I wrote an article for The National Post on WikiLeaks, pegged to the release later this month of the movie The Fifth Estate. Along the way I touch on PRISM, Napster, and the Industrial Workers of the World, among other topics. Here's the lede:
Fifth Estate
Of course they made a movie about Julian Assange. He's a complicated character being pursued by some of the most powerful people on the planet. It's a scenario that just screams to be filmed.
But while The Fifth Estate—which opens in theatres Oct. 18—may turn out to be a compelling picture, it probably won't shed much light on the revolution represented by WikiLeaks, Assange's website that specializes in publishing secret information. It's not likely to shed that light for the same reason the story is such an attractive idea for a film in the first place: It's about Julian Assange, a man whose adventures and personality threaten to obscure the conditions that thrust him into the news. Assange may have taken advantage of the circumstances that made the world ripe for WikiLeaks, but those circumstances were here before Assange came along, and they aren't going to disappear when he departs.
