- <nettime> #jakegate explained ... by a Dummy
- To: nettime-l {AT} kein.org
- Subject: <nettime> #jakegate explained ... by a Dummy
- From: Patrice Riemens <patrice {AT} xs4all.nl>
- Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2016 15:44:30 +0200
- NB Two days ago, The Guardian newspaper published a long article
- about Jacob Appelbaum, the first text in mainstream media since
- the two pieces in Die Zeit Online (see refs below), and only the
- second publication I am aware of since the storm around 'Jake' abated
- somewhere in last Summer.
- https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/11/jacob-appelbaum-tor-project-sexual-assault-allegations
- This post was largely written in Romania a few weeks ago, and hence
- is not informed by the article in The Guardian. It also looks at the
- whole affair from a different angle, less focused on the person(age)
- himself.
- #jakegate explained by ... a Dummy
- Well, since there are so many texts written for dummies, I thought
- it would be nice to have one ... written by one. And as you see, I
- carefully choose my subject ...
- The story going by the moniker #jakegate is, I assume largely known
- by nettime readers, but here's for an ultra-short ExecSum all the
- same: Jacob Appelbaum, aka ‘Jake’ is a prominent hacker-activist
- whose precipitous fall from grace and reputation has stunned the
- digerati scene. End May/begin of June this year (2016), organisations
- at the forefront of the battles for privacy and security like the TOR
- project, the CCC, Debian, and others, quite brutally scuttled him
- amidst accusation of (longstanding) sexual and social misbehaviour.
- But by now a backlash has also occurred as the same organisations
- stand accused of precipitate, non-transparent, and largely unfounded
- decision making - all this with 'Jake' himself largely disappearing
- from view.
- My reason for writing this piece is to try to understand - even if
- largely for my own sake – the circumstances and group processes
- that have been at work in creating this rather startling, though
- not totally unanticipated fracas. As a general disclaimer, I should
- reiterate that I am truly a dummy in this, in the sense that I am not
- an insider, even if I know a few ones. And all I do know stems from
- publicly available sources, of course supplemented by a few private
- talks – but don’t expect confidential information to be disclosed,
- since there was actually none. I do know Jake personally however,
- since 2003, and I have followed his activities ever since, be it
- from quite a distance. Also 'Jake' knows who I am and has always be
- very friendly to me, but we have always been distant acquaintances
- nonetheless. In short, my locus standi is situated at the 'core
- periphery' to the circles and activities Jake was or is related with -
- to use a swanky term Geert Lovink and I once made up.
- It may be needless to add and emphasize that ‘#jakegate’ is a very
- ‘complicated’ issue (as in Facebook), and that I tried to write
- about it, following Tacitus, ‘sine ira et studio’ ...
- I have structured this text in four sections (plus a concluding
- part): Jake’s persona(ge); his social circle, mostly in Berlin; the
- organisations he is (was) part of; and the the wider, bad world of
- surveillance and repression this constituency is facing and combating.
- These sections cannot, however, be strictly separated, they flow and
- must weave readily together towards the concluding remarks on the
- #jakegate backlash and beyond.
- On Jake’s persona(ge)
- It is self evident that Jake's character, as it appears to his social
- environment’s bystanders and to observers at large, provides a
- substantial, if by way insufficient, explanation of ‘#jakegate’.
- Even with some allowances, Jacob Appelbaum might be taken as
- exemplary for the phenomenon of a gifted, extrovert geek rising to
- prominence, not to say ‘rock star’ status, amidst the general
- hacker alternative, and mainstream, media hype. The by now fairly well
- documented mix of autism (-lite), mental (over)activity, sociopathy
- (-lite), maybe best captured by the German word ‘Drang’ - the
- ‘urge’ to do ‘something’ - can all be observed, and then in no
- small measure, with Jacob Appelbaum. Add precociousness and young age,
- and you have the potent combination which might largely – but again,
- not entirely – explain how 'Jake' ended up in the predicament that
- is now his.
- On Jake’s social environment and the groups he is/was in - in
- Berlin, mostly.
