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The Tea Party's popularity + successes are further confirmation that the real extremists and Kool Aid / Viagra pushers are the Obama.Bernanke.Geithner.Congress prostiitutes+parasites that exist at societies' + nature's expense, not unlike several exemplary 'artists'/professional prostitutes,who routinely bemoan the global budget cuts, even as the workers / tax payers are crushed by the gargantuan Ponzi schemes entitled democracy + capitalism.The Tea Party's popularity + successes confirm that what the so called 'foreign extremists'are defending is in fact elementary.In that sense the latter have succeeded not only in bankrupting western democracies,but have exposed the systemic bankruptcy and degeneracy of western democracies to their own citizens,and awoken their 'domestic extremists', who,no longer injest the ultra hyped, ultra extremist/'democratic'/republican/korporat fascist Viagra/Kool Aid BS.Kool Aid = Korporat Fascism = ExtremismVØte K A M F S \\ K F M F S Øut--- \ 9 \ -

Hallothe 23 of octobre i present a "BioEco Action" in the "PAV" of Torino, ( "Living Art Park" Centre for Contemporary Art ) by swedish artist Adreas Gedin.The action is the planting of 6000 flower bulbs that will grow through winter and flowering in springtime forming the word "Taking Over" on the grass field covering the ecological structure of the PAV.The phrase will result very big, extended on a 28m base.The operation begins with workshops on ecoloopen to the neighborhood ( a working class district of Torino ), young artists ecc...Following other actions and performances till the spring "opening" of "Taking Over".Lorenzo TaiutiPAV Centro sperimentale d?arte contemporaneaVia Giordano Bruno, 31 - 10134, TorinoTel. 011.3182235lab-Dt27rhE/6+4FkMP+ZTe18DUZDU+1vuVT< at >public.gmane.org

Dear all,for those of you who study hacker cultures - but also for those who areinterested in computer viruses - but also for those who work on thehistory of mediactivism: I have just put online my author's cut version ofa 36-page essay to be published in the Dec 2010 issue of the journal Body& Society 16 (4).You can find it here:A History of Virulence: The Body and Computer Culture in the 1980s (part 1)http://www.bodyspacesociety.eu/2010/10/15/a-history-of-virulence-the-body-and-computer-culture-in-the-1980s-part-1-2/A History of Virulence: The Body and Computer Culture in the 1980s (part 2– with illustrations and references)http://www.bodyspacesociety.eu/2010/10/18/a-history-of-virulence-the-body-and-computer-culture-in-the-1980s-part-2-with-illustrations/Cheers,Antonio

Hello nettimers,Something fresh from the Mute farm that may please, perplex or enrage you:old (net)timers Ted Byfield and Florian Cramer debate whether WikiLeaks isrunning the correct techno-political source code to really change the waystates do business within the context of info-capitalism.Hope you enjoy it,JosieM | U | T | E | __ rrrrrread it!________________________________________________16 March 2011_WikiLeaks Has Radically Altered the Military-Diplomatic-InformationComplex -- 10 Reasons For and AgainstBy Florian Cramer & Ted ByfieldWith co-founder Julian Assange garnering everything from a messianicfollowing to derision and calls to be 'hunted down like a terrorist',Florian Cramer and Ted Byfield stand in opposing corners of the WikiLeaksring to debate its impact on the modern statehttp://linkme2.net/p0

Paolo Virno on 'the turmoil and the theory of exodus'Friday 18 March,6pm GMT/ 7pm CET/ 1pm ESTlive streaming > www.globalproject.info/it/produzioninew website > www.lumproject.org::2011 reseach event:: The virtue of turmoil: the revolt between exodus and revolutionIn full swing of the systemic crisis of global capitalism, the debate among radical transformations is a living one. In fact, on the one hand the financial capitalism and transnational corporations do not accept any form of regulation and consider the crisis to be a structural condition to be viewed as part of the contemporary production of value. On the other hand, the parabola of Obama indicates that reformism has come to halt and neo-keynesian receipts are blunt weapons. This situation causes a rise in social tension, above all in the old continent, where deflationist policies dragged by Central Bank and Germany hit with more harshness. For about one year now on both sides of the Mediterranean turmoil has been spreading. The protagonists of these movements are the young, students, preca rious and migrants. This turmoil indicates a powerful resistance to austerity and rises the question concerning the project of transformation: what is the goal of metropolitan riot? Is the n o-future issue enough to explain the passions and the discord that animate the revolts that are taking place from Rome to London, from Athens to Tunis, from Paris to Cairo?The aim of the LUM cycle of seminars is to deal with these questions,starting from the assumption that the events of the last months have openeda new space of possibility, a space that must not be limited to thecheering narration of the ?burned generation?, a generation that rebelsagainst its parents. There is undoubtedly a gap in the future, a lack ofjob prospects as well as an existential void. There is however also asearch for a new kind of politics, for a new way to qualify thetransformation that is taking place in the revolts carried out by studentsand by the young. Something that urgently questions life and language,social relations and knowledge, the line of colour and sexual difference.But how can we articulate this research with the revolutionary theory andpraxis that we have known and that has taken shape over the past twocenturies? Does the desire to gain a monopoly on political decision, thestate, lurk among the tumult that penetrates European markets? Does theviolent breakthrough differ from the everyday construction of meaning thataims at creating new political institutions? Does the concept of exodus ?on which critical thinking has focused on several occasions during the lastyears- take full account of the unprecedented relationship among turmoiland constitutional praxis?In order to answer these questions the LUM cycle of seminar sets two goals:a) to qualify a theoretical and political conceptual constellation able todeal with contemporary change: we will do this through a critical review oftexts and political materials that have most informed the debate ofmovements over the past twenty years.b) To focus the attention on some revolutionary historical events of thelast two centuries, to trace the irreducible discontinuities concerning thepresent and also, on the contrary, the problematic knots that the greatrevolutionary experiences have exhibited and that still today remainunresolved.Seminar program:[All events will start at 6pm GTM]1. Actuality of the Revolt (from Europe to the Maghreb, and Egypt) -Augusto Illuminati (Friday, 18th February)2. On the Concept of Turmoil (in Machiavelli) - Gabriele Pedull? (Friday4th March)3. The Turmoil and the Theory of the Exodus - Paolo Virno (Friday 18th March)4. The Revolution in Europe from 1848 to the Commons (through the politicalwritings of Marx) - Paolo Vinci (Tuesday, 1st April)5. Jacqueries and Political Institutions - Marco Bascetta (Friday 15thApril)6. 1968 and the Politics of Difference (through the political writings ofCarla Lonzi) - Federica Giardini (Wednesday, 29th April)7. "War Machine" and the Multitude ? Francesco Raparelli and Alberto DeNicola (Friday 13th May)8. Haiti and the Black Jacobins - Fred Moten and Laura Harris (Friday 20thMay)for info: info-EFENIKs4qYUkk94PDnYflw< at >public.gmane.org www.lumproject.org-----LUM (Libera Universit? Metropolitana)presenta: Il tumulto e la teoria dell'esodo - Paolo Virno venerd? 18 marzo, ore 17presso Esc, atelier autogestito (via dei Volsci 159 - Roma) diretta streaming: clicca qua nuovo website: www.lumproject.org

