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Wikileaks

So I'm a bit undecided about the whole "cablegate" thing. In concept, I should be ecstatic, this is a wholesale example of the democratisation of information. However, I find myself somewhat shocked at the naivity of Julian Assange and his cronies. The publishing of so many secret documents is the action of an anarchist, not a democrat.

Why? Because there is no apparatus in place for the public to act upon such information. All it serves as is a tabloid insight into the machinations of a governmental system that keeps information secret to enable international diplomacy to function. I read with horror the exposure of China's willingness to discuss a unified Korea - in a stroke making such a thing impossible in our lifetime. What was the benefit of this to humanity?

I think that there's an important lesson in this for social network engineers within companies. Free exchange of information is only useful when it is done within the boundaries of a strategy and with a clear means to execute the lessons it creates. Without such it is at best value-less, at worse, ruinous.
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