In this class we de

1. DPI-665
Politics of the Internet
April 16, 2012
The WikiLeaks Conundrum
Micah L. Sifry
Audio: http://bit.ly/HXDoGd
CC-BY-NC-SA

2. Topics for discussion
What does the WikiLeaks episode of 2010-
present show us about:
-the power of networks?
-the power of governments?
-the promise and precariousness of online
freedom of speech?
-the evolving relationship between old and
new media?
-the collision between participatory
transparency and elite opacity?

3. Julian Assange
• Transparency
activist? Journalist?
• Hacking a
superpower?
Destroying an
“invisible
government”?

4. Bradley Manning
• Daniel Ellsberg-style
anti-war
whistleblower?
• Traitor?

5. Media gatekeepers?
• WikiLeaks as
“stateless news
organization,” but
one needing old
media for
amplification and
defense
• Old media
responded how?

6. The Obama government
• “The more freely
information flows,
the stronger the
society becomes”
(Obama in China)
• “Assange is a high-
tech terrorist” (Biden
in the US)

7. The new digital sovereigns
• Amazon, PayPal,
Mastercard, Visa,
Apple: did they
behave properly?
• Can they be trusted
as gatekeepers of a
networked
public/private
sphere?

8. Anonymous and “infowar”
• Is DDOS
(distributed
denial of
service) a form
of civil
disobedience?
• Or the internet
equivalent of
using poison
gas?

9. After WikiLeaks: More open or
less?
• When everything is
secret, is anything
secret? When you’re
open, can you be
“WikiLeaked”?
• “In the internet age,
power shifts from those
who hold secrets to
those to create
openness. That is our
emerging reality.”

10. Assange, post full release of
cables? hypocrite?
• “Transparency should
be proportional to the
power that one has. The
more power one has,
the greater the dangers
generated by that
power, and the more
need for transparency.
Conversely, the weaker
one is, the more danger
there is in being
transparent."