Dear nettimers,last weekend we hosted the 6th Video Vortex conference, here in Amsterdam.Here some news and announcements from our growing online video network.VV 7 will be held in Zagreb, Croatia, hosted by the Contemporary Arts Museum in April-May 2012.There will be a VV Summer School on the Croatian island Vis in August 2010.This is part of an effort to establish an international VV online video masters degree.Blog reports of VV 6 are available on the INC website and the videos of the talks will be there shortly.http://networkcultures.org/wpmu/videovortex/The Video Vortex Reader II can be downloaded as a pdf here:http://networkcultures.org/wpmu/videovortex/vv-readerIf you like to get the Video Vortex II reader, please let us know.For the VV6 occasion a third print run of the Video Vortex I was made (total is now 4750 copies).Of course the VV I reader can also still be downloaded as a pdf through the same page:http://networkcultures.org/wpmu/videovortex/vv-readerIf you have a class or conference that focusses on online video you can order the necessary books.The readers are free and will be shipped to your school from Amsterdam.Please write to: books-xAlTj2NUtBEeri3KQaAn9UB+6BGkLq7r< at >public.gmane.orgUrban Screens readers are also still there, as is Dmitri Kleiner's Telecommunist Manifesto.Having said that, this only works if you send us your (correct) postal address.Believe it or not but most people actually forget to do this... They think an email is enough.Best from Geert and the entire team < at > INC

The Hindu, a leading national daily newspaper got hold of a six million wordscoop on March 15th - the entire Wikileaks' India cables.Read how they got the scoop:http://wearethebest.wordpress.com/2011/03/15/how-the-hindu-got-hold-of-wikileaks-india-cables/A debate (if you can call it that) ensued in Parliament.http://www.indiapost.com/wikileaks-reports-suggest-pro-us-shift-by-upa-oppn/best,Ram

More than 130 international artists, curators, and writers have signed thepetition letter below. Please go to http://gulflabor.wordpress.com/ if youwish to add your name. March 17, 2010To: Richard Armstrong, DirectorSolomon R. Guggenheim Foundation1071 Fifth AvenueNew York, NY 10128We, the undersigned, are writing to demand that the Guggenheim Foundationobtain contractual guarantees that will protect the rights of workersemployed in the construction and maintenance of its new branch museum inAbu Dhabi.Human rights violations are currently occurring on Saadiyat Island, thelocation of the new museum. In two extensive reports on the UAE, HumanRights Watch has documented a cycle of abuse that leaves migrant workersdeeply indebted, poorly paid, and unable to defend their rights or evenquit their jobs. The UAE authorities responsible for developing the islandhave failed to tackle the root causes of abuse: unlawful recruiting fees,broken promises of wages, and a sponsorship system that gives employersvirtually unlimited power over workers.These violations, which threaten to sully the Guggenheim?s reputation,present a serious, moral challenge to those who may be asked to work withthe museum. No one should be asked to exhibit or perform in a building thathas been constructed and maintained on the backs of exploited employees. Human Rights Watch has expressed its concerns to the Foundation on severaloccasions, but so far, adequate steps have not been taken to ensure thatworkers? rights will be respected at the Abu Dhabi site. While theGuggenheim is franchising its name and is not a direct party to thesubcontractors who employ the migrant labor, it can and should assertresponsibility for the well-being of these workers.We urge the Foundation and its partners in Abu Dhabi, TDIC (TourismDevelopment and Investment Company), to conform rigorously to the variouscommitments made in the TDIC?s Employment Practices Policy (EPP), datedJune 2010, the TDIC/Guggenheim Statement of Shared Values, publishedSeptember 22, 2010, and the recent EPP update, amended March 11th, 2011.Moreover, we urge the Foundation and TDIC to address the current absence ofindependent monitoring of employers? compliance with international humanrights and labor laws, and the lack of an effective enforcement mechanism.A monitor must be empowered to make random visits to work sites andmaintain a relationship independent of employer influence. It must alsodetermine if its findings conform to international laws and standards, andit must issue public reports on these findings. In the absence of theseconditions, violations will persist and continue to be under-reported.Similarly, without explicit mechanisms for enforcin g the terms of thecontract or clearly enumerated remedies in the event of breaches, allefforts to protect workers will be in vain. TDIC has announced that it willappoint a ?reputable independent monitor? in May. We demand that theappointment be made as soon as possible and that the conditions outlinedabove be observed as part of the monitor?s mandate. Our cooperation with the Guggenheim in Abu Dhabi (and, for many of us, atother Guggenheim locations) will not be forthcoming if the Foundation failsto take steps to safeguard the rights of the workers who will be employedin the museum?s operations on Saadiyat Island. Human Rights Watch willdetermine if and when adequate monitoring measures have been establishedand effectively implemented.Signatories:Hamra AbbasJumana Abboud Adel AbidinDennis Adams:Shaina Anand Yazid Anani Ayreen Anastas Doug AshfordKader Attia Maja Bejevic Khaled Barakeh Yto Barrada Regine BashaShumon Basar Ute Meta Bauer Anthea Behm Zarina Bhimji Doris Bittar Monica Bonvicini Gregg Bordowitz Tania Bruguera Fran?ois BucherRingo Bunoan Janet Cardiff Mario Caro Mel Chin Wendy Coburn Pablo de Ocampo T. J. Demos Corinne Diserens Willie Doherty: Sam Durant Jimmie Durham Koken Ergun Annika Eriksson Harun Farocki Azin Feizabadi: Andrea Fraser Rene Gabri Emeren Garcia Andrea Geyer Leyla Gediz Miriam Ghani Paul Graham Avery Gordon Catherine Grout Hans Haacke Joana Hadjithomas Khaled HafezTone Hansen Shuruq Harb Mona Hatoum Sharon HayesSandi Hilal Christine Hill Thomas Hirschhorn Vlatka Horvat Alfredo Jaar Emily Jacir Luis Jacob Jakob Jakobsen Khalil Joriege Lamia Joriege Amar Kanwar Thomas KeenanDeborah Kelly Laleh Khorramian Marty Kirchner Silvia Kolbowski Barbara Kruger Carin Kuoni Laura Kurgan Eileen Legaspi-Ramirez Lani Maestro Chus Martines Angela Melitopoulos John Menick George Bures Miller Naeem Mohaiemen Rabih Mrou? Matt Mullican Huma Mulji Antonio Muntadas Monica Narula Issam Nassar: Yamini Nayar Diana Nemiroff Molly Nesbit Shirin Neshat Angel Nevarez Tom Nicholson Marcel Odenbach Gina Osterloh Trevor Paglen Cornelia Parker Christine Peters Nata?a Petre?in-Bachelez Alessandro Petti Paul Pfeiffer Walid Raad Mike Rakowitz Annie Ratti Martha Rosler Andrew Ross Natascha Sadr Haghighian Anjalika Sagar Jayce Salloum Rasha Salti Katya Sander Lina SanehAllan Sekula Vivian SelboStephen SheehiAdania Shibli Gregory Sholette Suha Shoman Reid Shier Katharina Sieverding Carl SkeltonAshok Sukumaran Julia Scher Hito Steyerl Beth Stryker Paolo W. Tamburella Rirkrit Tiravanija Valerie Tevere Oraib Toukan Tristan Tremeau Gediminas UrbonasMurtaza Vali Fabienne Verstraeten Krzysztof Wodiczko Akram Zaatari Florian ZeyfangAndrew RossDepartment of Social and Cultural AnalysisProfessor of American StudiesNew York University