- Another tentative, partial explanation may be found in the nature
- and ongoings within the social circles 'Jake' has been moving in the
- past years in Berlin, that ‘poor but sexy’ capital which had
- overtaken Amsterdam as the place to be if you are young, worldly,
- engaged - and poor and sexy. From the early 2000's the city had
- become an international magnet to all sorts of creative people and
- voluntary organisations, eager to contribute to the “an other world
- is possible” idea. Berlin has obvious ‘locational’ advantages
- in terms of situation in the geographical and political centre of
- Europe and because of its convenience in terms of affordable housing,
- cheap food, and a dynamic cultural life (with a frothy night scene to
- boot). But it is also the political climate and constitutional set-up
- of Germany that had made Berlin a place of choice for ‘technological
- refugees’, mostly from the USA, and thanks to its thriving IT scene,
- also a hotbed of digital political activism.
- Yet at the same time it should be noted that these circles are not
- that large - in the low hundreds in terms of number of members –
- and that they are more close-knit and culturally, demographically,
- and socially homogeneous than is normally the case in the larger
- society. In short, young (20/30-ish), single, english speaking, sort
- of full time artists/activists in one way or another. Add to this
- the pressure of operating against, and hence enduring the special
- attention cum repression from the Surveillance Empire, which makes it
- easy to imagine a situation where one is living permanently at the
- edge, with all its accompanying features like red eye nights, sexual
- promiscuity, alcohol and substance (ab)use, and what have you. A
- perfect setting for a scenario whose script can easily veer into all
- kinds of, err, ‘configurations’ ...
- On the organisations Jake works or has worked for
- Following on the factual demise of parliamentary political parties,
- trade unions, and of the ‘quality’ press as avenues of criticism
- and influencing the governance process, the 'NGO-isation of advocacy
- and of politics at large has led to the rise of a large number of
- voluntary initiatives, whose common characteristics - for the majority
- of them - appears to be small in size, and to be run by far too few
- underpaid (or not paid at all) people chasing far too many issues at
- the same time. This often results in near-mandatory commitment to a
- 24/7 work schedule, with its concomitant risks of stress, burnout,
- wayward behaviour, etc. This is especially the case with those
- outfits focusing on the variegated and nefarious manifestations of
- the 'deep state' (see below), and then more particularly in the realm
- of surveillance and repression. It is clear that such organisations
- and their personnel are themselves 'targets', not to say fair game,
- for the aforementioned deep state's agencies and services, and this
- equally on a 24/7 footing. Another aspect is that such outfits,
- despite their small size, 'enjoy' an inordinately large, and usually
- sensationalist media coverage every time they manage to uncover yet
- another 'scandal', enhancing at the same time their popularity among
- some sections of the public (academics, activists, 'progressive'
- people). This all makes for a very heady atmosphere, difficult both to
- avoid and to resist. And this has been Jake's 'natural biotope' for
- quite a number of years past.
- Their good work in exposing states' misbehaviour, and even crimes
- notwithstanding, such organisations have their dark sides also. Their
- small size results in a very limited number of people, or even a
- single person (as in a SPO, Single Person Organisation) acting without
- very much of an oversight, if at all. To this. organisations involved
- in the more 'sensitive' aspects of politics add an extra, justifiable
- but nonetheless secretive, opaque layer to their activities. Which
- in turn often leads to a permanent state of paranoia, a tunnel
- vision due to over-focussing on the outfit's specific issues (at
- the expense of looking at the world at large - or at life itself),
- and generally a form of dogmatism in both their internal and their
- external functioning. It had also as reverse a clear tendency to
- delusion of grandeur, exaggerating the importance and the impact of
- both the group(s) and the issues at stake among the general public.
- And then, also the effects of cut-throat competition in the permanent
- hunt for funding and attention among such outfits should not be
- overlooked. Finally, both their rhetorics as they working practices
- are essentially not that far removed from the modus operandi of
- commercial (IT) start-ups, with whom they appear to share (almost)
- the same recruitment demographics: young, bright, dynamic, hip - and
- single.
- The unhappy conclusion is that such organisations are always at risk,
- in the end, to veer towards becoming ineffective at best, and morally
- bankrupt at worst. Looking, for instance, at the recent management and
- political decision-making processes at the TOR foundation triggered by
- '#jakegate' don't make one overly optimistic.
- On the wider (and bad) world of big government, big corporation, and
- their oppressive practices of surveillance and control.
- First, I think we need to realize that, in society at large, the
- number of people truly concerned, and actively engaging, with the
- above issue is incredibly tiny (and shockingly so, even if it is
- slowly growing). To most citizens, this is a 'far-from-my-bed-show',
- and one they feel utterly powerless about at the same time. Activists
- and their organisations sometimes achieve a big media breakthrough and
- subsequent, but ephemeral, hype (Wikileaks, Snowden), but most of the
- time, awareness, concern, and hence political consequences remain at
- a low level, which might in part explain why measures progressively
- regulating and restraining citizen's rights and liberties end up so
- smoothly in the statute books.
