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While I can understand that, the root issue is that this “hacking” is in fact a public service—whistleblowing. There was much more support for Assange, even fro

While I can understand that, the root issue is that this “hacking” is in fact a public service—whistleblowing. There was much more support for Assange, even from the political establishment, before he published the emails in the lead up to the election. I can’t even be mad at that because it showed what a corrupt organization the DNC was at the time (and probably still is, although there is the Unity coalition now). So I would argue he embarrassed both the military industrial complex AND the DNC to get him where he is now. It’s also much harder to see publishing internal documents of a campaign/political party as a public service or whistleblowing, though I think the case for “russian interference” is entirely overblown compared to, say, blatant interference via the incestuous political/media blob.

freddie_mercury 7y ago
> While I can understand that, the root issue is that this “hacking” is in fact a public service—whistleblowing. How do you establish that a given act of hacking is or is not a public service? Especially in cases where there isn't a bright line like "someone broke law XYZ". It seems like going to court & having a jury decide that is not obviously the wrong solution. So even if one supports your position, it seems like the issue would still end up in court with a jury deciding whether someone spends years in jail or goes free.
- justinclift 7y ago
  > It seems like going to court & having a jury decide that is not obviously the wrong solution. If the court process was reasonably expected to be impartial and fair, then you'd have a point. That's very much not the case in this instance. :(
- pytester 7y ago
  >How do you establish that a given act of hacking is or is not a public service? If you hack and then publish embarrassing material to the whole world it's a public service. If you hack non-embarrassing operationally sensitive material and then leak it selectively to foreign governments then it's espionage. There's some fuzziness but it's not a bright line to cross and Julian Assange is very, very far away from it. The fact that the murders that were uncovered are still going unprosecuted adds considerable weight to the idea that it was a public service. If Assange had done the exact same thing to Russia the idea that it was espionage would be justifiably mocked. It's not mocked because nationalism is a potent drug, essentially (here, it's not like Russians aren't looking at this and shaking their heads).
  - nitemice 7y ago
    > If you hack and then publish embarrassing material to the whole world it's a public service. By that definition, hacking a celebrity's iCloud account and leaking their nudes is a public service. I think that's a bit of a stretch.
    - pytester 7y ago
      "on the government". Regardless, hacking a celebrity's icloud account and releasing the images is still more journalism than it espionage.
    - Nasrudith 7y ago
      Well it depends on how straight our heads on are for what we consider embarrassing. That "a human has a naked body" is embarrassing while "detaining suspects indefinitely without a trial and torturing them while using an utter bullshit pretext of a loophole which wouldn't survive an unbias court" isn't says a lot of things about us and none of them good.
    - SomeOldThrow 7y ago
      Only with a very disingenuous reading of the parent comment out of context can you imagine the definition was intended to imply in a case of hacking someone’s private life.

freddie_mercury 7y ago

> While I can understand that, the root issue is that this “hacking” is in fact a public service—whistleblowing. How do you establish that a given act of hacking is or is not a public service? Especially in cases where there isn't a bright line like "someone broke law XYZ". It seems like going to court & having a jury decide that is not obviously the wrong solution. So even if one supports your position, it seems like the issue would still end up in court with a jury deciding whether someone spends years in jail or goes free.

justinclift 7y ago
> It seems like going to court & having a jury decide that is not obviously the wrong solution. If the court process was reasonably expected to be impartial and fair, then you'd have a point. That's very much not the case in this instance. :(
pytester 7y ago
>How do you establish that a given act of hacking is or is not a public service? If you hack and then publish embarrassing material to the whole world it's a public service. If you hack non-embarrassing operationally sensitive material and then leak it selectively to foreign governments then it's espionage. There's some fuzziness but it's not a bright line to cross and Julian Assange is very, very far away from it. The fact that the murders that were uncovered are still going unprosecuted adds considerable weight to the idea that it was a public service. If Assange had done the exact same thing to Russia the idea that it was espionage would be justifiably mocked. It's not mocked because nationalism is a potent drug, essentially (here, it's not like Russians aren't looking at this and shaking their heads).
- nitemice 7y ago
  > If you hack and then publish embarrassing material to the whole world it's a public service. By that definition, hacking a celebrity's iCloud account and leaking their nudes is a public service. I think that's a bit of a stretch.
  - pytester 7y ago
    "on the government". Regardless, hacking a celebrity's icloud account and releasing the images is still more journalism than it espionage.
  - Nasrudith 7y ago
    Well it depends on how straight our heads on are for what we consider embarrassing. That "a human has a naked body" is embarrassing while "detaining suspects indefinitely without a trial and torturing them while using an utter bullshit pretext of a loophole which wouldn't survive an unbias court" isn't says a lot of things about us and none of them good.
  - SomeOldThrow 7y ago
    Only with a very disingenuous reading of the parent comment out of context can you imagine the definition was intended to imply in a case of hacking someone’s private life.