vRRitti.com, providing sentiency

Dutch website 952.nl dives into WikiLeaks and reports that:

• Donations to WikiLeaks go to the Wau Holland Foundation in Germany, enabling WikiLeaks to refrain from having to disclose names of donors;
• WikiLeaks is registered as a library in Australia, a foundation in France and as a newspaper in Sweden;
• In the US WikiLeaks’ donations are tax deductable;
• 10% of Wikileaks’ income relates to donations (20 euros per donation on average);
• WikiLeaks itself leaked an e-mail possibly exposing some 58 donors to WikiLeaks: http://www.plime.com/l/95532/low.mtm
• The newspaper The New Yorker points to Dutch hacker and entrepreneur Rop Gonggrijp (Collateral Murder: http://rop.gonggri.jp/?p=149 ) as the one paying for the costs related to the Iraq video WikiLeaks has released:

Assange was sitting opposite Rop Gonggrijp, a Dutch activist, hacker, and businessman. Gonggrijp—thin and balding, with a soft voice—has known Assange well for several years. He had noticed Assange’s panicky communiqués about being watched and decided that his help was needed. “Julian can deal with incredibly little sleep, and a hell of a lot of chaos, but even he has his limits, and I could see that he was stretching himself,” Gonggrijp told me. “I decided to come out and make things sane again.” Gonggrijp became the unofficial manager and treasurer of Project B, advancing about ten thousand euros to WikiLeaks to finance it. He kept everyone on schedule, and made sure that the kitchen was stocked with food and that the Bunker was orderly.

• WikiLeaks is said to make money via exclusive deals with various news media;
• 200,000 euros are needed to keep the site online. If WikiLeaks were to pay out salaries that amount would go up to 600,000 euros;
• At the end of August 2010 WikiLeaks had received almost one million euros in donations;
• A lot of the money is spent on traveling costs (for Julian Assange and Daniel Schmitt);
• Only 38,000 euros would have been spent currently;
• There are virtually no legal costs since WikiLeaks is allowed to use the services of the lawyers of AP, The Los Angeles Times and the National Newspaper Association, which saves WikiLeaks hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions of dollars;
• PayPal has ‘frozen’ 60,000 euros;
• The Swiss Postfinance Bank has ‘frozen’ 31,000 euros relating to the bank account of Assange himself;

 As a result, the Wikileaks project is doomed.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/wikileaks/8186569/Wikileaks-Julian-Assanges-fatal-mistake.html

trying to sell top secret documents from the military to an undercover investigator posing as a foreign agent

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2010/12/navy_intelligence_specialist_i.html

Speaking outside City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court, Mr Assange’s lawyer Mark Stephens said his client is “fine”.

Asked about the meeting with police, he replied: “It was very cordial. They have verified his identity. They are satisfied he is the real Julian Assange and we are ready to go into court.”

http://tinyurl.com/2ak2bge

http://truthdive.com/2010/12/06/Now-mini-WikiLeaks-on-web-US-cautions-Switzerland-over-Assange-asylum-offer.html

 If it’s OK for a democracy to just decide to run someone off the internet for doing something they wouldn’t prosecute a newspaper for doing, the idea of an internet that further democratizes the public sphere will have taken a mortal blow.

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/12/wikileaks-is-our-amsterdam.html

http://www.scpr.org/news/2010/12/07/wikileaks-founder-assange-surrenders-in-london/

BRISBANE – 12 noon, this Friday December 10
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, 295 Ann Street, City.

SYDNEY- Sydney Town Hall @ 1pm, Friday December 10.

MELBOURNE – Facebook event for the protest in Melbourne to defend Julian Assange: http://on.fb.me/gHWHyq

Melbourne Protest to defend Julian Assange at State Library, Melbourne 4.30pm, this Friday, Dec 10

http://indymedia.org.au/2010/12/08/australia-wide-protests-support-of-wikileaks-founder-after-his-arrest-today-in-london

http://tv.gawker.com/5707432/star-wars-holiday-special-ranked-as-worst-television-holiday-moment-of-all-time

How much your brain tricks you depends on how much ‘real estate’ your brain has put aside for visual processing

http://gizmodo.com/5707565/the-size-of-your-brains-visual-cortex-determines-whether-optical-illusions-fool-you

With doors closing all around him, Private Manning searched for a window: He thought that by leaking classified information about his government’s foreign policy, he might “actually change something.”