- But near-zero awareness is surely not what can be ascribed to the
- corporate intelligence contractors banding together with secretive
- government agencies, a complex best represented by the concept
- of 'deep state'(*). While the former 'partners' are primarily
- concerned with protecting and extending their business interests
- - which includes supporting, or at least not opposing, the most
- outlandish repressive measures by the state agencies when it suits
- them, the latter, on the other hand, will go in the end for outright
- elimination, physical if necessary, of their opponents and critics, be
- it individual or groups. These are the forces groups and organisations
- 'Jake' works(/ed) for are confronting - making them clear targets.
- How precisely and to what extent is difficult to ascertain - beyond
- at points of obvious contact, in the form of protracted harassment at
- border crossings for instance. This gives rise to speculations fast
- drifting into conspiracy theories - something that is not entirely to
- the displeasure of aforementioned agencies. I neither wish nor can say
- very much more about this, save than to presume that the situation is
- both pretty much calamitous and also not amenable to any (re)solution.
- Resistance may be the answer to what has probably become the essential
- constitutional issue of our times, but I am afraid not to see a
- positive outcome evolving unless it mutates into a real law and order
- problem for the powers that be. And this is in my view exactly the
- point where the above mentioned organisations and their associates,
- supporters, and techie-activists fail to enact the effective mix of
- political strategy, street-level tactics, and technological fixes,
- usually by prioritizing the last option at the expense of the two
- others.
- In conclusion
- As could be read, I have not at all addressed the question of Jacob
- Appelbaum's (very?) possible culpability in the matter of sexual
- harassment and uncivil/a-social behaviour - the mainstay of the
- #jakegate brouhaha. This is on purpose, since all evidence, as evinced
- in various interventions by equally various parties, point, to use
- Facebook's inimitable phrase, towards a 'it's complicated' verdict.
- Nonetheless, what I think is more important at this stage, also in
- view of the above mentioned evidence, or alleged lack thereof, is the
- conclusions the groups and organisations involved, as well as 'Jake'
- himself will draw for the future, and how his personal situation
- will evolve as a consequence. Now that he has been expelled from
- pretty much all the outfits he was associated with (Wikilekas appear
- to be an exception, for reasons that may - or may not - be easily
- guessed) the question is one of what 'Jake' is going to do next.
- For better or for worse, what has happened is beyond recall. With
- his 'rockstar' status clearly revoked - a good thing - I believe
- it is important for 'Jake' to start afresh and find sustainable
- footing in a much more modest and withdrawn role, something that is
- also the responsibility of his (former) 'Umfeld to make possible,
- or at the very least not to try to thwart it in a senseless pursuit
- of revenge. I am thinking of his pursuance of a Phd at Eindhoven
- Technical University, something that could constitute a perfect
- opportunity for retreat and 'reconfiguration'.
- To people who feel they have been to have been aggrieved by 'Jake'
- one way or another, and they might have good reasons to feel so,
- I would suggest that some 'truth and atonement' get together be
- organised, say in one year from now. In the end, whatever the way one
- wishes to describe those concerned by or involved in '#jakegate' in
- terms of a community (and that might also include some people in the
- nettime readership), then that 'we' must strive, immo, to overcome the
- conflict by learning its lessons ("no more rockstars" would be a good
- starter), and not repeat the same mistakes, neither at the individual,
- nor at the collective level.
- ------
- (*) A good exposition is Mike Lofgren: Anatomy of the Deep State (2014)
- (http://billmoyers.com/2014/02/21/anatomy-of-the-deep-state/)
- Patrice Riemens
- Amsterdam, October 7, 2016
- NB (but see the other NB at the head of this post)
- I started writing this story in Transylvania, 3 weeks ago. I dropped
- it till now, but nothing appears to happened in between, just his
- (quite empty) home page at Eindhoven T.U seem to have moved a few
- ranks. In fact nothing (afaik) happened since the #jakegate blowup
- in May/June (Jake's last Tweet is dated June 6), save for a long
- interview in Die Zeit Digital mid-August:
- http://www.zeit.de/kultur/2016-08/jacob-appelbaum-rape-allegations-contradictions
- and
- http://www.zeit.de/kultur/2016-08/jacob-appelbaum-rape-sexual-abuse-allegations
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