are worried about bias because the source could be selectively publishing truth with an ulterior motive, such as pushing a predefined agenda. Propaganda is even more dangerous when it's true, but only tell people half the story.

oxide 10y ago

Facts, stats and even graphs can all be used to push a narrative. Context is pretty key. To my eyes, Wikileaks seems to be cherrypicking and giving passes to others. The timing of the leaks has been nothing short of convenient, which makes me suspicious. That's my opinion, though. I have nothing to back it up and I wouldn't even try to prove it. But, hey, we're speculating here.

kahnpro 10y ago
The thing is, wikileaks publishes info that is given to them. What we could interpret as cherry picking, could just be that most of wikileaks' information is coming from particular interested actors. In other words, the bias isn't in wikileaks, but before wikileaks.
- atumakin 10y ago
  We cannot know that. WikiLeaks is a proverbial black box. Julian himself is sort of trapped in a box, too. Funny how for so many people he's conveniently become an acceptable Ministry of Truth. If you could work his levers, whether it be by compromising him with threats of violence/incarceration/family/use imagination. There's this mythology of "never publishing a falsehood" that's repeated in a meme-like din within the WikiLeaks context, but even if it is correct, it does not preclude selective publishing of the truth, or political timing, misdirection. Anyways, having watched the output of this black box over many years, even if I believe that black box were built with the best of intentions, I can no longer trust that the machine is altogether acting in good faith. The editorial discretion of a mere two billion dollars in Russia-Syrian transactions, for example, omitted completely by Assange as reported by The Daily Dot, make the man highly suspect as an objective purveyor of leaked materials received. As the US intelligence community seeks to investigate Trump, the Trump-aligned WL begins dumping on the CIA. Trump will begin whining about the "Deep State" even more. Prepare for another week of whataboutism.

swombat 10y ago

Journalism classes in Romania a few decades ago included exercises like: "Take this footage of snow in Bucharest and use it to tell a variety of different stories, e.g. 'Bucharest is paralysed by snow' or 'Bucharest enjoys fresh snowfall' or 'Bucharest efficiently deals with snow storm', etc". If we think that just because something is factually true no one is trying to fool us, we're quite the fools.

schoen 10y ago
I'm reminded of the replies to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13445190 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13445190 (about the Guardian story on WhatsApp). There Maciej, for example, said > I think the vaccine analogy is really helpful here. You can make true statements, like "vaccines can kill you", that cause massive public harm if they're not correctly contextualized.
- jwtadvice 10y ago
  This is perfect. Much of the US media narrative about its overseas interventions likewise fall into this category. Much of the war propaganda consumed by the US population is based on truth. The problem is that US citizens don't have the appropriate context to understand that truth. The fallout is incredible damage to people and lives overseas caught up in great power struggle that could be a different way if there we a systemic commitment toward building a real basis toward international security (over, say, unipolar control).
- guest 10y ago
  Regarding the vaccine analogy I think the problem is opposite, that the positive sides to vaccines have always been accounted for but as soon as negative attributes are brought forward they're met with ad hominem or ad absurdum. [Small rant] There are huge economical incentives to scold those who question medicines with high amounts of side effects. Do people really believe that big pharma doesn't account for a good share of the astroturfers online? To give one example: In Sweden a vaccine for the pigflue caused narcolepsy in completely healthy young individuals. [End rant] The problem here is not truth or how it's used to effect but foremost the missinformation that is blocking out all traces of it. Truth helps any discussion and creates trust - which the vast majority of societies are built on (or used to be).

anigbrowl 10y ago

This whole narrative of Wikileaks not being neutral is a very weird story, because they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true. What does the one thing have to do with the other? Just because you're truthful doesn't mean you're neutral, and nobody is seriously denying the authenticity of these files. What, exactly, have we learned here other than a spy agency knows interesting methods of spying? I mean, of course it's interesting to see they use this or that vector, but that this technology exists isn't surprising in itself. I see two possibilities: either this has caught the CIA on the hop, in which case everyone else will harden their security and the CIA will be less effective at gathering intelligence for a while, or the CIA has already moved onto better tools and is dumping details of its older ones to see who reacts and raise the technological stakes. There's no sure way for me to know if it's compromised or not, and the only predictable outcome is another leap in the diversity and capability of malware and another round of the cybersecurity arms race.