***This may be a stupid and redundant request, but please donate to Japan / Haiti (which is still suffering incredibly); every little bit helps. /- etc. - the same here, please just go online and try Red Cross, anything.Apologies for stating the obvious, of course, and thanks, Alan==email archive: http://sondheim.rupamsunyata.org/webpage http://www.alansondheim.orgmusic archive: http://www.espdisk.com/alansondheim/current text http://www.alansondheim.org/qx.txt==

[Twitter was lauded back in January when it challenged the subpoena for records (while others (Google? Facebook?), which were presumably handed the same subpoena, did not). The judge's argument is a fine piece of legalistic hair splitting. There is no freedom of speech issue here, since the messages had been published, and there is no right to privacy since the DOJ did not seek access to the content of the information (which has been published) but only to the connection data. Makes stuff like diaspora and the freedom box all the more necessary.]March 11, 2011 1:34 PM PST DOJ wins access to WikiLeaks-related Twitter accountsA federal judge in Virginia today granted federal prosecutors access to WikiLeaks-related Twitter accounts, including information about what Internet and e-mail addresses are associated with them. The 20-page ruling represents a clear victory for the U.S. Department of Justice, which sought the court order as part of a grand jury probe that appears to be investigating whether WikiLeaks principals, including editor Julian Assange, violated American criminal laws. U.S. Magistrate Judge Theresa Buchanan rejected arguments raised by the ACLU, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and a host of private attorneys representing the Twitter account holders, who had asserted that their privacy was protected by federal law, the First Amendment, and the Fourth Amendment. Buchanan rejected each of the arguments in quick succession, saying that there was no First Amendment issue because activists "have already made their Twitter posts and associations publicly available." The account holders have "no Fourth Amendment privacy interest in their IP addresses," she said, and federal privacy law did not apply because prosecutors were not seeking contents of the communications.<....>Buchanan's order isn't a traditional subpoena. Rather, it's what's known as a 2703(d) order, which allows police to obtain certain records from a Web site or Internet provider if they are "relevant and material to an ongoing criminal investigation." The 2703(d) order is broad. It requests any "contact information" associated with the accounts from November 1, 2009, to the present, "connection records, or records of session times and durations," and "records of user activity for any connections made to or from the account," including Internet addresses used. It also covers "all records" and "correspondence" relating to those accounts, which appears to be broad enough to sweep in the content of messages such as direct messages sent through Twitter or tweets from a nonpublic account. That would have allowed the account holders to cite a nonbinding but influential opinion from a federal appeals court, which concluded that a 2703(d) order is insufficient for content data and a search warrant is necessary. <....>J?nsd?ttir said in a Twitter message after the ruling that it's now "time to apply pressure on social media to move their servers out of the U.S." Appelbaum, who gave a speech at a hacker conference in New York last year on behalf of WikiLeaks, sent out a note saying: "Bad news is exhausting." Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20042277-281.html--- http://felix.openflows.com ----------------------- books out now:*|Deep Search.The Politics of Search Beyond Google.Studienverlag 2009*|Mediale Kunst/Media Arts Zurich.13 Positions.Scheidegger&Spiess2008*|Manuel Castells and the Theory of the Network Society. Polity, 2006 *|Open Cultures and the Nature of Networks. Ed. Futura/Revolver, 2005

Dear people, I would like to share my latest project. Archive of experiences with Media Art.Botaniq is a community that seeks to compile and build an archive of personal diaries through the experience of the usual unknown interactor with Works of Media Art, where the notation of the artistic experience becomes the work of art itself. It is an archive of experiences of the unknown witnesses of an unique moment, taking form in personal diaries thanks to a political, cultural and aesthetic reality.A way of preserving art is across our own experiences and interactions, reinterpreting and capturing its spirit or essence. To be able to look at the work of art more than in its materiality, as an artefact that narrates stories of a cultural moment, an unique journey, particular and unrepeatable.Here is is a video of the theory background.http://vimeo.com/18441863More info.www.botaniq.org <http://Www.botaniq.org/>info-w/NFK8yAUrVAfugRpC6u6w< at >public.gmane.org <mailto:info-w/NFK8yAUrVAfugRpC6u6w< at >public.gmane.org>Thank you very much.

