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Suelette's Friend

Some may vaguely remember.

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EVERYWHERE (Rixstep) — He's sitting quietly at an embassy in London. Most people don't even think of him from day to day. But this Australian Huckleberry Finn has done more to open our world and to open our minds than anyone. Our world is different today, and it wouldn't be what it is today without the contribution he made.

Some people may vaguely remember the book 'Underground' put online by Suelette Dreyfuss. They may remember that cool opening with the 'WANK' worm perpetrated on NASA. Hopefully their funny bones were tickled!

 W O R M S    A G A I N S T    N U C L E A R    K I L L E R S
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\__  ____________  _____    ________    ____  ____   __  _____/
 \ \ \    /\    / /    / /\ \       | \ \  | |    | | / /    /
  \ \ \  /  \  / /    / /__\ \      | |\ \ | |    | |/ /    /
   \ \ \/ /\ \/ /    / ______ \     | | \ \| |    | |\ \   /
    \_\  /__\  /____/ /______\ \____| |__\ | |____| |_\ \_/
     \___________________________________________________/
      \                                                 /
       \    Your System Has Been Officially WANKed     /
        \_____________________________________________/

 You talk of times of peace for all, and then prepare for war.

They might remember the concluding chapters where the corruption in the Australian courts was exposed.

Most will not have remembered the name of Suelette's friend, the technical consultant on that book.

The name reemerged in 2010, a watershed year for humans on the planet. In the ultimate 1-2-3 punch, a scarcely known and mostly anonymous organisation known as WikiLeaks gave the world the horrific video Collateral Murder, then 75,000 documents on the US war in Afghanistan, and then hundreds of thousands of documents on the US war in Iraq.

Then, as a finishing touch, after having suffered the slings and arrows of the bullies exposed as liars, they splatted on the world hundreds of thousands of US diplomatic cables. The tyrants of the world were not only exposed as liars and murderers, they were now embarrassed.

It was fitting, it was sweet, and it was well deserved.

All through that autumn, those who spent time online learned about the new topology of the 'web' and 'civilisation'. They used WikiLeaks to get the truth, they used it to learn how to dig up the truth on their own, and they used 'social media' to share that truth with others. Rick Falkvinge's idea of 'lateral information sharing' became a reality.

Suelette's friend won every conceivable award that year, save the Nobel Peace Prize and TIME's POTY. People soon learned why he wasn't to get the NPP and why TIME would override public opinion to give theirs to - Mark Zuckerberg? And so they learned of the shadowed vested interests who were the enemies of the people.

There have been considerable scraps since then. People have seen incompetence replaced by outright evil. They've seen the pathological liar DDB and the calculated liars of the Guardian. They've seen the grovelers like Bill Keller. And they've learned that their world isn't that simple, and they've learned that they have to fight and persist to get the world they so desperately want.

But they know they're in the right place. They can see the finish line now. And that's a great step forward.

Suelette's friend's birthday is 3 July. That's a long way off. But he's got a lot to celebrate, and so do we. Perhaps we should celebrate with him, and thank him for being so incredibly gutsy.