rfrank 10y ago
> What, exactly, have we learned here other than a spy agency knows interesting methods of spying? That the US government pays software companies to keep their products insecure [1]. Why do you believe that they aren't spying on American citizens? 1. https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/839168025517522944 https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/839168025517522944
- anigbrowl 10y ago
  Government is always asking technology companies for backdoors so that doesn't seem like news to me, but you may well be right that it's never been documented before. To me this doesn't seem any different from the Chubb lock company teaching spooks how its locks are put together or somesuch. I have no opinion on whether they're spying on American citizens, I have always assumed they would do so sometimes in the course of spying on other countries' citizens. Foreign spies seek agents and unknowing assets in their country of posting so that just seems inevitable. So what? I have to say that a lot of the response here seems very theatrical, albeit unwittingly so. Going back to the lock analogy, I'm sure the CIA has some of the world's best lock pickers and burglars on their payroll, but doesn't mean the CIA are trying to break into your house, does it? They could break into your house, if you embarked on an affair with a beautiful spy (or even a sort of frumpy one) they maybe would break into your house, but realistically they probably have zero incentive to do so right now. It's really hard for me to give a shit about the CIA possibly-in-theory-maybe spying on people when you have government organizations like ICE actually plucking ordinary people off the street and putting them in detention centers where the normal rules of arrest and imprisonment don't apply.

anarazel 10y ago

> This whole narrative of Wikileaks not being neutral is a very weird story, because they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true. First off, I have no opinion on whether they are neutral. That said, your argument imo doesn't hold much sway - not publishing something wrong, doesn't at all imply that they're not selectively publishing. And while I agree that there's some interest as describing them as partisan, I also think that some of Assanges public statements make that really really easy.

chillwaves 10y ago

> So why even give a shit? As long as what they're publishing is true Guess the phrase "lie by omission" doesn't mean much to you.

redahs 10y ago

> because they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true Mr Assange repeatedly claimed that Podesta's gmail password was 'password' in interviews, which was false: http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2017/jan/06/jesse-watters/claim-john-podestas-email-password-was-password-la/ http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2017/jan/06/...

mdashx 10y ago
right... so it was something like `p@SSw0Rd`, what's the difference?
- redahs 10y ago
  We don't know the email password was something like `p@SSw0Rd`, only that a staffer temporarily set a Windows 8 password to a variant of password. This does not mean that the gmail password was a variant of password. It was disingenuous of Mr Assange to claim his email password was password, as the only indication we had of a password being a variant of password was for a Windows 8 account and not the email account.
jwtadvice 10y ago
This is a far, far cry from the kinds of quality journalism that Wikileaks does. It appears that the claim the password was 'password' wasn't a story in and of itself but an anecdote relating to the weakness of Podesta's password (which is true). Compare that to Clapper, Director of National Intelligence stating for the record under oath that national intelligence does not have a surveillance operation targeting Americans in the homeland. That was a lie and one intended for testimony. Assange here is just saying: Podesta's password is weak. It's hard for him to qualify that it was spelled "p@ssw0rd" rather than "password" during an interview. The fact that you think saying "password" rather than "p@ssw0rd" disqualifies Assange as a lier goes to the heart of the anti-body reaction that nationalists have about hearing news that doesn't validate pre-existing opinions that they have about the nobility of their nation and its leadership. The difference between "password" and "p@ssw0rd", while technically true, it is so pedantic it does not apply to the spirit of the conversation.

fastball 10y ago

Let's say hypothetically that the Russian government has a Cyber Defense arm that has nearly the scope and capability as the US (the DNC/Hillary stuff seems to indicate this). Let's say this is true for many world powers (US, UK, China, and Russia for starters). However, it seems like Wikileaks, while claiming to be a neutral source that "just wants to make powerful people accountable", they only seem to be releasing damaging information about systems in place in the US. I think the issue here is that many (most?) of us assume that all global powers have this capability, yet a Wikileaks is trying to paint the US as the scary one, and so people are questioning their motives. Is what the US is doing morally wrong on a few levels? Undoubtedly. Can the US afford to stop doing these things when some arguably less moral actors are going to continue regardless? That is up for debate. Assange to me seems irrationally anti-America. Has the US done many reprehensible things now and in the past? Absolutely. But that is true for every powerful nation ever. And if you're looking at America's competition, you'd need to be blind to think that Russia is somehow more benevolent than the US.

