Wikileaks Needs Help, and Not Just Money 134
st1d writes to tell us that Wikileaks has put out a call for help. However, instead of just asking for money, they have also suggested technical and legal avenues for support. In the site's short life, Wikileaks has been at the center of many breaking scandals and investigations. "Wikileaks is currently overloaded by readers. This is a regular difficulty that can only be resolved by deploying additional resources. If you support our mission, you can help us by integrating new hardware into our project infrastructure or developing software for the project. Become patron of a WikiLeaks server or other parts of our technology, adding more pillars to the stability and balance of the WikiLeaks platform. Servers come trouble-free and legally fortified, software is uniquely challenging. If you can provide rackspace, power and an uplink, or a dedicated server or storage space, for at least 12 months, or software development work for WikiLeaks, please write to wl-supporters@sunshinepress.org."
Re:Freenet (Score:4, Insightful)
It seems that Wikileaks should operate over Freenet [freenetproject.org]. Leaks could be submitted anonymously that way, and also distributed anonymously. The advantage would be that it would be entirely decentralized, so there would be no organization vulnerable to legal action.
Freenet has been slow and hard to use in the past, but its improved quite a bit. It is the obvious platform for something like Wikileaks. Of course, there is nothing to prevent people from mirroring content on the web (since installing Freenet, like any piece of software, is a hassle). But at least there will be an unimpeachable backup of all data on Freenet.
I wish a comprehensive group of security experts with varying backgrounds and specialties would get together and try to compromise both Freenet and Tor to see just how secure and anonymous they really are. By this I mean in an open, public, collaborative sort of way. This could only be a good thing, as any vulnerabilities or weaknesses could potentially be addressed. Then we could be a bit more confident about the confidentiality of those who contribute documents to sites like Wikileaks. I am sure that many such folks are doing so at great risk to themselves, especially when they live under repressive regimes, yet they believe in our right to know and are willing to take that risk. It really would be nice to know they are a bit safer doing it.
Bad times (Score:4, Insightful)
Mirrors for popular files (Score:3, Insightful)
I downloaded ba-038-air-traffic-control-tape.wmv from wikileaks and distributed it to a few co-workers and friends. I don't have the resources to run a full mirror but I would be happy to mirror that file. If wikileaks had the ability to point to mirrors for specific files and verify the MD5s of the files on an ongoing basis then some load could be taken off their servers.
I suppose a sneaky mirror host could serve different files to different IP addresses though but I can't immediately see a reason for that.
Re:Torrents (Score:3, Insightful)
You know, the people who think that the only way to get an iPhone is to buy it locked (if they even understand the concept of a SIM-lock) and on a long contract with a huge telco.
Re:Bad times (Score:4, Insightful)
Not necessarily; even though people are struggling there are always people who are doing very well. Just a few of those pitching in can help considerably.
It never hurts to ask, the worst that can happen is "no".
Re:I donated money (Score:3, Insightful)
Jokes based on racial stereotypes can be funny, but the GGP's comment wasn't a joke at all, it was just a nonsensical statement with something about Native Americans.
Re:I donated money (Score:1, Insightful)
it was just a nonsensical statement with something about Native Americans.
Ever heard of the term "indian giver"?
It's even on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_giver
Re:Bad times (Score:4, Insightful)
They're also one of the few places where I feel we can see the facts behind some of the reasons so many people are struggling right now.
Seriously - We get fed all sorts of BS from the news agencies... WikiLeaks posts the stuff that can often verify or debunk much of that BS.
Re:I donated money (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Irresponsible (Score:3, Insightful)
Does the "fresh air" resulting from my publishing that you like to wear women's clothing and are having an affair with a male cubicle mate make you less inclined to indulge that behaviour?
Yes, actually, it probably would. But I agree: for the average citizen that information should remain private. However, public figures have to play by different rules, at least under U.S. law, and if those public figures happen to be people who make decisions that affect me ... you're damn right I want to know about it. I may want to vote against them next time.
Yours takes the form of a zero-tolerance policy that, by definition, precludes any such requirements, or any thinking generally.
The only zero-tolerance around here I see is yours. I made no such statement, and quite deliberately limited my remarks to governments and corporations that do bad things to people. And yes, if a corporation has dirty laundry it should be aired: they have way too much power in most societies as it is, and coverups rarely do any long-term good. The more the business world gets away with murder (in many cases, literally) the more comfortable they're going to feel in continuing their bad behavior. And as for government ... well, that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish but the same arguments apply. The disease of unaccountability is infecting more and more levels of government and corporate leadership, and there's only one way to put a stop to that.
... but don't make shit up. That's just irritating.
So feel free to disagree
Re:I donated money (Score:3, Insightful)
Do you need an explanation of this in kindergarten level?
There is 30 people in your class;
Out of those, 29 of them make a joke about 1 of them.
vs
That 1 boy makes a joke out of those 29 people.
Is it a same situation?
Re:Bad times (Score:5, Insightful)
Not necessarily; even though people are struggling there are always people who are doing very well. Just a few of those pitching in can help considerably.
I have the feeling that most of the people that are doing "very well" these days are not particularly interested in supporting a project that reveals secrets.
