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13 December 2010. Updated.
12 December 2010. The [WL] messages are excerpted without redactions from:
http://cryptome.org/wikileaks/wikileaks-leak.htm
Wikileaks Targets Daniel Ellsberg Brand
To: Barton Gellman From: John Young <jya[at]pipeline.com>Bart, These have just been published on Cryptome: To: funtimesahead[at]lists.riseup.net From: Hanna De Jong <snow[at]xs4all.nl> Date: Sat, 9 Dec 2006 20:42:37 +1100 Subject: [WL] Copy of WL letter to Ellsberg. This is a restricted internal development mailinglist for w-i-k-i-l-e-a-k-s-.-o-r-g. Please do not mention that word directly in these discussions; refer instead to 'WL'. This list is housed at riseup.net, an activist collective in Seattle with an established lawyer and plenty of backbone. Dear Mr. Ellsberg. We have followed with interest and delight your recent statements on document leaking. We have come to the conclusion that fomenting a world wide movement of mass leaking is the most cost effective political intervention available to us* We believe that injustice is answered by good governance and for there to be good governance there must be open governance. Governance by stealth is governance by conspiracy and fear. Fear, because without it, secrecy does not last for long. Retired generals and diplomats are vociferous, but those in active service hold their tune. Lord Action said, "Everything secret degenerates, even the administration of justice; nothing is safe that does not show how it can bear discussion and publicity". This degeneration comes about because when injustice is concealed, including plans for future injustice, it cannot be addressed. When governance is closed, man's eyes become cataracts. When governance is open, man can see and so act to move the world towards a more just state; for instance see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reporters_Without_Borders which shows a striking correlation between press freedom and countries known for their quality of life. us*: some attributes may have been swapped to protect selected identities, no particular order. 1) Retired new york architect and notorious intelligence leak facilitator 2) Euro cryptographer/programmer 3) Pacific physicist and illustrator 4) A pacific author and economic policy lecturer 5) Euro, Ex-Cambridge mathematician/cryptographer/programmer 6) Euro businessman and security specialist/activist 7) Author of software than runs 40% of the world's websites. 8) US pure mathematician with criminal law background 9) An infamous US ex-hacker 10) Pacific cryptographer/physicist and activist 11) US/euro cryptographer and activist/programmer 12) Pacific programmer 13) Pacific architect / foreign policy wonk New technology and cryptographic ideas permit us to not only encourage document leaking, but to facilitate it directly on a mass scale. We intend to place a new star in the political firmament of man. We are building an uncensorizable branch of Wikipedia for leaked documents and the civic institutions & social perceptions necessary to defend and promote it. We have received over 1 million documents from 13 countries, despite not having publicly launched yet! We have approached you now for two reasons. Firstly, we have crossed over from `prospective' to `projective'. The basic technology has been prototyped and we have a view as how we must proceed politically and legally. We need to move and inspire people, gain volunteers, funding, further set up the necessary political-legal defenses and deploy. Since you have thought about leaking more than anyone we know, we would like you on board. We'd like your advice and we'd like you to form part of our political armor. The more armor we have, particularly in the form of men and women sanctified by age, history and class, the more we can act like brazen young men and get away with it. Secondly, we would like to award "The Ellsburg Prize for Courageous Action" and "The Ellsburg Prize for Courageous Action (USA)", for the two leaks submitted in the past year which most assist humanity. The regionalization of the second prize is to encourage patrons of similar awards in other countries. Although it is premature to go into detail, we have designed a scheme were this can be meaningfully awarded to anonymous leakers. We have been pledged substantial initial funding. Please tell us your thoughts. If you are happy, we will add you to our internal mailinglist, contacts, etc. Solidarity! WL. ---------- From: "Nobody Niente" <nobodyniente[at]hotmail.com> To: funtimesahead[at]lists.riseup.net Date: Wed, 13 Dec 2006 05:17:33 -0600 Subject: [WL] Ellsberg [This is a restricted internal development mailinglist for w-i-k-i-l-e-a-k-s-.