jwtadvice 10y ago
Wikileaks published the internal communications of the Erdogan Administration in Turkey, indicating among other things (corruption) the administrations back channel to the Assad Administration in Syria (an enemy of the United States). The fallout of these disclosures potentially contributed to a building coup attempt in Turkey by forces loyal to the US (which the US tacitly supported) that burst just a week after the disclosures. Wikileaks does not only publish "against" America. When it does, it's closer to home for the Americans and we hear more news coverage about it. In any case, wouldn't it okay that there are outlets that produce true news focused on negative aspects of the United States, keeping it accountable? That seems like a positive thing to me - though I don't think Wikileaks is "it".
- joshuamorton 10y ago
  >The fallout of these disclosures potentially contributed to a building coup attempt in Turkey by forces loyal to the US (which the US tacitly supported) that burst just a week after the disclosures. I thought the conclusion was that that coup attempt was more or less theater by Erdogan. Organized with his approval and prior knowledge, destined to fail, and used to enact martial law.

rubyfan 10y ago

This is the approach used by both left and right parties in the U.S. The parties and their surrogates attempt to taint sources as biased and by proxy all content from the source invalid.

mhneu 10y ago
No, this is not true. We now have data showing that the left tends to read both mainstream and left sources. While the right tends to live in their own little Fox-Breitbart bubble. This means that the right gets news from extremely biased sources with no anchor in reality. While the left tends to read and share a wider variety of media. http://www.cjr.org/analysis/breitbart-media-trump-harvard-study.php http://www.cjr.org/analysis/breitbart-media-trump-harvard-st... It's also been shown that the right is more likely than the left to distrust the fact-bearing mainstream media [1], because a strategy of the right, as in some authoritarian countries, is to generate distrust in media that they do not control. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/04/opinion/sunday/why-nobody-cares-the-president-is-lying.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/04/opinion/sunday/why-nobody... So no, both sides do NOT do it equally. The right does way more to taint real sources like the NYT as biased. [1] within mainstream I'd tend to separate profit-seeking and independent/family-owned media. But you can lump them together for purposes of contrast with GOP-donor-funded conservative media.
- rubyfan 10y ago
  What part of what I said is not true? Are you asserting both parties are not guilty or one is more guilty than the other. In any case I don't think what I said is untrue or was an attempt to mislead.
- pottersbasilisk 10y ago
  I think this last election showed there is a coastal elite bubble and a clear cnn-msnbc bubble as well.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

latj 10y ago

I agree with you that if the info is true that's good enough to use that infor. But it is still worth knowing the motivations of the people providing your information. The truth is the most common source of bias in media is not telling out right lies but in deciding which truths to tell you. Its hard to believe that now given how much false information is being spread. But its still true. Propaganda is in the editing- choosing which stories get focus, which voices get amplified.

quakeguy 10y ago

You are right, the whole POL is a way to distract from WL and their releases. There are national actors trying to stir confusion, of course. But Assange remained cool, so should we.

whatdiditsay88 10y ago

Recently there was a discussion about a poet not able to answer questions about her poem, presented by some instructor. The most insightful comment I read online was that while the original author may have an idea of what it means, someone else may see a new metaphor via some phrasing, due to a different reading pace perhaps, who knows why. The point is that while Wikileaks may release only that which is true within it's own context, that still leaves other contexts to question from. Like why today? Why not next month or after Trump is out of office, whenever that may be?

_jal 10y ago

There is no such thing as 'neutral' where humans and politics intersect. Many others have made the point that it is perfectly possible to lie with a collection of true statements. It is also possible to be used in this context; that's where the phrase 'useful idiot' comes from. So Assange should be pure as the driven snow and be laundering manipulated documents, thereby giving them the imprimatur that you, among others, appear to grant great value. In fact, this is what I and others believe to at least occasionally happen with WL. > which it has always been so far. How do you know this? How do you know that 'truth' hasn't been shaded by blending observable facts with unverifiable ones or by omitting documents, or parts of documents? How do you know that everyone outside of WL insiders (loosely defined) is granted access to documents at the same time? I think there are still questions about Stone's access to the Clinton dumps. > distracting from the real story here Please. Everyone gets to pick "the real story" for themselves.

pmarreck 10y ago

If I hacked two people's private emails who were in some popularity contest, and they both contained severely incriminating things, and I only release 1 of those to the public, then I believe it is arguable that I have gone beyond mere truth-disclosure and on to outright manipulation.