Re:Freenet (Score:4, Insightful)
From the site [freenetproject.org]:
For best performance, Freenet will run continually. It should not interfere with your computer usage, as it requires around 200MB of RAM and 10% of one CPU core, plus some disk access.
And no wonder considering that it is written in Java...
Not all PCs have Java installed. First. Second. With that kind of resource utilization, I do not see Freenet catching with average consumers.
Probably they should invest into a lightweight C/C++ client. That even I would let run on my systems.
Re:I donated money (Score:4, Insightful)
Making a potentially offensive joke and then complaining about the moderators not getting the humor in it is also being an ass. So is continuing to post when the mass of "offtopic" moderators would prefer you to leave quietly.
BTW, I quite honestly had no idea that your "probably Native American" post was supposed to be funny.
I'm at the point in my life... (Score:5, Insightful)
...that I can't afford to be the legal test case for running a Tor exit node or a Wikileaks server, much as I believe in both of these projects. And I would imagine there are many who, while they possess the desire and the technical know-how to engage in such activities, simply cannot be expected to do so without some form of legal immunity (or at least a guarantee of unlimited legal representation). Until that time comes, I simply don't see many people stepping forward with offers of hosting assistance.
Perhaps an effort should be made to secure guaranteed legal representation from the EFF, FSF, and other groups for those who volunteer to run exit nodes, servers, etc.
Re:Freenet (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, it really should be rewritten in Python (or what is the cool language today).
Seriously, I much rather pay the memory penalty of Java than fight against the numerous security bugs C/C++ program would give.
An Anarcho-Capitalist Perspective (Score:1, Insightful)
I'm a big fan of Wikileaks. I run a local caching proxy (sorta like a mirror) that I and others access it through, and I certainly would encourage everyone to send a few bucks their way whenever possible (and I do try to follow that advice myself).
However, what comes to my mind when I read about the legal troubles of sites like that is a paraphrasing of a famous Alexander Haig quote: "Let them march all they want, as long as they pay their taxes." Winning back your right to march (or to Wikileak) is commendable, but it is not an end in of itself.
Free speech is only a small part of the battle for liberty, because dissent through speech alone is largely useless in the face of an all-powerful government that has near-total influence over public opinion. Dissenting opinions can not only be hijacked, marginalized, and ignored by the government-licensed media, but individuals can be preprogrammed to ignore them from their early childhood education onward! Tyranny 2.0 finds it more profitable to keep its slaves on longer chains, thus we can have things like the Internet, but those chains are nonetheless there lest you ever venture too far!
The best hope for resistance against such massive concentration of power comes in movements like the Free State Project (google it), which can make further tax resistance and secession movements possible in the future. Partisan democracy is a sham - only through intergovernmental competition can governments be forced to stop treating their citizens as subjects, and start treating them as consumers of their services who actually have a choice!
Re:Freenet (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I'm at the point in my life... (Score:1, Insightful)
I'm at the point in my life that I can't afford to stand for what I believe.
There, fixed it for you. Enjoy your "safe" life.
Re:I donated money (Score:3, Insightful)
Theres nothing funny about racist jokes. Leave that junk on 4chan and Digg.
I disagree. And let me point out that, as someone of Greek extraction, I personally have been the butt of many jokes over the years ("... so the Jew bent over, and the Greek disappeared", yeah I know, that's an oldie, but it manages to slam Jews, Italians and Greeks simultaneously.) I'm also part Irish, and if you have any awareness of ethnic humor at all you'd know how much ribbing I've taken from that part of my typically American polycultural background. "What do Irish do on their first date? Get drunk and have sex. What do the Irish do on their second date? Get drunk and have sex", etc., etc. Etc. Still, I accept them with good humor and in the spirit in which they were told. That's because I've found that people with high horses often fall off of them.
The way I look at this, if you're so goddamn proud of your heritage that you just can't stand to see anyone poke fun at it, well, you are the one with issues. In fact, maybe you aren't so proud of your background as you want other people to believe. Yes, it's true sometimes such "jokes" are told with mean-spirited intent: the best response then is to laugh uproariously and say to the teller, "Good one!", and file it away for future use. I've picked up quite a few that way.
Heck, I've got a fine collection of Greek and Irish jokes somewhere on my network here, and some of them are truly hysterical. My family and friends have all told them and laughed at them (and each other.) I'm also part German and if any of you have some good German jokes I'd appreciate your passing them along.
So it simply is not true that "racist" jokes are never funny. They're just not funny to certain people, and I feel sorry for them, because if you can't laugh at yourself then you have something wrong with you. Humor, racist or otherwise, is a powerful binding force that crosses racial boundaries like nothing else, if we let it.
Also, it's worth pointing out that the bulk of what human beings find "funny" is at someone else's expense, whether race is involved or not. That's just the way it is. Don't believe me? Just ask Moe, Larry or Curly (or Shemp, if you prefer.) Maybe the whole human race is mentally ill at some level, but trying to pretend that we don't find the discomfiture of others humorous at times is just denying what is. Such denial makes some individuals feel superior, I've noticed, but in reality they're just insecure and uptight.
The world is, and always will be, full of things that will offend us all at different times and different places. Learning to handle such affronts with grace and dignity is a major part of growing up.