-o-r-g. Please do not mention that word directly in these discussions; refer instead to 'WL'. This list is housed at riseup.net, an activist collective in Seattle with an established lawyer and plenty of backbone.] A simple googlestalking operation reveals his address to be: 90 Norwood Avenue Kensington CA 94707 USA ---------- Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2006 01:34:26 -0500 To: funtimesahead[at]lists.riseup.net From: Michael Ellsberg <ellsbergpress[at]gmail.com> Subject: [WL] Confirm your subscription to Ellsberg.Net [This is a restricted internal development mailinglist for w-i-k-i-l-e-a-k-s-.-o-r-g. Please do not mention that word directly in these discussions; refer instead to 'WL'. This list is housed at riseup.net, an activist collective in Seattle with an established lawyer and plenty of backbone.] Subscription Confirmation Before we add you to our mailing list, we would like to confirm your subscription. http://app.intellicontact.com/icp/q.pl?r=1023255897&s=AZUG&gid=40049&c=49945 Your subscription will be activated immediately upon clicking the above link. This double opt-in method ensures that all subscribers on our list do indeed want to receive our newsletters and that no one can add your email address to a list without your consent. Thank you for your assistance! This message was sent from Michael Ellsberg to funtimesahead[at]lists.riseup.net. It was sent from: Michael Ellsberg, 90 Norwood Ave., Kensington, CA 94707. You can modify/update your subscription via the link below. Email Marketing Software ---------- From: Julian Assange <me[at]iq.org> Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2006 17:43:24 +1100 To: funtimesahead[at]lists.riseup.net Subject: [WL] ellsberg email address [This is a restricted internal development mailinglist for w-i-k-i-l-e-a-k-s-.-o-r-g. Please do not mention that word directly in these discussions; refer instead to 'WL'. This list is housed at riseup.net, an activist collective in Seattle with an established lawyer and plenty of backbone.] Hanna, I notice ellsberg also uses ellsbergd[at]cs.com [compuserve] ---------- From: Julian Assange <me[at]iq.org> Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2006 18:07:01 +1100 To: funtimesahead[at]lists.riseup.net Subject: [WL] ellsberg phone [This is a restricted internal development mailinglist for w-i-k-i-l-e-a-k-s-.-o-r-g. Please do not mention that word directly in these discussions; refer instead to 'WL'. This list is housed at riseup.net, an activist collective in Seattle with an established lawyer and plenty of backbone.] Hanna, +1 (510) 5262605 ---------- From: Julian Assange <me[at]iq.org> Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2006 18:44:10 +1100 To: funtimesahead[at]lists.riseup.net Subject: [WL] That letter to ellsberg [This is a restricted internal development mailinglist for w-i-k-i-l-e-a-k-s-.-o-r-g. Please do not mention that word directly in these discussions; refer instead to 'WL'. This list is housed at riseup.net, an activist collective in Seattle with an established lawyer and plenty of backbone.] Hanna/nienty 'uncensorizable' should probably be 'uncensorable'. ---------- From: Julian Assange <me[at]iq.org> Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2006 19:05:34 +1100 To: funtimesahead[at]lists.riseup.net Subject: [WL] John Gilmore [This is a restricted internal development mailinglist for w-i-k-i-l-e-a-k-s-.-o-r-g. Please do not mention that word directly in these discussions; refer instead to 'WL'. This list is housed at riseup.net, an activist collective in Seattle with an established lawyer and plenty of backbone.] I've sent a version of Hanna's Ellsberg letter to John Gilmore. Begin forwarded message: > From: Julian Assange <me[at]iq.org> > Date: 16 December 2006 19:00:14 GMT+11:00 > To: gnu[at]eff.org, gnu[at]toad.com > Subject: document leaking > > Dear J, > > Are you interested in helping us build/support/get support for > this: www.wikileaks.org > [Ellsberg letter omitted.]