xenotb 10y ago
I'm out of the loop; whose emails did they not release? Trump's?
- pmarreck 10y ago
  This was more on principle, but there is some evidence that parts of the RNC were also hacked and the information never released: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2017/jan/11/donald-trump/trump-says-russians-were-unable-hack-republican-na/ http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2017/jan/...

hourislate 10y ago

Assange will be leaving the Ecuadorean Embassy soon. I have a feeling he tries to get to the Russian Embassy or Russia itself? You can bet GCHQ and NSA know something and could tell you exactly if Assange is working with Russia or anyone else for that matter. At this point they have people inside the Embassy cleaning his bathroom and vacuuming the carpets.

marmot777 10y ago

They are not neutral. I don't think it's even controversial to say they're working against the United States. They clearly are. It's an observation not a political statement to point this out. If they were neutral you'd see big releases of Russian secrets, etc.

matthewbauer 10y ago
It's possible there just aren't Russian leakers though. Russia can do some shady things to retaliate against leakers US not so much.
- mirimir 10y ago
  People with leaks about Russia don't need Wikileaks. They just go to establishment media. Also, US responses to Manning and Snowden seemed rather shady.
  - marmot777 10y ago
    Huh? Could you give some examples of Russian leaks that got legs through talking to the establishment media? And by the way, who are the establishment media you're talking about in this context? It can't be Russian State Media such as RT so you must be talking about U.S. media such as the NYT and Wahington Post though I'm not sure. Also, wasn't it this same establishment media that worked with WL to leak Snowden's documents? So why was WL needed at all since the media ultimately did the publishing that people saw in that case? People might forget that WL depended on "media" to actually publish the documents as WL has not always been the sort of household name it is now. They were just the agent now they're a publisher and a PR agent all in one.
    - mirimir 10y ago
      Please see my other comment about the Panama Papers. That went to German media. I occasionally see leaks about Russia in NY Times etc. But they generally aren't styled as "leaks", just reporting. Also, Snowden specifically didn't work through Wikileaks, because he didn't want a mass leak, but rather substantive and "responsible" reporting. Wikileaks just helped him find refuge in Russia.

unityByFreedom 10y ago

> they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true Says the 21 day old account with this single, highly upvoted comment. There are millions of documents on Wikileaks. I highly doubt everything there is verified.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

Buge 10y ago

Does this look neutral to you? https://twitter.com/i/web/status/788059864832602112 https://twitter.com/i/web/status/788059864832602112

MichaelMoser123 10y ago

> it seems that the strategy for discrediting Wikileaks has now become to accuse them of association with the Russians. I don't know if this would be in the Russian interest to publish all these expensive zero day vulnerabilities, it would be in their interest to (continue to) use this stuff too. these vulnerabilities will have to be fixed within some time (now that they are known). I wonder how long it will take for the spooks to get a new stash like this, this must be very damaging. I fear for Assange, the spooks will have a clear motive for demanding retribution against him.

eksemplar 10y ago

I get what you're trying to say, I'm even inclined to agree, but how can "they" fight each other with the truth if only one of the sides fighting gets it's dirty secrets outed? During the elections I kind of wrote it off as them being prepared for Hillary and unprepared for Trump, but I have to wonder why they haven't run any leaks on Trump by now, considering how willing people seem to be to leak information. Where is his taxes? Where is the truth about his Russian ties? I mean, take a stroll through the front page of Wikileaks and then tell me you don't wonder about the lack of Russian stories. Does Russia not have leakers?

ptaipale 10y ago

>This whole narrative of Wikileaks not being neutral is a very weird story, because they've never published anything that wasn't verified to be true. Note that "being neutral" is not at all the same as "publishing only things that are verified to be true". What you choose to publish still has a lot of impact on whether you are neutral or not. Even some of the worst propaganda sites publish true things. The propaganda is in which part of the truth they publish and which not. In Russian, the truth is "Pravda" and you know what it was. It was propaganda. Mostly it was quite true, just with a very specific view on truth.

iopuy 10y ago

This account was created 3 weeks ago and this is the only comment with no submissions or other favorites stories. This is not a lot of info to go off but i'd be willing to bet it is a schill.

iopuy 10y ago
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      https://blog.silentsignal.eu/2014/02/09/jdb-tricks-hacking-java-debug-wire/ https://blog.silentsignal.eu/2014/02/09/jdb-tricks-hacking-j...
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        iopuy 10y ago
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