Last month we had a strong debate on Nettime about the nature and meaning of the Arab Spring. The nature of it is up to the participants to say, but in my view the fall of authoritarian regimes in North Africa represents at least a partial collapse of one of the pillars on which the transnational state-form of the present was founded, way back in the late seventies-early eighties when Trilaterlaism (or "Triad Power") first got off the ground, on the backs of workers in the Arab world, in Latin America, and then increasingly in China. Now the rise of the BRIC countries and the development of the Gulf has entirely overtaken that old hegemony.In this paper by Nouriel Roubini and his wunderkind sidekick Ian Bremmer, the ineffectiveness of the present G-20 becomes the signal of chaos in the world system. Far from an abstract fancy hatched among the students of Immanuel Wallerstein, world hegemony is a da‎ily concern of the corporate classes because of its provision of so-called "global public goods" (mostly security, a sordid boon). Roubini and Bremmer don't see anyone delivering the goods in the near future.I'm sending the article because it nails the central point on which my analysis of the Arab Spring is based: the collapse of the Trilateral system that was perfectly represented by the members of the G-7. However, the paper was written before the events in Egypt and anyway, it's not certain these guys can look beyond the sagging values of economic growth. What I see in the future is a wide-open world where everyone can make a difference amidst the most unexpected circumstances. For the moment at least this is an incredibly light period, a time for escaping gravity. It's a time for invention. Learn some new moves in a zero-G world.ciao, BH***Foreign Affairs, January 31, 2011“A G-Zero World”The New Economic Club Will Produce Conflict, Not CooperationIan Bremmer and Nouriel RoubiniThis is not a G-20 world. Over the past several months, the expanded group of leading economies has gone from a would-be concert of nations to a cacophony of competing voices as the urgency of the financial crisis has waned and the diversity of political and economic values within the group has asserted itself. Nor is there a viable G-2 -- a U.S.-Chinese solution for pressing transnational problems -- because Beijing has no interest in accepting the burdens that come with international leadership. Nor is there a G-3 alternative, a grouping of the United States, Europe, and Japan that might ride to the rescue.Today, the United States lacks the resources to continue as the primary provider of global public goods. Europe is fully occupied for the moment with saving the eurozone. Japan is likewise tied down with complex political and economic problems at home. None of these powers’ governments has the time, resources, or domestic political capital needed for a new bout of international heavy lifting. Meanwhile, there are no credible answers to transnational challenges without the direct involvement of emerging powers such as Brazil, China, and India. Yet these countries are far too focused on domestic development to welcome the burdens that come with new responsibilities abroad.We are now living in a G-Zero world, one in which no single country or bloc of countries has the political and economic leverage -- or the will

----- Forwarded message from Michael Benson <michael.benson-uk8Mq7hFVJdDlGyqqv13OA< at >public.gmane.org> -----From: "Michael Benson" <michael.benson-uk8Mq7hFVJdDlGyqqv13OA< at >public.gmane.org>Subject: Re: <nettime> In brig, WikiLeaks suspect Bradley Manning ordered to sleep without clothingDate: Mon, 7 Mar 2011 18:27:22 -0500To: "Eric Kluitenberg" <epk-qWit8jRvyhVmR6Xm/wNWPw< at >public.gmane.org>Cc: <nettime-l-fO7mttO5ZDI< at >public.gmane.org>Importance: normalPriority: normalHi Eric, Yes, yes, you're so right and I must be off my meds or somethingto even respond. The fact is I find how Manning is being treatedinfuriating -- it makes me sick, and we don't even have the 'excuse'of having George Bush in power -- and of course I feel powerless todo anything about it, and then along trundles John Young to have hislittle bit of fun. Oh well...But thanks for the reminder.Cheers to most,MB ----- End forwarded message ---------- Forwarded message from Matthew White <mtw-FEVvXlZ26Zs< at >public.gmane.org> -----From: Matthew White <mtw-FEVvXlZ26Zs< at >public.gmane.org>Subject: Re: <nettime> In brig, WikiLeaks suspect Bradley Manning ordered to sleep without clothingDate: Tue, 8 Mar 2011 10:40:11 +1100To: Nettime <nettime-l-fO7mttO5ZDI< at >public.gmane.org>On Tue, Mar 8, 2011 at 1:45 AM, Karin Spaink <karin-P+5UVmBCxVisTnJN9+BGXg< at >public.gmane.org> wrote:utterly condescending and perverse idiot troll.FTFY.----- End forwarded message ---------- Forwarded message from John Young <jya-IR+WnUzluqRWk0Htik3J/w< at >public.gmane.org> -----From: John Young <jya-IR+WnUzluqRWk0Htik3J/w< at >public.gmane.org>Subject: Re: <nettime> In brig,WikiLeaks suspect Bradley Manning ordered to sleep without clothingDate: Tue, 08 Mar 2011 06:44:58 -0500To: nettime-l-fO7mttO5ZDI< at >public.gmane.orgManning has shown rare courage and determination. Sappyaccusations of torture are no more than auto-thrilling vicariousness, typical of those lacking Manning's charactersitics and facing none of his risk. More like media whores Wikileaks, Greenwald-grade sock puppets and Lamo than Manning, and who shop stalwartslike Manning in a instant when physical danger arises. Word fuckingis all they know to do.Manning is admirable, his insipid fans cretinous cowards, compare the fans to his jailers for they would not know what to do with their risible passions without victims to victimize catoonishly. So chuckled jokester Genet about Sartre's bloated tome about him,and who could taunt a pretentious asshole like Sartre begging buggering with his gaping piehole of philosophical pity for the pathetic prisoner, as if prisoners did not have the capability to handle themselves and knew to be extremely wary of haute-thinkers, lawyers and their legions of sock puppets begging for "defense funds." Write a big dick book, JP, Jean Gmocked the ugly runt.Assange has been trapped by such pusillanimous freedom of information cluckers, heading for, they hope, incarceration, campaigners ready to mount up.Troll mongerers: unsheath your key peckers. Think rotely, bray inunison. How daring, trolling yourselves in a inner circle.----- End forwarded message -----

