3 ms·

What are some of the ways that actual-Wikileaks differs from ideal-Wikileaks?

by samd 16y ago

tptacek 16y ago
A real simple one is that an ideal-Wikileaks would only safely shuttle information from leakers to the public, and not reframe and editorialize the information to favor Wikileaks own political agenda. Another one would be than an ideal-Wikileaks wouldn't have a critical operational stakeholder going on media tours, which make Wikileaks less about the information itself and more about the personalities of the people running Wikileaks (which are ultimately irrelevant), and, more importantly, which create situations in which the security of the whole endeavor could be compromised by a single arrest. There are lots of others I'm sure I could come up with. The fact of the matter is, for all you know, Wikileaks could be a very elaborate 4chan hoax. You know nothing at all about this organization or its true motivations, which is as it must be, since a "transparent" Wikileaks would immediately be shut down.
- samd 16y ago
  Those things are all bad, but Wikileaks still publishes raw data from whistleblowers to the public. The other stuff is, as you said, a sideshow; it doesn't detract from their primary function. The only thing that would make actual-Wikileaks evil is if they didn't publish information that didn't agree with their agenda. But I suspect that if a whistleblower gave information to Wikileaks which then went unpublished, they'd find some other way to get the information out there.
- yread 16y ago
  Wikileaks said when publicizing the video that the leaker himself asked for it to editorialized for largest media impact. Which kinda makes sense when reading the transcripts of idealistic Manning confessing to Lamo that he gave it to them to start "worldwide discussion, debates, and reforms"
  - tptacek 16y ago
    NOT. RELEVANT. An ideal-Wikileaks would not taint every subsequent disclosure it had a hand in by overtly participating in the editorialization of the information it was disclosing. From now on, every time they publish anything we have to wonder not only whether the leaker is giving us the whole story, but whether Wikileaks is being faithful to the material as well. An ideal-Wikileaks would stay out of the story and allow third parties to maximize the media impact. The real-world Wikileaks wants to sit across from Stephen Colbert.
    - niels_olson 16y ago
      ah, no. As I'm sure you know, true neutrality is rare, and in a social system, where people come and go, neutrality is an unstable equilibrium. There is a story about a Soviet diplomat and an American diplomat at a treaty conference. The Russian observes "I envy your propoganda. In the USSR, at least we know Pravda is lying. In the US, you don't even know that." I would prefer Assange's idea: admit that neutrality is unstable and instead, take a stand, but back it up by publishing your source material. This is precisely what scientists do. Rare is the scientific article that publishes all the data from the study. Instead, they publish their analysis of the data: graphs, tables, words. The WikiLeaks model is actually more rigourous than most scientific literature: they publish the whole dataset on top of the analysis and editorial."

What are some of the ways that actual-Wikileaks differs from ideal-Wikileaks?

by samd 16y ago

What are some of the ways that actual-Wikileaks differs from ideal-Wikileaks?

A real simple one is that an ideal-Wikileaks would only safely shuttle information from leakers to the public, and not reframe and editorialize the information to favor Wikileaks own political agenda. Another one would be than an ideal-Wikileaks wouldn't have a critical operational stakeholder going on media tours, which make Wikileaks less about the information itself and more about the personalities of the people running Wikileaks (which are ultimately irrelevant), and, more importantly, which create situations in which the security of the whole endeavor could be compromised by a single arrest. There are lots of others I'm sure I could come up with. The fact of the matter is, for all you know, Wikileaks could be a very elaborate 4chan hoax. You know nothing at all about this organization or its true motivations, which is as it must be, since a "transparent" Wikileaks would immediately be shut down.

samd 16y ago
Those things are all bad, but Wikileaks still publishes raw data from whistleblowers to the public. The other stuff is, as you said, a sideshow; it doesn't detract from their primary function. The only thing that would make actual-Wikileaks evil is if they didn't publish information that didn't agree with their agenda. But I suspect that if a whistleblower gave information to Wikileaks which then went unpublished, they'd find some other way to get the information out there.
yread 16y ago
Wikileaks said when publicizing the video that the leaker himself asked for it to editorialized for largest media impact. Which kinda makes sense when reading the transcripts of idealistic Manning confessing to Lamo that he gave it to them to start "worldwide discussion, debates, and reforms"
- tptacek 16y ago
  NOT. RELEVANT. An ideal-Wikileaks would not taint every subsequent disclosure it had a hand in by overtly participating in the editorialization of the information it was disclosing. From now on, every time they publish anything we have to wonder not only whether the leaker is giving us the whole story, but whether Wikileaks is being faithful to the material as well. An ideal-Wikileaks would stay out of the story and allow third parties to maximize the media impact. The real-world Wikileaks wants to sit across from Stephen Colbert.
  - niels_olson 16y ago
    ah, no. As I'm sure you know, true neutrality is rare, and in a social system, where people come and go, neutrality is an unstable equilibrium. There is a story about a Soviet diplomat and an American diplomat at a treaty conference. The Russian observes "I envy your propoganda. In the USSR, at least we know Pravda is lying. In the US, you don't even know that." I would prefer Assange's idea: admit that neutrality is unstable and instead, take a stand, but back it up by publishing your source material. This is precisely what scientists do. Rare is the scientific article that publishes all the data from the study. Instead, they publish their analysis of the data: graphs, tables, words. The WikiLeaks model is actually more rigourous than most scientific literature: they publish the whole dataset on top of the analysis and editorial."