I am of two minds about the Wikileaks excitement this past week. On the one hand I am concerned about the damage to the US the release might cause. On the other, I remember the honored examples of the Pentagon Papers, Watergate, and other whistleblowers, and the duty in a free society that the press -- and any other concerned parties -- has to make sure the government operates with transparency.
However, regardless of whichever way I end up navigating between these two opinions, I am unarguably opposed to the outright acts of censorship the US government is imposing on the information and Wikileaks itself. As you may or may not have heard, US pressure has forced the site off of at least one host so far, and has also forced its DNS to remove the entry for Wikileaks, to keep readers from getting there. (I suppose I should note that such reactions only encourage me to embrace the second of my two positions, as they only undermine any moral high ground the US government might try to claim...)
Fortunately, this is the Internet, and we have ways of thwarting two-bit bullies when they attempt such strong-arm tactics. There has been a massive backlash against the US-backed censorship. Like other groups before it, the US government is discovering that trying to quash something it doesn't like only results in thousands of copies of it popping up in more places than it can throw its weight around in. Of particular interest is a suggestion (that many are following) that folks around the world add a subdomain to their sites that points to Wikileaks.
There is also a Twitter tag for people interested this and other censorship circumvention methods.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
However, regardless of whichever way I end up navigating between these two opinions, I am unarguably opposed to the outright acts of censorship the US government is imposing on the information and Wikileaks itself. As you may or may not have heard, US pressure has forced the site off of at least one host so far, and has also forced its DNS to remove the entry for Wikileaks, to keep readers from getting there. (I suppose I should note that such reactions only encourage me to embrace the second of my two positions, as they only undermine any moral high ground the US government might try to claim...)
Fortunately, this is the Internet, and we have ways of thwarting two-bit bullies when they attempt such strong-arm tactics. There has been a massive backlash against the US-backed censorship. Like other groups before it, the US government is discovering that trying to quash something it doesn't like only results in thousands of copies of it popping up in more places than it can throw its weight around in. Of particular interest is a suggestion (that many are following) that folks around the world add a subdomain to their sites that points to Wikileaks.
There is also a Twitter tag for people interested this and other censorship circumvention methods.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.