Dear nettime, This will probably be my last long report. After this, I'll only discuss selected aspects of the movement.With links in the text, here:http://prop-press.typepad.com/blog/2011/03/from-madison-third-report.htmlenjoy,dan*This third report from Madison is difficult to write. Since at least the middle of last week there are too many lines of development for one person to follow, much less explain. In that sense, the Wisconsin uprising has truly become a broad movement, complete with sub-fronts, fissures, and rumors swirling daily. Ten days ago I still had the security of knowing that I had a privileged view of the struggle by virtue of living here. Now, I get the feeling that I’m only seeing the close-up action, while larger forces with national reach, perhaps imperceptible to us inside the city limits, are somehow shaping the contest.This feeling of disconnect, of the local movement having lost its monopoly on the narrative, was confirmed when I started receiving email blasts last week from MoveOn, Democracy for America, TrueMajority, and other national progressive groups. After about the third one (and there have been countless since) I cringed to see the creativity, humor, and outrage of a citizen and worker-driven, organically developing movement that has no central leadership, and variable demands, be reduced to a branded online petition and donation button. I’ll take the sectarian newspaper hawkers over the dumbness of a professionally marketed email cause (of the week, or until donations crest) any day. At least the sectarian leftists entertain with their inadvertant goofiness. Let’s talk about three fronts to this battle: the space of the Capitol, the April 5 election, and the possibility of a strike. Each one is a complicated tale in its own right.Up until about last Sunday night, Feb 27, the Capitol building could be accurately described as occupied. Up until late this past Thursday there were still protestors inside. For their last four days they dwindled in number and were basically cut off from the outside. The attrition—once a person exited, they were not allowed back in—guaranteed that the authorities would retake the Capitol sooner or later.The Capitol police had been boxing demonstrators out of various corridors and corners of the building all week long. The occupied space shrunk continuously through the simple tactic of clearing people out of a section “for cleaning” and then marking that section off with police tape and posting police to guard it. The order to vacate the building in whole was finally delivered on Sunday, but with several hundred demonstrators inside, the police chose to let people stay but locked newcomers out. And so the attrition began. Looking back, it was a very smart non-confrontational move on the part of the Capitol police.This Wisconsin constitution specifies that the Capitol is to remain open to the public during all daytime hours. Scott Walker flouted this constitutional guarantee, thereby inviting a lawsuit. A Dane County judge quickly granted the demonstrators a temporary restraining order on Monday, preventing the governor from locking out the public. But he flouted that, too, and kept only one door unlocked and guarded, and set rules for who could come in—some vague requirement that it be “on official business.” The situation became so ridiculous that the Dane County sheriff, Jim Mahoney, took the extraordinary step of relieving his deputies of having to guard the entrances. Walker doesn’t control the sheriff, and Mahoney let him know it by quipping that the sheriff’s deputies “are not palace guards.” Thus continued the sub-plot of Scott Walker antagonizing even law enforcement. (Word from unnamed sources is, the Madison police—one of the best educated forces in the country—are resentful. He’s transferred into Madison a bunch of outstate cops to help, but their loyalty is questionable, too. Only the Capitol police are under his strict control.)The Teaching Assistants Association ran the occupation—coordinated cleaning, managed the food, kept in contact with the police, etc—and they had the option on Sunday to end the occupation on their terms, in consultation with the police. They chose not to, and the lockout is what happened; after a few days of legal wrangling, the building was opened to the public again, but with shifting and possibly illegal conditions placed by the governor. No matter. Even with this setback and miscalculation, the occupation was a success. In America there have been only a handful of occupations of state capitol buildings historically, and all the rest were only for a day or part of day. The occupation in Madison went on day and night for thirteen days. Already it is widely acknowledged as an historic event. The longer term ramifications are unsettled, but clearly there will be some. As far as the governor bringing in the heavies goes, here again, as with this whole sorry tale to begin with, he overreached. The video of a Democrat lawmaker getting thrown to the ground while trying to enter the building has further hurt the standing of the governor. Equally important has been the nature of the occupation, what it proved to the demonstrators, and what the space became. During the day the rotunda was a cauldron of shared anger, the drumming and unison shouting so loud it made your ears ring, and kept the lawmakers hidden deep in their chambers and offices on edge all day long. By the second week, the occupied areas would turn into a social forum in the late evenings and nighttime, with people coming to read the hundreds of signs, to talk politics with strangers, to eat free food, and to perform music or speechify from the open mike center. It was quite a sight, and for anybody who entered during those days, one’s sense of possibility could not help but be enlarged—this was a co-op, a commune, a punk house (where everybody cleaned up after themselves, imagine that), a labor temple, a free speech zone…in the freakin’ state Capitol building! When does that ever happen?! This will not be erased from memory anytime soon. Also worth reiterating here is the way the occupation started. That first Tuesday night/early Wed morning, Feb 15-16, when debate was cut off by the Republicans, those waiting to testify against Walker’s bill were so many and so livid with anger that the police couldn’t do anything. The cops were too scared. Those who weren’t scared were sympathetic.Here is very good take on the occupation, how it evolved, what it served, what it meant. Sorry, you have to read it on Facebook.Next: The April 5th election. The reality is, should Scott Walker ram through his bill—and all indications are that he still believes that he can—many of the provisions will be decided in the courts. The Wisconsin Supreme Court now has a 4-3 conservative majority, but a sitting conservative judge is up for election on April 5, facing a liberal challenger, an environmental law attorney from lefty Madison. (In Wisconsin judges are an elected position. As in all other parts of American political life, what used to be a rather sedate, non-partisan affair has in recent years become yet another polarized fight zone.) This election will be treated as a referendum on the Walker agenda. One question is, then, how will the movement make the transition from street demonstrations to taking a side in an electoral campaign? Are there enough people with enough energy to keep Scott Walker embattled with large demonstrations at the Capitol for the next four weeks while also ramping up work on what is normally a low-key, low turnout, spring election? As well, there are now recall campaigns underway, targeting the eight eligible Republican state senators, ie who have been in office for at least a year already. The recall process is by design extremely demanding, and no matter how energized an electorate, requires a great deal of effort for even a chance of success. The movement only needs to recall and replace three senators to gain control of the Wisconsin Senate, but even this will require the dedicated attention of many activists, not to mention money, legal counsel, media work, etc.In sum, since my last report, battles on the terrain of conventional electoral politics have emerged as another true front of the struggle. Here, too, as with the contest over control of the Capitol, there is a politics of space in play, but at the comparatively neglected scale of the state senate districts, typically encompassing an average population of 160k, some more and some less, and a ground area of about two or more counties. One by-product of all this mess is, thousands more state residents will learn for the first time what the size and shape of their senate district is, and, moreover, what it means to act politically at that scale of space. For nearly a generation now, the US left has permitted the right to act at this and other mid-level scales of governance with hardly any challenge. This newly sparked engagement cannot be a bad thing, especially in the long term—unless it drains movement attention and substantial bodies from the still-important