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Off topic, but I had to ask this: Am I the only one here that thinks that this upcoming leak will pose a threat to the national security and should be stopped?
by zeeone 16y ago
Off topic, but I had to ask this: Am I the only one here that thinks that this upcoming leak will pose a threat to the national security and should be stopped?
- aw3c2 16y agoThe national security of what country? I suspect it could improve the security and life of some affected countries. If there was no exploitation and shady operations that seriously harm others, there would not be such excitement in the US government.
- zeeone 16y agoThe national security of all countries involved. Sensitive diplomatic information is often better handled by diplomats. Unleashed to the masses, it may cause unnecessary aggression, maybe even riots somewhere. Not to mention that it puts a lot of people's lives at risk.
- blueben 16y agoBest handled by diplomats? Because us unwashed masses can't handle the truth, public debate just second-guesses those who are in charge, and we should really leave the important things to the ruling class?
- garply 16y agoReports about brutal repression of Tibetan protesters would be a threat to Chinese national security. Should those be stopped? Or do you only support freeing damaging information about countries you don't like?
- Pahalial 16y agoErm.. Well, seeing as you can't really have anything to base this on other than the US Government's say-so, I'm not sure what kind of discussion there is to have on the matter as of yet. You trust these governments far more than I do, I will say that.
- sad_hacker 16y agoYes, you are the only one.
- zeeone 16y agoHi. Reddit is this way ---> http://reddit.com http://reddit.com
- bruceboughton 16y agoI'm pretty sure most companies have information they'd rather wasn't public. Most people do too. I don't see why governments would be any different. There's a careful balance between transparency and secrecy.
- commandar 16y agoNot really, on freedom of speech grounds. That said, I'm a bit torn on wikileaks as an organization. I think there needs to be an organization like wikileaks that serves as an outlet for whistleblowers, but I also think that wikileaks is falling too far down the path of self-aggrandizement for me to take them seriously. For one, they've heavily promoted some releases that have turned out to contain very little truly new information. More importantly, their inclination to editorialize hurts their credibility in a massive way. The "Collateral Murder" video is case in point -- you not only have the title the video was released under, but the entire thing was annotated telling you exactly how you were supposed to interpret it. You're a helicopter pilot observing a combat zone and somebody traveling with a group of armed men pokes a cylindrical object around a corner in the direction of your forces - are you likely to think that object is A. a weapon or B. a pro-grade telephoto lens. According to the Colateral Murder video, it's ridiculous to think A. Things like that make me somewhat distrustful of wikileaks since it makes it clear they have an agenda beyond the simple dissemination of information, and forces me to wonder whether they'd actually publish information contrary to that agenda if they were to receive it.
- blueben 16y agoI'd love to hear somebody say they don't take Steve Jobs or Larry Ellison seriously because they're too "self aggrandizing". What happened to results mattering most? There are a lot of reasons to dismiss people and organizations, but how ego size is just about the most shallow reason I can think of.
- commandar 16y agoSteve Jobs and Larry Ellison aren't trying to fill the role of an information clearinghouse. The information they're disseminating should be what's important; instead I've increasingly gotten the impression that wikileaks being in the spotlight is being given more consideration.
- blueben 16y agoAm I to take from this that journalism is a higher calling that requires a self-less attitude and a humble ego? Because I'm pretty sure that kind of journalism has never existed. Regardless of whether Wikileaks is self-aggrandizing or not (and the recurring theme here is that people "feel" it is, but can never substantiate), the information released and the results achieved speak for themselves.