Okay, I'm bored with the wikileaks hype machine now. If you're gonna leak something go ahead and leak it, don't build it up for months on end and then reveal something disappointingly prosaic, like you have the last few times.
While I agree with you that the content of the last few releases have been fascinating but mostly inconsequential. The reason given for staggering the releases is a good one: if you released it all at the same time, each individual issue would not get as much attention. Assange also states that Wikileaks makes a promise (among other promises such as to protect their identity) to its informants to try to achieve the maximum possible impact on the world due to their leak.
It could also be a way to spread the ideology of leaking information. I'm sure there is more than just a strategy to leak the information they have, but to add momentum to the whole idea. Undertaking such a controversial objective could be backed up by a belief. It seems giving the sensitive nature one would assume there are larger objectives involved than the attention created, or it could be as simple as that.
I also see it as following the motion picture marketing model. Build interest months before the release, develop buzz, and then increase that to a countdown ramp-up.
Seems to work quite well, and indeed you are correct it does keep individual issues from getting lost in the release process quite well.
Building hype and waiting and releasing information in parts also dilutes the Wikileaks brand as a publisher of important information, so there is a trade-off involved.
Wikileaks is now creating a channel and noise surrounding the release of sensitive information. This can now start planting the meme of disclosing information. It once was a abstract thought, now it can hold onto the possibility of action.
The Wikileaks mission is not just to release information but to release it in such a way as to maximize political impact. The hype machine is not going away anytime soon.
Wikileaks takes some time to assess stuff before releasing it. That's probably not a bad thing, despite the boredom of anticipation. The general reason for the delay is dealt with in the first question in the interview (to which the article links).
Forbes: To start, is it true you’re sitting on [a] trove of unpublished documents?
Julian Assange: Sure. That’s usually the case. As we’ve gotten more successful, there’s a gap between the speed of our publishing pipeline and the speed of our receiving submissions pipeline. Our pipeline of leaks has been increasing exponentially as our profile rises, and our ability to publish is increasing linearly.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Apparently detailed reports of the US spying on its allies, or reports that the US deliberately concealed the civilian death count in Iraq to make the war look better, is prosaic? Because I find shit like that very interesting.
By the time the US responds to the current leak, the bank leak will be ready or nearly ready. The public will see it as a response to the bank leak and ask who is really in charge.
> He confirmed that WikiLeaks has damaging, unpublished material from pharmaceutical companies, finance firms (aside from the upcoming bank release), and energy companies, just to name a few industries.
The thing that I dislike most about this is Wikileaks alone gets to choose the conversations we have based solely on what they decide to publish. While it was understandable for anything that might actually be life threatening, it doesn't feel right for other types of information.
I don't believe Wikileaks is an objective enough steward to get to decide all of the conversations we are going to have about information that was leaked to them. If you want me to believe you are impartial, dump it all; otherwise, you are trying to manipulate me just like Fox News does.
> Wikileaks alone gets to choose the conversations we have based solely on what they decide to publish.
There's an entire ecosystem of media (ranging from MSM to bloggers) that sets the conversations. Picking out one small element and giving it this massive importance really isn't accurate. It's true that they editorialize by choosing what to cover and what not to. So do all news media. Don't you remember the NY times sitting on the warrantless wiretapping story for over a year?
If you don't like the messages being pushed you have one option -- start using your own printing press. Create another site dedicated to publishing leaks,with your own editorial policy, such as "publish everything as soon as you get it".
OK, you're running a small non-profit organisation. You get a subset of the records of anglo irish bank, say a truck load's worth. (this is a example, not the current thing they are generating spin about). While most of these documents are in the public interest in Ireland and Europe (Anglo Irish bank have been on life support in Ireland for 2 years now, the money needed to keep it afloat has forced the IMF to bail out the Irish government) some aren't, for example records for customers. At this point, you need to get someone to read though millions of words and decide what to release. If you have money, you ring up the local temp agency and get a load of people to do it for you for minimum wage. However, wikileaks doesn't have money. They have to pick what piles of documents are worth reading though.
I agree that its sucky, and would much prefer a system in which wikileaks had the resources to leak more stuff and were not picking and choosing what to release. However, I understand why wikileaks does what it does.
And how many of them will read the dump ? Will it create the impact as it is doing now ? Doesn't this fails the purpose of existance of wikileaks or say any whistleblower site.
I'm having a hard time imagining what could be more scandalous than enriching the super-rich, looting the middle class and leaving the US economy in the shitter for years to come. That's old news.
Maximizing publicity is important, if you actually want to enact positive change as a result of what is being revealed. If everything was released at once there wouldn't be any focused attention and easier for those effected to try and deflect attention.
It's also an interesting way to put all banks on notice for their behaviors, as unless they know more than us they would all consider it's possible that their documents have been leaked.
Get it wrong and they could quite easily cause a run and bring down a bank. That'd be unlikely to cause deaths but could very easily cause personal and corporate bankruptcies.
Leaking US Government data could seen as a threat to US interests. Now leaking business information could be seen a threat to many interests.
Now It's easy to play the shift blame game if anything happened to the people behind Wikileaks. In the beginning it would have been easy to assume it was the US government taking convert action. Now who knows how many ways this could be twisted to hide the actions of any acting party.
Governments love secrets. Corporations love money.
If your going to play information warfare you might want to do a little bit of risk assessment.
I would assume those behind Wikileaks have a system in place such that information they already have will be released one way or another even if something happened to them.
if that server has collected information on it. It can be considered leaked. It's out of their control. I would think any interesting information could be considered all ready in the queue. If I wanted to do damage control the best option is to stop any addition of information to that server.
It was mentioned that Wikileaks redacts information.I'm sure it only a matter of time before that information "Leaks" as well.
Pretty sure (but can't find source at the moment) that that number only reflects the cables on the wikileaks website itself. The number of cables released to newspapers is significantly higher but not a quarter million.
According to a Guardian video I watched yesterday, all of their (the Guardian's) stories so far have been based on "a couple of hundred" cables, which seems to suggest the media does not have to full set yet either.
Oh, gossip is not boring, that’s what’s so devious about it.
I don’t know about eye-opening, though. There are interesting pieces here and there, nothing good journalists didn’t already know or (in the best case for Wikileaks) suspect. Much is nice padding material for articles journalists have already written, another piece of evidence. Nice to have but no game changer.
I like Wikileaks, I really do, but it’s very hard for me to convince myself that this leak is in any way a big deal.
Yeah - except the cable thing has Wikileaks in the news on my rock music radio station. They've really gone mainstream with this one, and the next one will be heard.
Assange is a grandstander, true, but this is really starting to get interesting.
What worries me is that while the government may inefficiently try to haul Assange into court and call him a terrorist, the banking & finance elite may just decide he should have an "accident." I wouldn't put it past them.
> He confirmed that WikiLeaks has damaging, unpublished material from pharmaceutical companies, finance firms (aside from the upcoming bank release), and energy companies, just to name a few industries.
It's almost as if Forbes is sending out a big heads up to various Republican power interests to say, "Ok, he's coming after you guys next." Could serve as a call to action for some.
