Posts by Russell Brown
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Hard News: Book review: 'Wikileaks:…, in reply to Laurence Millar,
PLeased to report that I watched the full show, online, in SIngapore an hour after the show.
Excellent.
And I can confirm that you were able to do solely because your earlier complaint was drawn to the attention of the appropriate people.
You squeaky wheel, you :-)
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Meanwhile, Daniel Domscheit Berg's book and interviews have taken things to a whole other place:
In an excerpt of Domscheit-Berg’s upcoming book, Inside WikiLeaks, that was leaked to the document-publishing site Cryptome, an English-language version of several pages states that he and one “architect” of WikiLeaks’ submissions platform took control of WikiLeaks’ system for submitting leaks away from Assange–along with at least some portion of the leaked material that WikiLeaks had obtained–to ensure the security of the site’s sources.
The excerpt also criticizes Assange’s character, his attitude towards women, and his handling of several matters related to the release of the Apache helicopter video, titled “Collateral Murder,” showing the killing of innocent civilians in Iraq in April of last year. Specifically, the excerpt states that Assange lied to the New Yorker about decrypting the video clip and that he refused to reimburse WikiLeaks’ staffers, including Icelandic spokesperson Kristinn Hrafnsson, who worked on the project and flew to Iraq to meet with the victims’ families.
But far more crucial for WikiLeaks’ secret-spilling mission is a passage that begins, “Children shouldn’t play with guns. That was our argument for removing the submissions platform from Julian’s control.”
That portion of the excerpt states that at the time Domscheit-Berg and others left Wikileaks in September of last year, its submissions system had security flaws that convinced Domscheit-Berg and the site’s “architect” to take control of the submissions system until WikiLeaks could ensure the security of the leaks’ sources.
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Hard News: Book review: 'Wikileaks:…, in reply to Jonathan Milne,
It is true that the Star-Times did not publish any further articles by Nicky Hager after the Herald on Sunday obtained and published the classified cables in their entirety. But it was only Nicky’s analysis that was denied to the New Zealand public – the cables themselves were available, and so too analysis by other journalists and commentators.
Sure -- but I think there's a case for saying that Hager was particularly well-placed to write this sort of story. And the fact that he had in fact written those analyses and they were yanked from the SST because David Kemeys got spooked by you guys is ... remarkable.
Mind you, the SST's legal threat again Brian Edwards yesterday suggests a predisposition for stupid decisions.
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Muse: TV Review: Good Gods Almighty!, in reply to Simon Bennett,
Less-than-enthusiastic review in On Film:
Give her a break! It’s her first TV review.
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Hard News: Book review: 'Wikileaks:…, in reply to sally jones,
I presumed ‘pinned down’ implied a struggle on the woman’s part not to be pinned, rather than consensual ‘pinning’ for the fun (?) of it.
If both parties consider it fun, it’s fun, it doesn’t matter what you or I think. I don’t think finding physical restriction erotically satisfying is even that rare.
Perhaps Assange, who self-mythologised himself as “dangerous” in that OK Cupid profile thought he was being wild and mysterious. Perhaps the stream of wikigroupies produced a familiarity that led to contempt. Maybe he’s just a sexual creep.
The molestation charge seems to relate to him (allegedly) taking his cock out and rubbing it against Miss A when she declined further sexual encounters later in the week he stayed with her. Eeew. Not cool, dude.
The condom thing with the second woman seems clear-cut in terms of consent. I don’t know how her admission that she consented to him continuing affects things, but, wow, what a creep. Allegedly.
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I think everyone could be telling what they regarded as the truth here and it still might not be obvious whether what happened was rape.
And it's worth noting the same documents translated by Juha Saarinen also don't speak well of the competence of the Swedish police.
I think what's really out of order is the bald-faced lies Assange's lawyers have told about the case, and the implicit encouragement to vilify the women.
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Hard News: Book review: 'Wikileaks:…, in reply to Steve Parks,
I hadn’t either until I read this description of the claims:
Yes. It does annoy me that people still fixate on a couple of tweets when she contemporaneously told friends -- who were later subsequently interviewed by police -- things that seem to bear out her later police statement.
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Hard News: Book review: 'Wikileaks:…, in reply to Don Christie,
Man, that's an amazing story -- and it's nice to see Anonymous doing something smarter than trying to break the internet.
Seems fair to note that the firms involved will have got the idea about sowing dissent in Wikileaks from the well-documented dissent in Wikileaks, which I don't think was made up.
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Up Front: Say When, in reply to Mikaere Curtis,
The only solution is to have a big party and revel in turning 40
+1.
Mine was a cracker.
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Hard News: Book review: 'Wikileaks:…, in reply to Hilary Stace,
Why was Julian Assange (or his twin) tracking Hone Harawira on the television news the other day?
That would be John Hartevelt of The Press. He must have some interesting conversations in airports.