Subject: URLs Date: Monday, 13 Dec 2010 Yes, Hanna, but that name and that email address could be spoofs or throwaways of a guy or a girl or a group. Nobody/niente is a common pseudonym, like anonymous. Several people may use it at the same time. It appeared several times on the list. Signing "WL" was to pretend security, mysteriousness and branding. Same for the use of secrecy and anonymity. On the list there was discussion of the value of these to stimulate drama to attract journalists. "Using real names of unknown persons has no appeal." A variation on "inside sources," "confidential sources," "not authorized to speak," "an unnamed official," "names redacted to protect lives," "deep undercover," and the lot of fictional ploys. Julian used the nom de plume "Julien" on the list, as a joke about this nonsense. His nym "me" as in me@iq.org is a shortened version of his hacker nym "mendax" and the ego. Cute, huh? You may have seen that one of the list posters used the nym "martha stuart pgp." Which prompts the wonder if she was solicited for support despite the misspelling, as Ellsberg was misspelled then and now, Ellsburg. I recall that Ellsberg first publicly commented on Wikileaks in April 2010 during the gunship video furor. Said he had been suspicious of WL from the beginning but now had just made a $1000 contribution. That fits Ellsberg's disdain for anything he can't capitalize upon, not unlike, oh my god, the New York Times with its "iconic Pentagon Papers," and the alltime inveterate publicity whore, Michael Moore. Excuse my charitable views on these sumbitches. At 12:33 PM 12/12/2010 -0500, you wrote: Well, I can't say I'm surprised, but I hereby acknowledge that you're true to your principles, even when uncomfortable.... Thanks.... So this means that the letter to Ellsberg was sent from Hanna De Jong <snow[at]xs4all.nl> and signed only "WL"? Still seems odd. As for nobodyniente, does he/she still use that pseudonym? -- Barton Gellman PGP key: on keyserver or direct download
To: Barton Gellman From: John Young <jya[at]pipeline.com>
Subject: Architect Date: Monday, 13 Dec 2010 Active New York City architect. Not sure how the retired was invented, probably due to ageism and not knowing self-employed architects never retire. At 10:54 PM 12/12/2010 -0500, you wrote: For identification, are you a New York City architect or a retired NYC architect, as I think I once saw you identified? -- Barton Gellman
To: Barton Gellman From: John Young <jya[at]pipeline.com>
Subject: URLs Date: Sunday, 12 Dec 2010
From: Barton Gellman To: John Young <jya[at]pipeline.com>
Subject: URLs Date: Sunday, 12 Dec 2010 At 11:23 AM 12/12/2010 -0500, you wrote: What I don't understand is -- the letter goes to Ellsberg and is signed by WHOM? Were there real names attached? Pseudonyms? Or merely the closing lines of "Solidarity! WL." Was the source email account some throwaway, or the "funtimesahead" account, or what? I would really, really like to know the names of those two persons. Not necessarily for publication, not without their permission, but I'd like to talk to them. And how about this, Mr. Death to Secrecy? Can you not send me some of the unredacted email archives. If three-month-old IM transcripts ("you are not a god") are public, what's the harm? I will, on the other hand, agree not to publish any name you tell me is out of bounds. Barton Gellman __________ On 12/12/2010 11:04 AM, John Young wrote: Bart, Checking the unredacted emails, the Ellsberg letter was drafted by two persons other than Assange and posted for review and comment. Julian made a comment on the list about a misspelled word addressed to the two named, maybe pseudonymously, drafters. The letter apparently went out with the one-word spelling correction. Julian may have previously worked on the draft though. There was discussion on the list about how to reach Ellsberg and possible email addresses, mail addresses and phone numbers were dug up. Not long after a pro forma message from Ellsberg's son was posted to the list welcoming a new subscriber to the Ellsberg.net mail list. A later posting mentioned a Ellsberg celebration. Nothing else about Ellsburg appeared until recently with a couple of spams from Ellsberg.net. However, not all emails to WL and participants were posted on the list, based on-list references to unposted communications and my own experience. An identical copy of the letter to Ellsberg was sent to others whose names I redacted. Nothing about responses from any of them. I know a number of those persons and, uncharacteristically, have seen no public comment from them about Wikileaks. They are usually quite outspoken, if that is a clue. Some are generous supporters of initiatives like Wikileaks, though not of Cryptome, darn it, a pity, too vulgar they say. Fuck you, I say. Notably, Julian does not use vulgarity, indeed, appears to be the best mannered little rebel a lawsuit-and-investigation-averse supporter could hope for as befits those among them who have faced USG attacks and lost. A few solicited by WL are named here along with the usual suspects: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cypherpunk John ________ Coda, When I wrote nothing else about Ellsberg, I should have said this includes an archive of WL emailings to volunteers and the press which I have not published. This contains a mix of emails which were intended to be private to volunteers as well as public to the press. The list named "WL-Volunteers WL-News" covers the time period of May 15, 2007 to August 27, 2008. The list named "WIKILEAKS" (from press-office[at]wikileaks.org) covers the time period of November 3, 2008 to August 1, 2009. You will recall Wikileaks.org closed shortly thereafter and reopened with the gunship video in April 2010. John _________ To: Barton Gellman From: John Young <jya[at]pipeline.com>
