Herniated Disk & Vertigo

he won or lost?

Wikileaks, FTW or WTF?

Difficult to start an article on Wikileaks so it seems that everything has been said about the subject! I myself wrote an article by analyzing cross 4chan last August. It must be said that the website, which we forget it exists since 2006, knew his mark in a few months time.

If this business has been so political and cultural echoes, is that beyond the appearance of radical and dramatic, it concentrates most of the attributes of post-modernity: transparency, obsession with putting directed especially towards widespread distrust all authority.

This distrust concerned including traditional media, singled out by Julian Assange for their complacency and cowardice. If Wikileaks is born is precisely because the press would not do his research and advertising (literally), or an accomplice of those in power while ignoring some of his mistakes. This virulent criticism did not stop Wikileaks to join with five major newspapers worldwide (The World , The Guardian , The New York Times , Der Spiegel and El Pais ) to disseminate and discuss quasi-continuous intra-trade of American diplomacy last November. Then a decision widely criticized and, post could appear as an error.

With "Cablegate" was seen to establish a convergence phenomenon well described by this recent article of New Yorker. On the one hand, Wikileaks uses more and more journalistic methods to disseminate its information, working closely with some newspapers and broadcast over the revelations dropper. On the other, and most importantly, traditional media have seized Wikileaks model and have modeled their convenience. Because what happened had actually happened is: great press marks begin to develop their own systems of "leaks" that allows anyone to send them digitally and anonymously sensitive documents. Al Jazeera was the first to launch in early January with the creation of his "Transparency Unit" , and the New York Times would also consider a similar service. And it's a safe bet that very many others (including The World ) follow suit ... Especially since the fact that a title as respected and conventional cross the Rubicon would have the effect of any inhibitions the area!

This double movement of convergence poses a question: four years after its inception and more than seven months after its media explosion, Wikileaks he won or lost?

The even on Twitter, consecration
pop culture

Somewhere, Julian Assange and his buddies won. Because if they attacked the mainstream media was urging them to mobilize, which is done. On behalf of Wikileaks has entered popular culture. Values, such as activism and transparency have found some resonance, not least because they have been widely debated. His model, finally, is recovered by the press and thus tends to become mainstream, even natural. What began as a warning shot to the traditional media has turned into impetus, and investigative journalism, with all that implies taking risks, seems to revive the concept of Wikileaks.

However, one can also see this phenomenon in the defeat of Wikileaks. Being aped by the media that criticized the site forfeits all exceptional. If several spinoffs had already emerged, it was primarily to honor and support their model. However, when Al Jazeera or New York Times create their own structures of leaks is rather short-circuiting an organization that does not really good news (pun free day) and whose head shall be deemed somewhat accommodating.
Wikileaks could even suffer a double penalty: on the one hand, it would again become a regular site, but vaguely subversive political clout. On the other, he would continue to be targeted by inertia, violent criticism from governments and part of public opinion. Most remaining big irony, as pointed out by philosopher Slavoj Zizek in a forum echoed by Owni that Wikileaks is never quite out of the liberal-democratic political system which he revealed the flaws, what makes his model was not that easier to absorb by the "dominant ideology" (that is, in the eyes of Assange, media pouring into the soft consensus, guarantees of political stagnation) ... After

blogs, which have shaken (and I mean jostled, eh) the legitimacy of professional journalism, and social networks that have to be pushed more reactive and do nothing omitted, Wikileaks appears to have scored a third identity crisis of the press in the space of ten years. Except that this time, traditional media has reacted swiftly and dramatically. At least on this point, everyone wins.

What do you think?