"Why isn't Julian Assange dead?"

On the eve of the Jon Stewart rally to "turn it down a notch," rightwing columnist Jonah Goldberg wonders why the CIA hasn't yet assassinated the WikiLeaks founder.

Future of Journalism

Will erecting pay walls around news content help? No, says Arianna Huffington in May 2009 Senate testimony. Here's "Life After the Pay Wall" nightmare scenario from Advertising Age.

Biggest Moments in Journalism-Blogging History

...according to Online Journalism Blog (as of Nov 2008).

Indy Outlet vs. Joe Miller

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Joe Miller in Alaska -- who may still win the election -- has fallen in the polls since the online indy Alaska Dispatch wrote articles about his past (for example, here and here) and then had one of its top staffers arrested by Miller's security people.

Rally to Restore Sanity

Your faithful blogger gets the last word in Sunday's London Observer report on Stewart/Colbert rally: "It is a sad commentary that the two most important news shows are on the Comedy Channel," said Cohen. "In their comedic format they are doing what journalists should be doing."

Clever rally placard here and here and here. (H/t to TPM.) Also, here's one from student Pete B, and another.

Izzy Award Winner Scahill on MSNBC

Independent journalist Jeremy Scahill gives his take about WikiLeaks Iraq documents from his reporting post in Kabul, Afghanistan. Scahill focuses on abuses by private military contractors. (H/t to Andrew C.)

Influence Tracker

Who funds our Congress members? Wired magazine and a nonprofit research group (and American Public Radio) team up to present politicians (in their well-dressed suits) as NASCAR drivers (with their logo-adorned uniforms). H/t to Kellan.

Google deal to keep doing business in China

Google agreed in June to quit automatically switching its users in China to Google's uncensored Hong Kong search site. But there's a tab users can click to be switched. Is it safe to hit that tab?

AFTER Yahoo provided info to China's government...

...that led to the imprisoning of two Chinese dissidents in 2002 and 2004, Yahoo announced in 2008 that it was establishing a fund for people jailed in China for posting human rights views online. Meaningless gesture?

Big Media "Hall of Shame"

"Hall of Shame" video from the media reform group Free Press highlights media corporations caught censoring web or cellphone traffic.

Web censorship

In Feb 2008, Wikileaks.org was ordered to be shut down (ineffectively) by a federal judge's order, after complaint from none other than a Cayman Islands bank! The judge removed his order after 10 days.

Inner City Press, a monitor of Wall St. and the United Nations, temporarily is delisted from Google News. The de-listing happened soon after Matt Lee of Inner City Press questioned Google's commitment to free expression.

In 2007, consumer rights groups mobilized to tell the Federal Communications Commission: "No More Media Consolidation." CommonCause was blocked from placing an anti-consolidation ad on My Space, which Rupert Murdoch had bought in 2005. The banned ad featured a photo of Murdoch and the caption: "This is the face of Big Media." Is it your space or Murdoch's space?

Filmmaker Josh Fox of "Gasland"

Josh Fox, the director of a documentary about gas drilling or "fracking," will be at Ithaca College Tuesday evening. Here he is on "The Daily Show."

Gay Indy Blogs

Adam P has put a very helpful slide show on his blog re "Most Important Gay Indy Blogs." HuffingtonPost has had great success attracting eyeballs to its slide shows of "10 biggest this" or "8 funniest that"

Turning piracy into profit

Jacob's blog: "How to handle piracy 101."

Kellan D cited by "News 21"

Kellan's "Internet footprint" in the form of a blog post noticed by News 21

WikiLeaks Rap

Cute video from indy producer in Australia. H/t Pete B.

NPR, ABC tell their reporters: Don't Attend...

...Colbert/Stewart rally in D.C. I'm quoted in Christian Science Monitor article on the issue:

The main reason mainstream media is under siege is because on major story after major story, they got it wrong. It’s not because reporters marched in Washington. It’s because of the botched reporting in the run-up to the Iraq invasion and the totally missed financial crisis. The independent new voices have blossomed because of their content failures.