demonstration spectacles on the Capitol square. To spell out the dilemma: the fourteen awol Democrat senators are the only thing standing between Scott Walker and his agenda being legally realized, but they can only stay away for as long as there are large daily and occasionally massive demonstrations of support, and realistically, can only stay away until the April 5 election. So the demonstrations must not dilute the campaign messaging, and ideally, need to echo it, but at the same time not be reduced to it. To lose the April 5th election and to fail on the most achieveable recall efforts would, unquestionably, be major defeats.Finally, there is the spectre of a strike. The truism of labor’s ulimate power being that of withholding its work activity, which in the US context sounded practically meaningless only a month ago, rings with revitalized freshness, given the threats of force and firings being leveled by this governor. But how and when? Who and where? Teachers? Students? Those who are legally granted the right strike, or those who instantly run the risk of being fired? What is the strike supposed to communicate? How does it get organized, and what kinds of practicalities would be involved? Would it be a symbolic one-day strike or a true shut-down of business as usual? The South Central Federation Labor has already endorsed a general strike, so the language is getting out there and these questions coming into play.Already there are two points of reference, generated by the movement itself. One, during the first week we saw the Madison Public School teachers essentially call a strike without using strike language, shutting down the schools for three days through a massive sick-out. It was a bet that paid off, but only because the message was not primarily about leaving work to protest the budget cuts and attacks on unions; rather, the message was one of love, as in, the teachers love their jobs, schools, and students so much, that they are walking out, and the students love their teachers so much, that they are joining them, and the parents love their children’s teachers so much, that they are supporting them. The message of love is what a proper and possibly general strike must convey—the conservatives have found it impossible to argue against it, and even have professed the same love, to the jeers of the public. And then two, to return to the occupied Capitol, there now exists an actual model of a self-organized society, an example of something that worked. Over the two weeks of occupation, food stations, childcare, clean-up crews, first aid and internal communication structures inside the Capitol were set up as needed. In contemporary America the term mutual aid is tossed around by radicals as a vague, dreamy concept, or else made real through slowly growing limited projects around a given focus of cooperative energy. Here mutual aid became real in a way that was entirely outside of our American experience, as a process of change, spontaneous giving, and practical adjustment, focused on meeting immediate and concrete needs that arose in new situations daily. What happened at the Capitol shows us that the many kinds of support that a strike beyond three days would require *will* materialize, even if in the end it’s neither perfect nor sustainable. Strikers will not be left high and dry by their fellow workers, their neighbors, their friends.The who and when of a strike is the biggest question. If Scott Walker follows through on his threatened firings of state workers, 1500 or a thousand at a time, for no other reason than to pressure the absent Dem senators into returning from out of state for a vote, then the mood for striking will go up. I suspect the teachers’ union would be the first to declare; if and how other unions respond will be most important. If AFSCME turns scared in that moment and publicly dissociates itself from strike tactics, the battle may be lost. If they merely hold their cards, refusing to say one way or other, then I think the momentum towards a strike will build, especially if there are massive student strikes, too. If any other union joins the teachers with a sympathy strike that goes beyond a short symbolic gesture, then the general strike may indeed be on, especially if the governor reacts with aggression.Other points:1) As expected, national media coverage has been atrocious. While utterly oblivious in some significant and surprising respects, Scott Walker has proven himself a skillful handler of journalists, and nearly impossible to shake from the script. While he’s managed to skew the national media discussion toward the smokescreen of budgetary matters by repeating the same script with each and every appearance, the non-corporate media (just one example: rotundaville) has been disseminated so widely, and the numerous media lies of Walker are so quickly debunked, that Walker’s single and well-practiced strategy is not enough to drive the narrative.2) After Walker unveiled his bi-annual state budget last Tuesday, new outrage arose from heretofore quiescent parts of the state—particularly in the rural areas and in the urban core. The massive cuts to schools and healthcare he had planned for the budget were based on the first bill passing, which would have freed up county and town governments to do away with their public sector union employee contracts as a way to make up the shortfall in state funding. The governor put off announcing his budget for two weeks, hoping the demonstrations over the “budget repair bill” would die down. They haven’t, and now he’s had to show the whole state exactly what he has in mind for them, thereby digging himself a deeper hole, politically. After three weeks, we can say definitively: Scott Walker has been the greatest gift to the American left since Richard Nixon, and maybe even since Bull Connor.Here is a little video from Tuesday, March 1, outside the Capitol. At the very moment this was shot, Scott Walker is announcing details of his budget at a press conference inside the building. He packed the media room with a gallery of his corporate supporters, smuggled in through the steam tunnels. He illegally locked out the demonstrators, but couldn't lock out the noise; they could hear us inside.http://www.vimeo.com/20579626 3) The rural and urban expressions of discontent arrive in Madison this coming weekend. A farmer-organized convoy of tractors is scheduled to demonstrate on the square on the same day that a march of high school students from Milwaukee arrives. These actions come just in time. Even though the past three Saturday demonstrations have turned out massive numbers of protestors, the energy that comes out of a new and unexpected movement is dissipating. The protracted struggle has begun and the anti-Walker constituencies must adjust to the reality of political work without the advantage of novelty. As with the convoy and march, coming up with new storylines is a necessity if we are to maintain visibility as proof of commitment.4) As the struggle has take a turn for the local, with thousands of activists diving into the minutiae of recall campaigns, dealing with the legalities concerning the fourteen absent Dem senators, and countless other details of hard-slog politicking, the international dimensions are fading from front-line consciousness. As it happens, the main battle from the other side of the globe is no longer a peaceful occupation of Tahrir Square, but a shooting civil war in Libya, complete with hundreds of gruesome deaths, displaced peoples, and a paralysis in international response. Thus, the comparisons no longer suit. But even without convenient parallels that insist on connection, I hope it is not lost to people both inside and outside of Wisconsin, inside and outside of the US—what’s happening in Wisconsin matters to the world, for the following reason. The election last November of Scott Walker along with Ron Johnson’s defeat of Russ Feingold for a Wisconsin US Senate seat were taken by the national GOP as a model and pathway to their future power, so much so that Wisconsin GOP head Reince Priebus was elected to lead the Republican National Committee shortly after, and then Janesville, Wisc., congressman Paul Ryan was granted the slot to respond to Obama’s State of the Union address. Walker is seen as the operations guy, Priebus the strategist, and Ryan the policy brains—the rising star triumvirate of the GOP. Because of their national prominence, if they manage to win the day in Wisconsin, the rest of the world will feel no doubt feel the effects. If we win, we will have struck a blow against all three. How to reinstall the internationalism of the movement's first week under these changed conditions is the challenge. http://www.midwestradicalculturecorridor.net/# distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission# <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism,# collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets# more info: http://mail.kein.org/mailman/listinfo/nettime-l# archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime< at >kein.org

