One day, we'll all hate WikiLeaks
There's whistle-blowing, and then there's a stadium full of vuvuzelas. One can be ethically questionable but ultimately moral; the other is overbearing noise that initially makes us smile, but ultimately makes us all deaf.
If you're a US government official, you probably hate WikiLeaks. It certainly would have messed with your weekend. It trumped the voluminous war logs by releasing, starting last night, hundreds of thousands of classified diplomatic dispatches. One day, we'll all agree with the Americans.
Someone I spoke to this morning - in the media, not in any government - described the situation as "apocalyptic", and called Julian Assange, the infamous founder of WikiLeaks, an "information terrorist". I thought the terms were overwrought, but the more I think about it, the more I agree.
Continue reading the full opinion piece on www.thedailymaverick.co.za.
For more:
- TechCentral: Why we should celebrate WikiLeaks
- TechCentral: WikiLeaks: some leaks can be dangerous
- Charles Apple: How papers covered the latest Wikileaks release
About the author
Ivo Vegter is a former technology journalist who took up carpentry and ran away to Kynsna after one too many incidents of crime in Johannesburg. But because he likes argument for the sake of it (the coherent, intelligent type; not the froth-at-the-mouth version found among political and religious fanatics) he still writes a number of regular columns for [[www.thedailymaverick.co.za The Daily Maverick]]. Follow him on Twitter at [[@IvoVegter]].