Megaupload Assisted FBI vs NinjaVideo, But Evidence Then Used Against Them

http://torrentfreak.com/megaupload-assisted-fbi-vs-ninjavideo-but-evidence-then-used-against-them-121121/

96 51 14 years ago

rymith3• 14 years ago

Why are all the people fighting the fights I want to get behind, completely obnoxious? Kim Dotcom, Juian Assange, Richard Stallman, etc... Can't we have a champion for the digital causes with the charisma that exceeds new money red neck, rapist, or raving homeless person? I'm not asking for MLK or Gandhi, just an average Joe.

a_bonobo• 14 years ago

Cory Doctorow has quite the charisma - I love his speech at last year's Chaos Computer Conference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUEvRyemKSg

Don't really like his novels (subtlety is French to them) but his speeches are great.

jivatmanx• 14 years ago

Because political activism on an issue that's not obvious injustice is a quixotic, and the smart people are out building new things/finding ways to route around the problem rather than fighting a losing battle.

possibilistic• 14 years ago

While it may not be universally true, I quite like this.

Any insight on how one might route around the upcoming internet control battle that will take place in the UN? Or the neverending stream of [RI|MP]AA-written laws that congress tries to pass?

freshhawk6• 14 years ago

if by "route around the problem" you mean "extract money from the broken system" then I would agree. Otherwise I'd need to be convinced with examples.

cynicalkane• 14 years ago

From what is publicly known, there's very little reason to believe Assange raped anyone and the Swedish authorities seem uninterested in questioning Assange, filing charges, or anything besides extraditing him to Sweden for some reason.

I don't really want to talk about the details and hijack the thread, but there's something Kafkaesque about how thing shave been handled. The terrifying thing about the case is people are ready to hate him because of flimsy rape allegations, even on Hacker News!

Anyway, I guess the point of this post is Assange isn't all that obnoxious if you ignore the rape media circus. Maybe he is egotistical but most important hackers are.

rymith3• 14 years ago

To quote Shakespeare "The lady doth protest too much, methinks" Fighting extradition was one thing, but asylum from Ecuador has me fairly convinced there is more to the change than I originally thought.

MemorableZebra2• 14 years ago

What's interesting to note is that Sweden doesn't extradite for political crimes. So, legally, there's nothing that Assange has to worry about. Honestly, the more I looked at it the more I started to wonder if he was just being paranoid.

mtgx• 14 years ago

He's not not accused of rape, actually.

johnny222• 14 years ago

I wish i could understand why anybody would defend Assange for anything.

Atropos• 14 years ago

Even apart from the rape allegations, I have lost all respect for him because of this "hiding in the embassy" thing. He can't go to Sweden because he "might" be extradited to the US? Even if he is extradited, he still has access to the US judicial system and as an Australian citizen can count on some basic diplomatic support, furthermore the attention of the international media...

There are thousands of political activists in third world countries, who take much greater risk of bodily harm for themselves and their families every single day, without the perks like having a platform to portray themselves as a "civil rights hero" in the world media, or receiving donations for "legal defense and bail money", or being able to sleep with several groupies on a short Sweden trip.

Grandstanding speeches in the media combined with cowardly behavior is not something I can admire...

TheAnimus• 14 years ago

http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/david-allen-green/2012/09/...

There are so many myths arround Assange, we might never really know whats going on. Afterall sexual molestation claims could be true, could be black helicoptor crew or even just a piss of lady.

What I would say, and what angers me about him is how any message about freedom of information has been utterly lost. He has shacked up with someone who directly opposes his (former?) cause, all I see now is a self publishing type hiding in the shadows.

spindritf• 14 years ago

Well-adjusted individuals who do well within the system have little reason to fight it.

MemorableZebra2• 14 years ago

I think part of the problem is that many of them just get more headlines as a result of their weirdness. There are plenty of people fighting these fights without being insane, Schneier for one. http://www.schneier.com/

You just don't hear him being accused of raping anyone, that's all.

qq66• 14 years ago

It's because the government strategically makes example cases of the least sympathetic individuals. Why do you think all of the anti-privacy legislation is deployed first against child pornographers?

brabram• 14 years ago

Just take a look at Eben Moglen[0], he is a very brilliant speaker and a brilliant man in general. Or Jérémie Zimmermann[1] for the European side. Or Benjamin Bayart for the French side.

[0] http://youtu.be/sKOk4Y4inVY [1] http://youtu.be/qRiY9tkdkV8 [2] http://youtu.be/i7JVzN3dM34 (in french)

bravoyankee4• 14 years ago

Then you be the champion. I'm serious (not being sarcastic or anything). Someone else needs to step up to the plate.

wololo• 14 years ago

MLK and Gandhi were real people once too

http://www.snopes.com/history/american/mlking.asp

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/article/the-gandhi-nobody-...

http://wagingnonviolence.org/2012/02/gandhi-and-the-dalit-co...

mylittlepony• 14 years ago

You are not helping by unjustly calling him a rapist. In fact, even if he did what's he's being accused of, in most countries wouldn't be considered rape.

If you only read the headlines you are better off not reading news at all.

nmridul• 14 years ago

Because, when a smart person comes out in the open, he quickly gets labelled as a new money red neck, rapist, or raving homeless person. That is the power of the opponents. They are able to manipulate the media outlets better.

Semaphor• 14 years ago

Don't know about Stallman but Assange has some ego issues that didn't get smaller with the media attention (though to be fair without his ego he probably wouldn't have survived being the public image of Wikileaks) and Dotcom always was a Grade A scumbag.

alexhektor• 14 years ago

@ rymith: very interesting that your post is the only one slightly on-topic ;) And I totally agree. We need a president of the internet. I'm serious.

rdl• 14 years ago

There are a lot of great (personally) people doing great work, even in IT/security/digital liberty. It's just that the more obstreperous ones stick out in your mind.

Linus Torvalds is pretty universally regarded as a nice person, and very important to open source. Same with a lot of the earlier Bell Labs UNIX people, and computer scientists like Knuth, Ritchie, etc.

Within the startup world, it's even easier -- most of the well respected early angel investors, founders, etc. are decent people.

Every EFF employee that I've spent time with has been great, and a lot of them (Seth Schoen; Wendy Seltzer come to mind) are really important. Same with Prof Zittrain, Lessig, etc.

Even in computer security -- Jon Callas, Bruce Schneier, Ian Goldberg, Hugh Daniels, John Gilmore, Ben and Adam Laurie, Nicko and Alex van Someren, etc.

jQueryIsAwesome• 14 years ago

As soon as you find one they will make rape accusations against him, or just anything that is as evil in your eyes.

iaw• 14 years ago

A Texas ranger was chasing a Mexican bandito around the turn of the last century. The bandito had robbed a bank in Texas and was hiding in a bar in a border town when the ranger found him. The ranger only spoke English and the bandito only Spanish so he found a local translator. The conversation went like this :

Ranger : Ask him where he hid the money.

Translator (in Spanish) : He wants to know where you hid the money.

Bandito : Tell him to go [expletive deleted] himself.

Translator (in English) : He said he's not going to tell you.

The ranger stands, draws his revolver, points it squarely at the bandito's head, and says "ask him again."

Translator (in Spanish) : He still wants to know where you hid the money...

Bandito : Okay! Okay! I hid it in the dried up town well, just tell him not to kill me!

Translator (in English) : He said that he is prepared to die.

Moral of the story, everyone has an agenda.

Megaupload Assisted FBI vs NinjaVideo, But Evidence Then Used Against Them

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