Z/Web

I vaguely heard about this movie about Wikileaks in theaters and wanted to see it, but the negative reviews killed my enthusiasm. I figured it was like most Hollywood attempts at showing technology where they muck everything up and didn’t want to see that.

But it turns out most of the negativity was from fans of Julian Assange, who didn’t like how he was portrayed. Apparently the film is based on material from his ex-partner after they had a falling out. But I didn’t feel it was that negative. Sure, it paints him as an eccentric genius, difficult around people, and incredibly arrogant, but I suspect those things are probably true. I also felt the debate over whether he should release secret material without redacting names of people who might be in danger was worth exploring (and there really isn’t a right answer as both sides are correct).

In terms of story, they did a good job. I found it compelling and interesting. There’s a bit too much emphasis on certain kinds of artificial drama (arguments and personal bickering) and while the film hints at spies and black ops shadowing and such, there it feels phony, like it’s just there for the film. There’s also not nearly enough technical info about exactly how Julian hides his identity and travels without being followed and such, which I found weird. If he’s really worried about being followed, shouldn’t he be taking measures against that? Yet we’re not shown any of those, just his paranoia and mentions of tech like “cryptophone” as though that solves everything.

On the other hand, what impressed me the most was a better understanding of just what Wikileaks is and how it was created. I knew little about it other than it was a way for whistleblowers to anonymously post secrets on the web. I never realized the incredible amount of work it took to make that happen. I just figured people used an anonymous email account and emailed in documents, but it’s not that simple.

For one thing, Wikileaks had to verify all the sources and info, so they acted like editors. They didn’t just post whatever they were sent, but checked it over throughly to make sure it was accurate and truthful.

For another, it’s one thing sending a website an anonymous tip about the next Apple iPhone, but it’s quite another posting the secrets of governments. That requires some amazing encryption and obfuscation to mask the identities of the sources. I didn’t realize that Julian was a mathematician who create his own encryption techniques just for the website, nor did I think about the difficulties of hosting a site that many governments all over the world want shut down.

In the end this is a cool story: dramatic and interesting, a bit grandiose, but revealing an important new type of journalism. It provokes thinking and debate and it worth viewing. It doesn’t quite live up to The Social Network in terms of quality of story, but it’s similar and I enjoyed it. Perhaps it is biased, but I didn’t find it that negative. I came away feeling that Julian is a real hero.