26 October 2010. Via radio the awards sounded like great fun. Cryptome treated with swell humor, quote: "the mother of all Wikileaks." A voice cackled, "mother?"

25 October 2010. Erich Moechel's Quintessenz.at has for years mirrored Cryptome. His email may be was not a punk.

Cryptome May Be Not Punked

Date: Sun, 24 Oct 2010 13:28:51 +0200
From: "Erich M." <erich[at]moechel.com>
To: John Young <jya[at]pipeline.com>
Subject: Defensor Libertatis Award to John Young tomorrow on stage in Vienna

Dear John,

To my great pleasure I passed the necessary security clearance ;) to relay the following information to you:

It is about the "Defensor Libertatis" Award at the 12th Big Brother Awards in Vienna Austria on Monday [25 October 2010]. This is the sole positive category amongst six negative ones featuring the worst surveillance companies politicians etc.

This is the gist of the Laudation in German [below]: John Young is awarded the "Defensor Libertatis" 2010 for his long, enduring and courageous fight against surveillance and censorship.

The event will be staged on Monday at 19.00 GMT, at the already sold out Vienna Rabenhof theatre. There is a HDTV-Transmission to the eLevate Art-Feststival in Graz and Live-Videostreams in various formats.

http://www.bigbrotherawards.at/2010/Gala

http://www.rabenhof.at/index_2010_fall_1.html

I wonder if we could get in contact with you via fone tomorrow. The organizing committee would like to record a short audio adress by you that could be played in the show. Time from 16:00 GMT onwards. Here come my personal congrats because I had the honour to write the laudation.

Sorry no time yet to translate it. Extremely busy with the preparations.

== Laudatio John Young ==

Was ein einziger Mensch für die Weltöffentlichkeit bewirken kann, beweist der New Yorker Architekt und Einzelkämpfer John Young. Seit 1996 haben sich auf seiner Website Cryptome.org 56.000 Dokumente angesammelt, deren Verfügbarkeit Regierungen rund um die Welt ein steter Dorn im Auge ist. Wenn Meldungen über im Internet veröffentlichte Namenslisten von MI6 oder CIA-Agenten durch die Breitenmedien gingen, dann fanden sich diese Listen in Zeiten vor Wikileaks stets auf Cryptome. Wann immer es in der Vergangenheit zu riskant erschien, gewisse, eigentlich nicht für die Öffentlichkeit bestimmte Dokumente europäischen Ursprungs im EU-Raum ins Netz zu stellen, genügte eine Mail an John und schon waren sie öffentlich. John Young hat sich im Lauf der Jahre mit praktisch jedem Protagonisten des militärisch-elektronischen Überwachungskomplexes der Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika angelegt: Mit vielen davon auch persönlich, weil dieser zornige alte Mann den grassierenden Überwachungswahn ganz persönlich nimmt. Für ein Leben im Kampf gegen Überwachung und Zensur und für nachgerade beängstigenden Mut wird deshalb der "Defensor Libertatis" an den Verteidiger der Freiheit John Young verliehen. Für uns und alle anderen aber bedeutet diese Vorbild: Schafft ein zwei, drei, viele Cryptomes! Schafft ein, zwei, drei, schafft viele Wikileaks!

http://www.cryptome.org

http://www.natsios-young.com/nya-bib.htm

cu

Erich M.

http://moechel.com        NEW PGP KEY 0xEA7DC174

http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0xACC6A796EA7DC174

--... ...--   -.. .   . .-. .. -.-. ....   --- . ...-- . -- -...

Dear Erich,

That is a wonderful surprise. It will be a pleasure to speak with you tomorrow. Pick a convenient time and I will answer the phone for a change.

Thanks very much for your long time effort to mirror Cryptome.

Best regards,

John
US 212-873-8700

On 10/24/2010 03:39 PM, John Young wrote:

We will call you before the show and record our conversation. Could take a bit of time because there are the guys from two nationwide radio stations tomorrow there recording/broadcasting as well.

The jury decision was unanimous. You were the only nominee.

This is the jury take a look ;)

http://www.bigbrotherawards.at/2010/Jury

cu

Erich

NEW PGP KEY 0xEA7DC174

http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0xACC6A796EA7DC174

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Erich,

For the phone recording may I suggest:

1. The honor should go to Cryptome, a collaboration of thousands, not to John Young, the backroom grunt who provides janitorial labor.

2. A principal collaborator is my long-time Cryptome partner, Deborah Natsios, who also avoids the spotlight in favor of quiet scholarship. I do that too but keep it even quieter.

3. Celebrating Cryptome should encourage others to do something similar, as you say, one, two, three and beyond. As Wikileaks was encouraged, and as it will inspire others to do.

4. Quintessenz is a collaborator, as are cypherpunks, and multitudes of others around the world, many preferring to remain anonymous and not seek celebrity over public service.

5. Cryptome could not happen without the vast opportunities of the collaborative Internet to avoid the constricted control of heirarchical authoritatives -- who will forever attempt to use the Internet to maintain control as if a god-given responsibility.

6. Disobedience of authoritatives is essential, as the Big Brother Awards amply evidence.

7. You might think of giving Cryptome the award then taking it away to be sure your principles are trustworthy. All awards are authoritative, bestowed by rigged juries, promotional PR stunts, and so on. Bite the hand that feeds you praise.

Looking forward to being made a fool of, me, not those who constitute Cryptome's shadowy gang of dissidents, or who pretend they are.

Poor Assange, being punked by the media for seeking to be a solo heroic mastermind genius. Wikileaks will survive that as it splits into hundreds, even thousands, of un-attackable iterations. Am I clear, punk John Young, punk him good.

Regards,

John