For pirates, anti-pirates, or just the piracy-curious, our report is nowavailable.http://piracy.ssrc.orgCheers,Joe

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/05/AR2011030503686_pf.htmlBy Ellen NakashimaWashington Post Staff WriterSunday, March 6, 2011; A08Military jailers are forcing Bradley Manning, the 23-year-old soldier accused of passing classified documents to WikiLeaks.org, to strip naked in his cell at night and sleep without clothing, a requirement his attorney says was imposed after Manning made a "sarcastic quip" about his confinement.For most of the past eight months, Manning has been required to sleep wearing only boxer shorts, because of his status as a detainee under "prevention of injury watch," said 1st Lt. Brian Villiard, a spokesman for the military detention facility, or "brig," in Quantico. Beginning Wednesday night, the facility commander ordered that Manning turn over his boxers, too."The intention is not to cause any sort of humiliation or embarrassment," Villiard said. "The intention is to ensure the safety and security of the detainee and make sure he is able to stand trial."Villiard said he could not explain how Manning might harm himself if he were allowed to keep his underwear, citing rules to protect detainees' privacy. All he could say was that "circumstances warranted" the measure, which was ordered by the brig commander, Chief Warrant Officer 2 Denise Barnes. The requirement will remain in effect until a review next week, he said.But Manning's attorney, David E. Coombs, said he thought the order was "punitive" under the "guise of being concerned" about Manning's welfare.In a blog post Saturday, Coombs gave this account of how the boxers were taken away: On Wednesday, Manning was told he would continue to be kept under the restrictions of prevention of injury watch, that there was nothing he could do to change his maximum-custody status and that the brig commander considered him at risk of self-harm. Manning then said that the restrictions were "absurd" and that if he wanted to harm himself using an item of clothing, he could do so "with the elastic waistband of his underwear or with his flip-flops."Without consulting the facility's mental health provider, the brig commander used Manning's quip as "justification" to increase the restrictions on him, Coombs said. He said Manning was not placed under suicide watch because that would have required a mental health provider's recommendation that the brig commander lacked.In response to this specific incident, the brig psychiatrist assessed Manning as "low risk," Coombs wrote. In particular, the psychiatrist said that Manning's statement about his underwear waistband was "in no way prompted by 'a psychiatric condition.' "Villiard did not immediately respond to messages left late Saturday seeking comment on Coombs's claim.The conditions of Manning's confinement have become controversial, with the United Nations special rapporteur on torture saying he submitted a formal inquiry to the State Department about Manning's treatment. The State Department confirmed Saturday that U.S. officials "have met with the special rapporteur and are preparing a formal response."Under prevention of injury watch, Manning sleeps on a mattress with a built-in pillow. He has no sheet, only a blanket designed so that it cannot be shredded.He is in maximum custody, which means he is allowed out of his cell for only one hour each day - to exercise by himself, indoors or outdoors. The maximum-custody designation is based on the seriousness of the alleged offense and the potential length of the sentence, as well as the military's duty to protect him from himself and others, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said last month.Morrell said he had visited Quantico to observe the conditions of Manning's detention. "I came away enormously impressed by the professionalism of the brig staff and reassured that the manner in which they are housing and treating him is appropriate," he said.Morrell said that he did not actually speak to Manning but "was just able to see him." He said he was accompanied by Pentagon general counsel Jeh Johnson."There's this misperception out there that he is in somehow in solitary confinement, out on his own somewhere in a dark and dreary cell," Morrell said. "That could not be further from the truth."Coombs said that although Manning is technically not held in solitary confinement, "the cumulative effect of his confinement conditions are tantamount to solitary confinement." He said that there are no other detainees on either side of his cell and that the cell lacks a window or natural light. If Manning tries to speak to others several cells away, "the guards will likely view it as disruptive and require him to stop speaking," he wrote in his blog.On Friday afternoon, Manning was the only detainee in maximum custody; two other maximum-custody detainees had left that morning, Villiard said.The jail has 30 cells arranged in a U formation. Though the detainees may talk to one another, the cells are designed so that no detainee has a direct line of sight to another, Villiard said.On Wednesday, the government denied Manning's request to be removed from maximum custody and prevention of injury watch, said Coombs, who will appeal.Villiard said the prevention of injury watch status is reviewed every week with input from mental health providers.Coombs has asserted that the facility's forensic psychiatrist recommended that the watch be lifted. A separate psychiatrist hired by the defense concurred, he said.

What is really going on in LybiaPeople in Lybia manage to communicate news reports via satellite phone, ham radio, pigeons, across the border local wifi, and who knows what else.What can we do?Better than a no-fly-zoneA free com zone?notes:http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/118969/20110304/libya-cuts-off-internet-engages-kill-switch.htm"Free"dial in service for Lybua provided by:Telecomix in Germany: +49 231 97844321 username= pw: telecomixXs4all In Holland +31205350535 user=pw xs4all

I would like to share these two very interesting video articles. One isfrom Al Jazeera, a panel discussion, ?Can a no-fly-zone over Libya reallyhelp to end the violence in Libya??http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=6359The other article is "The aReal News Network," Paul Jay's interview withHamid Dabashi, Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature atColumbia University in New York, ?Supporting Libyan Revolution, OpposingForeign Intervention,?http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=6357Every time the US government is willing to use its military might for?humanitarian? reasons I feel quite uncomfortable. Especially if onefollows the statement made by Hamid Dabashi, ? US intervenes in Libya, willbe act of imperialism. ...? The important point that Mr. Dabashi makes isthat there is a question, by the US and British government, interestinglyput forward to peace activists throughout the world in a way, should themilitary intervention be accepted as a valid mean of helping people ofLibya who have been assaulted by Libyan military airplanes, or if the oneis not accepted it, ( no-fly zone ), as a valid option, do the activistsface the question of being accused of complaisance . Mr. Dabashi isactually saying that the question has to be redirected toward the westerngovernments and put ?them,? the power structures, in the position of?either or? because, in the first place, it is the western ammunitionpurchased from the west that has been used against Libyan people. Also if these two video articles are approached comparatively, what seemedto me is that Al Jazeera's panel is done more as a mean, tool, for findingjustification for the implementation of ?no-fly? zone. I do not see astrong objection has been successfully raised to the tremendous?hypocritical? nature of Obama's and alikes concerns with the refugescrisis on the border of Libya, while there are millions of refuges anddisplaced people in Iraq. Though, we might conclude that the goal of Al Jazeera's panel wasn't toaddress this issue, moral-hypocritical nature of Obama's call ( myinterpretation ), but rather to discuss technicality of a military act,i.e., ?no-fly? zone, one cannot but wonder the real goal of this videoarticle. The overall impression to me was that it is rather a preparationof ?public domain -terranean? for accepting military intervention.Anyhow the question would be, ?How we can turn this question of beingaccused of complicity if one doesn't accept any military intervention ofany kind? around and impose it upon western governments?

