Re: RT interview?

Zack:

Yep, Ayla e-mailed again to let me know she was referring to the TNR
reporter. I spoke to her for a while and got her in touch with House
via his MIT e-mail address, so presumably they've spoken by now.

Very interested in this Occupy Data project, which I hadn't heard of
before. Apps and schematics that can help to harness/direct the
talents and energy of information activists are going to be a very
necessary part of whatever comes next, in my opinion, and so I'll do
anything I can do to support, promote, publicize, etc.

As for Rauhauser, I consider him to be more trouble than he's worth
and generally ignore him these days. To the extent that he has useful
information on something, it's certainly worth listening to him, but
he's a massive liability. The problem isn't that he's made too many
enemies, but rather that he's made too many enemies for the wrong
reasons - organizing Twitter trolling shit, making bizarre accusations
about people's involvement in this Weingergate stuff, and even
engaging in/promoting persona management, which I didn't know about
until recently, and which I strongly disapprove of. As for that
particular congressman and Neal's legal issues, I'd be wary of taking
Neal's claims about that at face value; certainly there has been
attention to Neal for a while now by a number of conservative bloggers
who are looking at his connection to Kimberlin, and it's public record
that a number of congressmen have learned about the SWATing issue and
all that, but there's zero reason to believe that the legal action
comes from on high as opposed to being the natural consequence of this
giant squabble between him and whoever else on one side and these
bloggers on the other. On the other hand, he does sometimes have
actual, verifiable information that's of use.

I'm actually still kind of unclear on what Project Vigilant is/was,
although Neal once told me some stuff about it . Personally, I'd be
disinclined to have anything put up on the wiki about it if the info
is hearsay or otherwise unverifiable, especially since our focus is on
contracting firms and specific capabilities - "cyber-industrial
complex" issues, basically - that we can reasonably expect journalists
to cover. Not sure who Chet is, or this keysersoze fellow on Twitter.
If you're asking my opinion, I'd just note that there a lot of people
out there who are worth the time and energy of working with and who
are less shady, so I'd suggest that you refrain from pursuing anything
involving Neal and instead focus on this Occupy Data thing and
anything else like that.

I've been doing a lot of thinking about the factors that have to come
into play for crowd-sourced activism to get results, and I'm entirely
convinced that organizational platforms which facilitate the actual
work of activism, and particularly that portion of activism which
involves compiling and disseminating information, is the aspect that's
most lacking and most needed. So to the extent that you can get a tool
created, I'd do everything possible to get it used.

On Fri, Jun 29, 2012 at 12:59 PM,  <auto37959964@hushmail.com> wrote:

Hey Barrett,

Thanks for getting in touch. It seems as though Eliza has gotten in contact with you. And as you may have discovered by now, this was for the New Republic (not RT). Eliza and I spent the day together at Brad's hearing on Monday -- she's basically looking at various communities of support and what motivates them. I suggested she try to reach you because I felt you could provide some good insight, and because frankly, I'm personally interested to hear what you have to say too.

While we're at it, I saw the other day you had mentioned something on twitter about new information re: HB Gary. If that info is out there anywhere, I'd be interested to hear more. Especially of course given their targeting of dhouse.

Along those lines, I just thought I'd give you the heads up (in case you weren't already aware) that someone from Project Vigiliant has been quietly in touch. I'm working with our new DC organizer Bailey / "Jack" Jeffers (do you know him? of him? he was recommended via ayla) to try to pull at the string here a little further. Any additional insights you might have on PV would be greatly appreciated. In return I'll promise that once we can get wiki2.echelon back online, I'll start working on a PV entry, adding info over time as I become better able to discuss what I know. Some potentially critical information was provided to me and one other person via Neal Rauhauser. I know he's a shady character with an incredibly ridiculous background, but I'm not entirely convinced his intentions are nefarious or that the info was bogus. He seems to have a bone to pick with Rep Mike Rogers (R - MI) chair of the House Intelligence Committee. I'm wondering if there is any overlap between
that committee and/or Rogers and WL issues. If there is, it would appear to be below the surface. And if so, it would help explain our confluence of interests. Apparently Rogers is behind some sort of legal action coming down against Neal. He announced to us at an Occupy Data meeting in DC on Tuesday evening that he's going into hiding "out west" after July 1. I'm also trying to figure out if Neal has any personal problems / friction w/ Chet. All I've really come across are some money issues that seem relatively insignificant in the larger scheme of things. Basically, I don't think he's the kind of person who would try to take down PV for purely noble reasons.

He intro'd me to his friend @keyserxsoze -- who seemed like a nice guy -- as a way to stay in touch. But of course I have no way of knowing whether and how to trust these types of characters.

In all likelihood I've probably just told you a bunch of things you already know, but hopefully some of this was helpful. I sincerely appreciate the research your team has been able to dig up -- it's been incredibly valuable. To the extent you can keep this information discreet, or at the very least, separated from me, that would also be helpful.

I would also be interested in brainstorming any sorts of new ideas with you, should they arise. One potential project that we're working on with Occupy Data is setting up a useful crowdsourcing tool, using the Document Cloud model, but adding additional functionality, and making it more readily available to activists / journalists etc. OWS techops is offering considerable server space to hold it. So at some point, we may be able to do some innovative work if, for example, we have some massive document that gets released that needs to be quickly scanned for relevant info by lots of people, etc. Will keep you posted.

Finally, if you ever have any needs with regards to press outreach, I'm more than happy to be of service.

All the best,

Zack Pesavento
202-713-6981

On Wednesday, June 27, 2012 at 1:45 AM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:


Hi-

Ayla, the person who runs the OpManning twitter account, sent me a
message earlier advising me to get in touch with you; she said that
you were giving an interview to RT tomorrow and that she thought
that
I was also scheduled to participate or something of the sort, but I
haven't heard anything from RT about this so I'm not sure what the
deal is, if she's mistaken or something, so figured I should ask
you
if you know anything about this. Either way, good luck with
everything.

--
Regards,

Barrett Brown
940-735-9748




-- 
Regards,

Barrett Brown
940-735-9748