While these aren’t the worst things in the world, a couple of things from the world of information and journalism that were surprising enough to me, even though I think I ought to be pretty hardened to these things by now.
(1)
Through Wikileaks’ twitter feed, I saw this story about one of the founders of the Pirate Bay – a statement, by one of said founders, Peter Sunde. Lots to find outrageous in here, but one aspect of the story that Sunde quoted was amazing:
While these aren’t the worst things in the world, a couple of things from the world of information and journalism that were surprising enough to me, even though I think I ought to be pretty hardened to these things by now.
(1)
Through Wikileaks’ twitter feed, I saw this story about one of the founders of the Pirate Bay – a statement, by one of said founders, Peter Sunde. Lots to find outrageous in here, but one aspect of the story that Sunde quoted was amazing:
“One week after the filing of the concluded investigation, one of my acquaintances noticed that Jim Keyzer had changed his “network” on Facebook. He was no longer part of “Police Authority in Stockholm”, but was now part of the “Warner Brothers” network. Warner Brothers is one of the corporations behind the charges against The Pirate Bay. I got very upset and called Jim Keyzer to ask him what was going on, and was informed that he had changed jobs and was working for Warner now; Warner and NBC Universal, another corporation behind the charges (not to mention the political pressure). Warner and Universal are also part in the Anti-Pirate Bureau (Antipiratbyrån), an organization which was one of the formal plaintiffs during the trial. Keyzer’s new role was anti-pirate manager for these organizations. He had started his new job the day before the investigation was formally concluded.”
If I understand this correctly, the principal investigator in the case started working for Warner Brothers, rather than the police, and continued to investigate without identifying that he was no longer police.
(2)
Then, the tireless Joe Emersberger sent me this blog entry. Apparently someone who behaves in emails as appallingly badly as the average youtube troll is making pleas in the Guardian for internet civility.
Here’s a quote from the column: “The blogosphere, increasingly fuelled by toxic language, is hindering honest engagement rather than encouraging it ”
And here’s a response from Beaumont to one of his readers: “piss off now like a good boy to your Chomsky”.
I flip between thinking: “why should this be surprising?” to finding these things breathtakingly appalling… and I’m not sure I ever want to lose the feeling of being appalled by these things.