Who needs Wikileaks indeed, if you can pay for this alternative newsservice. Now just demand that the Open Sorce Center becomes really .. OpenSource!--------original to:http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704629004576136381178584352.html#Today's News, Brought to You by Your Friends at the CIASpy Service Translates World's Papers at Secret Cost; Mr. Hounsell Has FewBuyersBy BARRY NEWMANALEXANDRIA, Va.—Now that the revolution is over, Egypt's newly free presswill make a fascinating read—if you happen to know Arabic. How the Libyancrisis plays in the newspapers of oil-rich Azerbaijan might be intriguing,too—if your Azeri is up to snuff.If it isn't—and if your Urdu is as rusty as your Mandarin—you might checkout the biggest news service in the U.S. that almost nobody has ever heardof. It's called World News Connection.WNC delivers the news online from 1,750 newspapers, broadcasts and blogsin 130 countries. It employs a host of translators—human beings, notmachines—who turn foreign arcana into fluent English every day. Theproduction cost is surely huge—but it's a secret. That's because WNC'sstaff is paid from the classified budget of the CIA.This tweet, translated from Farsi, ran on WNC last year: "Iran says thatCIA agents have been arrested ahead of the 11 February rallies."Who needs secret cables when the Central Intelligence Agency tosses outnuggets like that—plus tons of ore for data miners? Gary Price of thedatabase guides INFOdocket.com and FullTextReports.com, calls WNC "justincredibly cool. It has stuff nobody can get any other way."Yet WNC is "one of the least known" of the many databases Mr. Pricetracks—a fact painfully well known to John Hounsell. His job is retailingWNC to the public.Mr. Hounsell, 61 years old, works in a Commerce Department outpost here inVirginia—a branch that pays for itself by selling government-generatedinformation. The Commerce Department repackages the CIA's content andsells it as WNC.His desk radio played quietly one day as Mr. Hounsell opened WNC's searchpage. A late news flash came up—Bedouins shooting at Egyptians—newlytranslated from Ma'an, a Palestinian website. "We get an hourly feed," hesaid, "whatever's not classified."Mr. Hounsell's promotions tout WNC as "compiled by intelligence experts"and "not filtered by Western biases." The Commerce Department gets its CIAfeed for nothing (and the CIA gets nothing back), but sales are dismal:$500,000 a year on a pitiful 2.5 million hits. "We're stagnant." Mr.Hounsell said.He has one hope: ProQuest, a database supermarket, soon will load WorldNews Connection onto a "Google-like" site with plans to vault itsdistribution from about 300 college libraries to thousands of librariesand businesses around the world. (Individuals can buy it now for $300 ayear, plus $4 a hit.) "We want to surface WNC, get it out there," saysProQuest's head marketer, Libby Trudell.WNC does have an image problem, the same one borne by CIA grunts who watchBosnian TV via satellite in Virginia instead of going on spy missions.Dull as it may seem, though, following the news from Uruguay or Togo hasoften proved informative over the years.The first ever analysis by U.S. monitors reported: "Japanese radiointensifies still further its defiant, hostile tone.…" It was dated Dec.6, 1941.On Oct. 28, 1962, Radio Moscow broadcast this message from NikitaKhrushchev to President Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis: "…we haveordered our officers to stop building bases, to dismantle the equipment,and send it back home." On April 28, 1986, item 21 on Moscow Televisionbegan: "An accident has occurred at Chernobyl nuclear power station.…"When the Cold War ended, it became less urgent for monitors to stockpiletea leaves for Kremlinologists to read. In 1993, Congress gutted the CIA'smonitoring service. It reversed itself after the spying lapses of 9/11 andIraq. In 2005, the service reopened as the Open Source Center, and washoused in the CIA. Any aggregator would envy OSC's website, but unlikeWNC, it's classified.In his office, Mr. Hounsell allowed a peek: The home page had lots ofpictures, a headline scroll, a most-popular list. Foreign TV news—withEnglish subtitles—was streaming away. Passwords go to government workersand contractors on national-security duty. To everybody else, the OpenSource Center is closed.World News Connection is a way in. The CIA, according to one of its pressofficers, sends WNC 40,000 unclassified items a month. What it doesn'tsend isn't so clear. WNC gets nothing by jihadists, for example, yet itdoes get summaries of OSC's pointed in-house analyses.What the CIA keeps to itself interests some WNC junkies less thanintelligence that hides in plain sight. Gary Sick studies Iran at ColumbiaUniversity, a WNC subscriber, where he devours speeches by autocraticleaders. "They say what they think," he says. What Prof. Sick can'tdecipher is why WNC isn't free: "They give it to everybody in thegovernment. Why not give it to us taxpayers?"Mr. Hounsell's answer: copyright. The CIA circulates Vladimir Putin'sspeeches inside the government, but WCN needs permission to sell them—andit has to pay royalties to agencies that publish them. Mr. Hounsell spendshis days mailing letters (in English) to faraway newspapers or radiostations, pleading for clearance. If they don't agree, WNC erases theircontent."Right now, I'm contacting new sources," Mr. Hounsell said, opening aspreadsheet on his screen. It listed 757 letters that have so far goneunanswered. No reply from Essirage, in Nouakchott; from Komentari, inKiev; from Dinamina, in Colombo. "A guy in Baluchistan got back," Mr.Hounsell recalled. "He wrote, 'Can you protect us?'"When Mr. Hounsell covets a source, he'll pick up the phone and call. Hecan say, "Does anybody there speak English?" in multiple languages. Thosewho sign get 25% of the income per hit. Krungthep Thurakit, in Bangkok,got more than 4,000 hits last quarter—and received a check for $323.The copyright rule has an exception: a handful of "rogue states." "Wedon't pay them," said Mr. Hounsell. "But if that's brought to anybody'sattention, we'd have to pull their stuff." To keep axis-of-evil rawmaterial online at World News Connection, (including the latest speechesby a certain North African colonel), Mr. Hounsell has asked that theirnames remain an open secret.Write to Barry Newman at barry.newman-Oo4YIDBCiv0< at >public.gmane.org

From: "Joost Van Bennekom" <joostvanbennekom-PkbjNfxxIARBDgjK7y7TUQ< at >public.gmane.org>Date: Thu, March 3, 2011 12:12Help write to the UN about internet freedomAccess has been invited to speak at a UN Human Rights Council event onFriday in Geneva on the topic of internet freedom in front of foreignministers, UN ambassadors, and other high-level foreign officials.Over the last few weeks you've been a big part of our efforts to promotedigital freedom around the globe, now together we have a chance to tellthe UN, in front of the world's media, what they should be doing tosupport digital rights, and we’d like you to help us write the speech!There are a few occasions when we have the attention of our leaders, and it'sat these moments, that we must unify our voices to have them heardclearly. Please take a moment to click on the link below and fill outour survey and add your comments and we'll include your thoughts in ourspeech on Friday:https://www.accessnow.org/policy-activism/press-blog/write-our-speech