Wiki-Who?

I remember when I used to catch the train to work, I would pass an area in Redfern where there was some graffiti on the wall which said 'Free Julian Assange'. At this time, I had no idea who he was, and even though I was curious, I did not go out of my way to look it up on the internet as it did not really phase me.

Over time, I would randomly hear his name on the TV or see some headline in the newspaper about it but curiosity did not kill the cat and its only now, years later that I have actually learnt who Julian Assange is and what Wikileaks does. 

Wikileaks was founded in 2006 by Julian Assange. It is a not for profit organisation whose aim is 

"to bring important news and information to the public... One of our most important activities is to publish original source material alongside our news stories so readers and historians alike can see evidence of the truth."(Wikileaks, n.d.)

Wikileaks focuses on leaking secret information as they believe in freedom of information which I wholeheartedly agree with (Wikileaks, n.d). Wikileaks has created a new estate known as the fifth estate, which takes the information from the media and traditional journalists and exposes people, corporations and the government (Wikileaks, n.d.). 

Although I think that even though Wikileaks is making public, secret information, is this actually doing more harm than good? What do you think? 

I also think with Wikileaks being a huge threat to the government that they could plant information that they intend for them to find and by leaking that information it could be quite catastrophic. Although Julian Assange has proven he is quite clever and witty and has outwitted the government on many occasions.

Wikileaks has proven that knowledge is power by the reactions of the governments. They say Julian Assange is a terrorist due to his actions. According to the Oxford Dictionary (2014), a terrorist is one that engages in acts or an act of terrorism. Not to get all stereotypical on you, but below is a picture of a group of terrorists and a picture of Julian Assange. Do you think he is terrorist? 

Along, with the information I have uncovered about Wikileaks, I have come across the term 
known as whistleblower. The people who work for Wikileaks are considered whistleblowers. So what is a whistleblower you ask? 

Wikileaks believes scrutiny of government and large corporations encourages them to improve their procedures and prevent corruption. It provides more support from the society as a whole and as a result of this it improves transparency in relation to publishing information and freedom of information (Wikileaks, n.d.). 

I leave you now with a clip about Barrack Obama, making changes to the transparency of documents. How conveniently interesting considering the timing of everything.

Signing out for now, See you next week!KM



References
Merriam Webster Dictionary (2014) Whistleblower, retrieved 28th January 2014, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/whistle-blower

Oxford Dictionary (2014) Terrorist, retrieved 28th January 2014, http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/terrorist

Wikileaks, Retrieved 28th January 2014, from http://wikileaks.org/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CU0m6Rxm9vU