Anyone commenting about the supposed irony of Wikileaks putting an embargo on releasing this information before an agreed date is being naive.
At one point in time Wikileak's stated mission was just to leak information, and this was done without — comparatively — much fanfare.
What we see now is a change of tactics. If the ultimate goal is not simply to leak information, but to effect change, then what is the best way to do this?
A coordinated, simultaneous release has a better chance of being noticed by more people and thus a greater chance of effecting some meaningful change.
We can disagree on tactics. Assuming you believe their goals are reasonable, what else could they do? I'm not suggesting there are not other options, but I rarely read any suggestions of a better way.
i'm not sure you can say that wikileak's goal is to effect change. their goal is to take information that was private, and make it visible to as many people as is possible. controlling the release furthers that goal. they don't seem to care what happens with the information once it is released, just that the release gathers notice. i don't think their goals have changed over time, they've just become more aware of the fact that releasing information is no good if there's no audience for the release.
Well, effecting change is their stated goal. Assange has spoken at length about the idea of exposing information in order to break down conspiracies which an informed public may consider corrupt. I think that Wikileaks is a long way from being able to do that yet — undermine the corruption/lawlessness in a govt to an extent where it's weakened — but I'm hopeful.
Their focus is not simply exposing private information. Again, Assange has repeatedly said that Wikileaks has no interest in violating personal privacy and has in fact explicitly said that an individual has a right to privacy.
Exposing all private information is a radical position, one for which they couldn't expect to gain popular support. In other words, that is not their goal at all. It's reductive to simply say that they want to destroy privacy.
>I think that Wikileaks is a long way from being able to do that yet — undermine the corruption/lawlessness in a govt to an extent where it's weakened — but I'm hopeful.
They were completely successful in Kenya and had a not-insignificant role in sparking the Arab Spring. They're not able to bring down powerful corrupt regimes, but they've certainly proven successful at effecting change in some of the smaller countries.
At one point in time Wikileak's stated mission was just to leak information, and this was done without — comparatively — much fanfare.
What we see now is a change of tactics. If the ultimate goal is not simply to leak information, but to effect change, then what is the best way to do this?
A coordinated, simultaneous release has a better chance of being noticed by more people and thus a greater chance of effecting some meaningful change.
We can disagree on tactics. Assuming you believe their goals are reasonable, what else could they do? I'm not suggesting there are not other options, but I rarely read any suggestions of a better way.