This could be cool. A new site, Wikileaks, is setting up an open-source, online repository for leaked information. Using a wiki interface, it will allow anonymous whistleblowers to upload confidential info—but unlike Wikipedia, unhappy bosses and government agencies won’t be able to edit or delete the entries. The site already claims to have received 1.1 million documents and plans “to numerically eclipse the content the English Wikipedia with leaked documents.” Sounds like a potentially great source for activists and journalists. Not everyone is excited, though. Steven Aftergood of Secrecy News, who often passes on leaked or declassified documents from the U.S. government, writes: “In the absence of accountable editorial oversight, publication can more easily become an act of aggression or an incitement to violence, not to mention an invasion of privacy or an offense against good taste.” Which gets to the heart of the wiki issue—unfettered authorship versus the demands of accuracy. Let’s see what happens here.
