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.
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...
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.
Don't really like his novels (subtlety is French to them) but his speeches are great.
You just don't hear him being accused of raping anyone, that's all.
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?
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.
[0] http://youtu.be/sKOk4Y4inVY [1] http://youtu.be/qRiY9tkdkV8 [2] http://youtu.be/i7JVzN3dM34 (in french)
If you only read the headlines you are better off not reading news at all.
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.