Did WikiLeaks documents expose individuals...

...to danger in Iraq? That's the Pentagon's claim. So far, no evidence supports it, according to this Christian Science Monitor piece.

NYT piece by John Burns and others....

...disparages Julian Assange of WikiLeaks. Blogger Glenn Greenwald calls the NY Times article a "sleazy hit piece" and the journalists "Nixonian henchmen of today."

"Control Your Image: Women Musicians Seize On Social Media"

Laura Sydell's 5-minute NPR report (Aug 19) on indy female recording artists using Facebook and social media: "More women than men use social media, according to several studies. And more women musicians seem to be finding it a good way to connect with fans and sell records without having to resort to some of the old marketing cliches."

Motives of an Accused Leaker

Investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill ended his August report in The Nation, "Wikileaks and War Crimes," with this discussion of the motives of 22-year-old Army intelligence analyst Bradley Manning, facing life in prison as an accused WikiLeaks leaker:

In Manning's online chats with Adrian Lamo, the hacker turned government informant who turned him in, Manning claimed to have access to 260,000 classified State Department cables exposing "almost criminal political backdealings." Lamo asked Manning to list the "highlights" of what he gave to WikiLeaks. Among those described by Manning are documents on the US Joint Task Force at Guantánamo, which Manning called the "Gitmo papers," a video of an airstrike in Afghanistan that killed civilians and State Department cables—the information, Manning said, would cause Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to "have a heart attack." Curiously, there was no mention of Afghan war documents. We may never know whether Manning leaked those documents. But what is clear from the chat logs is that Manning believed he was performing a public service by leaking what he did.

In one chat, Manning and Lamo are discussing Manning's passing of documents to WikiLeaks. Lamo asks Manning what his "endgame" is. Manning replies, "god knows what happens now," and adds, "hopefully worldwide discussion, debates, and reforms if not... than [sic] we're doomed as a species."

In one of his last chats with Lamo, reportedly on May 25, Manning says, "what if i were someone more malicious i could've sold to russia or china, and made bank?"

"why didn't you?" Lamo asks.

"because it's public data," Manning responds. "information should be free it belongs in the public domain...if its out in the open... it should be a public good." He adds: "im crazy like that."

Within days, Manning was arrested.

"You Tuber" makes it into...

...big leagues.

Formulaic TV News

Correspondent Charlie Brooker on BBC's Newswipe offers a segment lampooning the samey nature of stories on TV networks like BBC. Hopefully, indies will find alternative approaches.

Online reporter handcuffed...

...and detained for asking questions of the Alaska Republican candidate for U.S. Senate, Joe Miller. The reporter -- a well-known journalist in the area and founder of Alaska Dispatch -- was handcuffed by Miller's security personell after a dispute over his questioning of the candidate about his role as a former part-time city attorney. Here's Alaska Dispatch's version.

Police repression against indies

Since the 1960s when the FBI and local police engaged in violence and harassment against "underground weeklies," great progress has been made in freedom for dissenting U.S. outlets. But harassment of indy media continues, as in Minnesota during the 2008 Republican convention.

Are we caught in Zuckerberg's web?

After seeing the movie "Social Network," viewers might ask themselves whether Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's has improved his attitude at all about respecting others' privacy. H/t to The Nation's Ari Melber for these messages from "Zuck" at the beginning.

Flush with thousands of profiles submitted by his peers, Zuckerberg typed out his thoughts via instant message to a friend at Harvard:

ZUCK: yea so if you ever need info about anyone at harvard
ZUCK: just ask
ZUCK: i have over 4000 emails, pictures, addresses, sns
[REDACTED]: what!? how'd you manage that one?
ZUCK: people just submitted it
ZUCK: i don't know why
ZUCK: they "trust me"
ZUCK: dumb fucks

Critique of Margaret Sanger ...

...by a political economist exposing Sanger's dabbling in racist (eugenics-based) arguments in support of birth control.