As I mentioned in an earlier post, Returning to My Roots, I've decided to return to my journalism roots, and resume posting to a blog focussing on News and Media Criticism called Media Vulture.
From the New York Times article:
In a move that legal experts said could present a major test of First Amendment rights in the Internet era, a federal judge in San Francisco on Friday ordered the disabling of a Web site devoted to disclosing confidential information.
The site, Wikileaks.org, invites people to post leaked materials with the goal of discouraging “unethical behavior” by corporations and governments. It has posted documents concerning the rules of engagement for American troops in Iraq, a military manual concerning the operation of prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and other evidence of what it has called corporate waste and wrongdoing.
(read my post on WordPress for more details)
Oddly, this ruling gave more publicity to the Wikilinks website than they could possibly have gained for themselves, and the plaintiff, Julius Baer Bank and Trust, inadvertantly brought a ton of attention and scrutiny to their shady dealings– just as they were planning to take the company public on the NYSE.
In researching this story, I found myself "going down the rabbit hole" into a motherlode of Alternative News, and I really haven't had time to sift through all of it– especially if you include the many crazed conspiracy theorists. (actually, the reality is weird enough. check out the text of HR 1955, passed by Congress, which you can view on the US Government website at http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=110_cong_bills&docid=f:h1955eh.txt.pdf. I especially like lines 18 – 22, which specifically prohibits "thought-crime")
(2) VIOLENT RADICALIZATION.—The term ‘violent radicalization’ means the process of adopting
or promoting an extremist belief system for the purpose of facilitating ideologically based violence to advance political, religious, or social change.
Man!