The Newscorp/BSkyB decision: it's big & it's political

With all the excitement about Julian Assange it’s easy to forget that another hugely divisive figure in global media is also facing a crucial judgement. Rupert Murdoch’s Newcorp wants a complete takeover of BSkyB which would help cement his position as the biggest broadcaster apart from the BBC AND the biggest owner of UK newspapers

The Rhetorical Algorithm: WikiLeaks and the Elliptical Secrets of Donald J. Trump

Algorithms were a generative force behind many of the leaks and secrets that dominated the 2016 election season. Taking the form of the identity-anonymizing Tor software that protected the identity of leakers, mathematical protocols occupied a prominent place in the secrets generated during the presidential campaign. This essay suggests that the rhetorical trope of ellipsis offers an equally crucial, algorithmic formula for explaining the public production of these secrets and leaks. It then describes the 2016 DNC leak and Donald Trump’s “I love Wikileaks” moment using the trope of ellipsis, which marks a discursive omission or gap in official executive discourse

“It’s Not the Abuse That Kills You, It’s the Silence”: The silencing of sexual violence activism in social justice movements in the UK Left

Widespread doubt and disbelief of women and non-binary survivors who disclose, speak out and demand accountability for the violence they have experienced within social justice movements in the UK Left reveals a painful impasse and persistent barrier in movement building. Systemic failures of criminal justice responses to rape, sexual assault and domestic violence coupled with State violence and regulation of social justice movements and marginalised groups has led to consideration of community alternatives to help transform activist communities into cultures of safety and accountability. However, ‘counter-organising’ (INCITE! 2003; 2006) can distort, scrutinise and dismantle the work of survivors and their supporters in developing community accountability and safer spaces processes. The salvage research project (Downes, Hanson and Hudson, 2016) used participatory action research approaches and qualitative interviews with 10 women and non-binary survivors to explore the lived experiences of harm, violence and abuse experienced in activist communities in the UK. This article will explore how resistance to disclosures of gendered violence and anti-violence activism can be as (or more) harmful than the violence initially experienced. Five key silencing strategies are explored: (i) discrediting survivors and supporters; (ii) questioning the legitimacy of claim; (iii) questioning the legitimacy of community accountability; (iv) avoiding troubling recognitions; and (v) placing burden on survivors. The silencing of survivors and their supporters permits unequal power relations to remain unchanged and removes any need for the misogyny and sexism produced in activist communities to be critically examined

Ecuador's Decission to grant Asylum to Julian Assange : The Manifestation Of Human Security?

Ecuador's decision to grant asylum to Julian Assange (Australian citizen) on August 16, 2012 has caused several impacts. As we know Julian Assange the founder of WikiLeaks was arrested in Britain in connection with a Swedish investigation into accusations of sexual offenses. But United States Law enforcement official said the fact that he was in custody did not affect their deliberations about whether he might be charged in this country in connection with publication of leaked government documents. Being disappointed with the decision the British authorities sent a written notice to the Ecuador's Embassy in London that they would assault the Embassy if Assange was not handed over. The letter has led to tense diplomatic relations between two countries. Moreover, Britain also refused to provide Assange to Ecuador and local police would arrest him once he stopped out from the Embassy. This would make the condition remains unchanged for Assange, who has stayed at the Ecuador's embassy in London for the last two months. It means Assange, as human being can't enjoy a human security environment. Facing the difficult situation UNASUR (The Union of South America Nations) held a foreign Ministers Meeting (FMM) after the President's of Ecuador granted the asylum. The meeting produced an agreed document that support Ecuador's decision and encourage all parties to have continuous negotiation to find mutually acceptable solutions based on good neighbour principles

Different Spirals of Sameness: A Study of Content Sharing in Mainstream and Alternative Media

In this paper, we analyze content sharing between news sources in the alternative and mainstream media using a dataset of 713K articles and 194 sources. We find that content sharing happens in tightly formed communities, and these communities represent relatively homogeneous portions of the media landscape. Through a mix-method analysis, we find several primary content sharing behaviors. First, we find that the vast majority of shared articles are only shared with similar news sources (i.e. same community). Second, we find that despite these echo-chambers of sharing, specific sources, such as The Drudge Report, mix content from both mainstream and conspiracy communities. Third, we show that while these differing communities do not always share news articles, they do report on the same events, but often with competing and counter-narratives. Overall, we find that the news is homogeneous within communities and diverse in between, creating different spirals of sameness.Comment: Published at ICWSM 201

Fake News, It's Ideology Stupid

Ideology is everywhere in political speaking, writing, and conversing. The sooner everyone in the debate about fake news gets comfortable with this basic concept, the better

Most Dominated Problems of Mass Media Dialogism in National Dailies during the Trial Process of Wikileaks Grounder Julian Assange

This paper examines media mediation, media effects and their impact on the literacy of the public sphere. To examine the medial text and media mediation´s impact on various journalistic fields in different countries, I analyse during the current moment of “the global hunting” around WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange. As the source, I use 764 published articles in newspapers and online media from six different countries: Sweden, UK, Ecuador, Russia, Latvia and Malaysia. The objective was to test the intertextuality with using of qualitative research. The period for analysis is the last 1.5 years (2012 - 2013, 04). Results of my research show that the majority of articles demonstrate evidence of demonstrative rhetoric, despite the fact that “the Assange case” actually was a purely legal process and therefore demanded of the mass media factual, legal analysis of the situation. My conclusion shows that here we can see a new, obvious signs of the new way of deliberate censorship by means of linguistic expression. This shows that a very special kind of censorship is implicit in the mission of the global media

Julian Assange: A Content Analysis of Media Framing in Newspapers around the World

Researcher conducted a content analysis in order to examine how the media framed Julian Assange after the Ecuadorian government granted him political asylum at their embassy in London on August 16, 2012. Researchers compared 380 English and Spanish language newspaper articles from North America, Europe, Australia/New Zealand, Asia, and Latin America to examine regional differences in the way Assange was framed. This study revealed that generally the tone toward Assange was mostly neutral or positive in all continents. Furthermore, European media gave more attention to Julian Assange than did media from North America or other continents. Exploratory research revealed that English language newspapers placed Julian Assange in headlines more frequently than Spanish language sources. Interestingly, even when Assange’s participation in the publication of secret documents affected many different countries, he was not given page prominence in newspapers

Assange and WikiLeaks: Secrets, Personas and the Ethopoetics of Digital Leaking

This article suggests a rhetorical orientation for some future work in persona studies. In this paper, I maintain that persona studies can usefully contribute to the close description of complexes of discursive events. In particular, I contend that persona studies can enhance efforts in the humanities to describe discursive events involving public figures who have achieved a degree of fame or notoriety. The descriptive purchase of persona studies is maximised, I argue, when we foreground its rhetorical and semiotic postulates.To make this case, I read the figure of Julian Assange rhetorically. By focussing on questions of ethos and ethopoesis – the performative, discursive construction of full human character – I show that Julian Assange can be usefully read as a particular, digitally inflected instantiation of the persona of the information activist.In this instance, persona studies helps us to read the constitutive relation between digital leaking and issues of secrecy and publicity, and to understand the fortunes of the figure of Julian Assange in terms of Assange’s particular performance of the persona of the digital information activist.