Today, Pte. Manning is being held in solitary confinement in a military prison in Quantico, Va., where he is under a suicide watch. He has been charged with illegally leaking classified information and faces a possible court-martial. If he is found guilty, he will face a maximum of 52 years in jail.

Pte. Manning’s turning point apparently came when he watched Iraqi police detain 15 people for printing anti-Iraqi literature that turned out to be a scholarly critique of Iraq’s Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

“After that … I saw things differently,” he wrote. “I was actively involved in something that I was completely against.”

http://tinyurl.com/3afh9d8

Calgary police said Monday they were compiling evidence for the Crown to determine whether charges should be laid against a former adviser to Prime Minister Stephen Harper for comments Tom Flanagan made suggesting WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange should be assassinated.

Calgary police are the first to act on public complaints against Flanagan, who is a political-science professor at the University of Calgary.

“Due to a number of calls we have received from the public regarding this matter, the Calgary Police Service will be compiling all facts and compiling a package that will be forwarded to the Crown prosecutor’s office for review,” said Supt. Kevan Stuart in a prepared statement. “The Crown’s office will then determine if this is a criminal matter.”

http://tinyurl.com/27osotp

in the open letter posted on the ABC’s Drum website, figures such as writer Noam Chomsky, former Family Court chief justice Alastair Nicholson, retired intelligence officer Lance Collins and actor Max Gillies call on Ms Gillard to ensure Mr Assange’s safety in light of the inflammatory rhetoric surrounding WikiLeaks.

“We therefore call upon you to condemn, on behalf of the Australian Government, calls for physical harm to be inflicted upon Mr Assange and to state publicly that you will ensure Mr Assange receives the rights and protections to which he is entitled, irrespective of whether the unlawful threats against him come from individuals or states,” they write.

In the letter, almost 200 signatories including Chaser star Julian Morrow, Greens MP Adam Bandt and author Helen Garner, say the Prime Minister needs to make a strong statement in support of freedom of information and resist calls to punish Mr Assange for the leaks.

“We urge you to confirm publicly Australia’s commitment to freedom of political communication; to refrain from cancelling Mr Assange’s passport, in the absence of clear proof that such a step is warranted; to provide assistance and advocacy to Mr Assange; and do everything in your power to ensure that any legal proceedings taken against him comply fully with the principles of law and procedural fairness,” the letter states. ”A statement by you to this effect should not be controversial – it is a simple commitment to democratic principles and the rule of law.”

http://tinyurl.com/266xdmq

Lawyer Mark Stephens told reporters in London that the Metropolitan Police had called him to say they had received an arrest warrant from Sweden for Assange. Assange has been staying at an undisclosed location in Britain.

“We are in the process of making arrangements to meet with police by consent,” Stephens said Monday, declining to say when Assange’s interview with police would take place.

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9JUP8R00.htm

and:

Late last night London’s City of Westminster magistrates were expected to enforce the warrant.

His lawyer Mark Stephens, of Stephens Finers Innocent, said he believed the Swedish rape claims were a “political stunt”. Mr Stephens confirmed British police had telephoned him to notify him that they would serve the extradition request from Sweden. He refused to confirm whether his client was in Britain, but said the meeting would take place somewhere in Britain.

“The arrangements I have been making are for him to come and meet the British police,” Stephens said, without giving a date for the interview.

One British newspaper reported that Mr Assange would be expected to post bail of between 100,000 pounds and 200,000 pounds and would need up to six people offering surety. But Mr Stephens said while he had been informed of the warrant, he knew nothing of a pending court appearance.

“I have not concluded any arrangements with the police at this time,” he said.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/world/hunt-for-wikileaks-julian-assange-may-end-with-surrender/story-e6frf7lf-1225967095676

See also:

Scotland Yard has arrest warrant for Assange

http://tinyurl.com/28sk827

 I think we’re up to today cable 261 of 250,000. The media organisations that are working with WikiLeaks to publish this material have been working on this for some time and we suspect that the cables will continue to be published in an orderly fashion in accordance with the schedule agreed for the coming months and perhaps longer.

So there is a wealth of material that’s out there and that will not stop with Mr Assange’s arrest.

http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2010/s3086480.htm