The Blast Shack, Bruce Sterling's (long) essay on Wikileaks (opens in new tab)

Great hacker culture perspective. As a hack, Wikileaks is neatly and intricately constructed, working on multiple mutually-reinforcing levels. When it hits the real world, things get a lot more complex.

Similarities between this essay and an episode of CSI - both rely on cardboard cutout characters, simple binary motivations, cleat cut good/bad guys and almost completely no basis in reality. The more you understand how the things they portray actually work, the more your enjoyment diminishes (I'm more of an NCIS fan :)

Differences between this essay and an episode of CSI - CSI knows full well its entire purpose in life is to be mildly entertaining. It never pretends to be a reflection of what real life CSI is like. It's entertainment, nothing more, and it knows it. Unlike the author of this essay, who for some reason thinks he has a deep understanding of "Hacker culture" and the entire saga, and needs about 3000 patronising words to explain his great insights to us.

oh, and if I ever see/hear the word 'cypherpunk' again I think I shall probably vomit.

He seems to think we have only two options, transparency and pain, or discretion and balance. The next step in this sage will be finding a way to have transparency and balance.

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