Subject: URLs Date: Sunday, 12 Dec 2010 Bart, BG:First, may I presume that Julian wrote it? (It sure sounds like him, word for word.) JY: Yes, this reads like Julian wrote it. However, I have learned recently that he had early help from a highly skilled public relations expert (who was also wealthy). Mailings were commented on and critiqued by the group. BG: Second, did he really sign it only "WL"? I have a hard time believing that Ellsberg would accept an anonymous approach. Or were they already acquainted somehow? JY: WL usually signfies that a document had been jointly prepared rather than by an individual. This was intended to be a validation of significance by Wikileaks. No doubt it was faked in instances, then as now, to amplify an individual effort. BG: Third, how did Ellsberg reply? I don't see an answer in those
files. Did Ellsberg lend his name to the Wikileaks launch? I've seen
places where Julian -- in those early days -- cited Ellsberg as a kind
of ancestor and implied he was a supporter, but I don't know the basis
for that. I do of course see that Ellsberg has leaped to the defense
of WL and Julian this year.... JY: Ellsberg did not reply as far as I know. A number of notable persons did not reply as far as I know. There was WL lamentation abou that. Indeed, if a reply was received it was immediately posted to the mail list as evidence of success. However, it is likely that there were private communications outside the mail list. Individuals on the mail list communicated outside it. I got private mails that way, some I published, some not. JY: Ellsberg, like other notables, gets endless appeals. His son vets them, as he eventually did in response to Wikileaks. His son is one of the very few who still sends press releases to the WL restricted mail list (I am on it under a pseudonym). One appeared a few days ago about Ellberg's appearance on Colbert which I posted to Cryptome. JY: You may be aware that Wikileaks has claimed sponsorship by several notables who claimed they never heard of the org when contacted by reporters, Noam Chomsky an example, who has lately joined the supporters. Cryptome posted an email exchange with Chomsky about WL: http://cryptome.org/0001/wikileaks-noam.htm JY: Julian later admitted Chomsky's involvement was not true. BG: One last thing: why did you turn so suddenly and sharply against WL?
It's clear you were skeptical about the $5 million funding goal and the
1 million documents, but you go from skepticism to fuck-you-all without
any apparent transition in the archive. What touched it off? JY: Caused by private emails pleading I back off my criticism to protect a "fragile initiative" for which my "support is essential." I have received these flattering back-channel suck-ups in other cases, which are con (blow) jobs. They are commonly deployed by manipulators to bring dissenters and doubters into the fold, yep, like all authoritatives. Julian is a skilled practitioner of this, and it usually works. That is what brought Ellsberg into the fold as well as the Guardian, NYT, Der Spiegel and the others now racing to protect their reputation against being gulled by a master. Time was an early victim -- the Time 2007 report by Tracy Smith which was assisted by back-channels to me and I assume others fingered by Julian to be seduced by media attention, then as now. JY: His back-channel entrapments would be wondrous to leak, no? I don't mean those to cohorts, celebrities and media, I mean the deep pocketed ones. JY: You have a better chance at those than me. Send along any you or Time dare not publish. JY: This email is not private. You will understand why that is impossible. So it is said. Regards, John
Cryptome brand said to Bart Time brand by telephone that the Daniel Ellsberg brand (what the New York Times brand touts as its responsibly-narrated "the iconic Pentagon Papers" against Ellsberg wishes) is managed by Ellsberg's son and that a cold email would likely produce a canned response, if any, as with hundreds of other appeals sent to notables, the wealthy and the MSM. That the Ellsberg brand like the other come-hither iconic targets is too valuable to give away free unless for opportunities to promote the brand and speaking and advertising income. Ellsberg and the MSM smelled the revenue coffee with the gunship video in April 2010 when the Wikileaks public relations advisor explained how to make coffee with bombshell return on investment liquor. (More on that coffemaking in Wikileaks Taps the Power of the Press, NY Times, 13 December 2010.) Only Dan's iconic-benumbed son cluelessly continues to send Ellsberg.net spam with other odd-ball spammers to the abandoned WL press list.
Time Man of the Year is a pretty good brand of liquored-up coffee -- when fresh. Dynamite Nobel bombshell ticking.
Coda: "Wikileaks" is no more PR-pretentiously buffoonish than shrewdly silly brands of attention strivers old and new: The Guardian, Der Spiegel (The Mirror), Le Monde (The World), El Pais (The Nation), The Nation (US), National Review, Time, Times in many apish iterations, Countdown, Slate, Gawker, Raw Story, Twitter, Facebook, Google, Yahoo, Central Intelligence, National Security Agency, The Presidency, Supreme! Court, MI5 and MI6 (nyms ever so scary), Official! Secrecy Act, Secrecy News, Public Intelligence and Charlie Chan inscrutible Cryptome -- how is that pronounced, ah, "Crypto Me," OMG, how did Charlie Chan ah so Assange trojan his and our universally addictive ego-nym in there.