Wikileaks Founder to Host New Television Series

[Keith Millea]

Published on Tuesday, January 24, 2012 by Common Dreams

Wikileaks Founder to Host New Television Series

10-part series on iconoclasts, visionaries, power insiders, and 'the world tomorrow'

- Common Dreams staff

Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange, has announced plans for a new television series. The program will launch mid-March and will include ten weekly half-hour episodes featuring "in-depth conversations with key political players, thinkers and revolutionaries from around the world"

Should things go accordingly for Assange, the show will "explore the possibilities for our future in conversations with those who are shaping it. Are we heading towards utopia, or dystopia and how we can set our paths? This is an exciting opportunity to discuss the vision of my guests in a new style of show that examines their philosophies and struggles in a deeper and clearer way than has been done before," Assange states.

The theme of the show will be "the world tomorrow". The Wikileaks press release adds:
Upheavals and revolutions in the Middle East have commenced an era of political change that is still unfolding. In the West, the deterioration of the rule of law has demonstrated the bankruptcy of once leading political institutions and ideologies. The internet has never been so strong, or so much under attack.

At this pivotal moment there is an awareness of the need to radically rethink the world around us.

WikiLeaks, as the world's boldest publisher, has been at the front line of this global movement for understanding and change. Its founder, Julian Assange, as the subject of an ongoing Grand Jury investigation in the United States for over 500 days now, is one of the world's most recognizable revolutionary figures.

Both a pioneer for a more just world and a victim of political repression, he is uniquely placed to catalyse a global discussion on how to go forward.

In recognition of this, Assange will draw together controversial voices from across the political spectrum - iconoclasts, visionaries and power insiders - each to offer a window on the world tomorrow and their ideas on how to secure a brighter future.

Assange is planning to host the show, although it is uncertain whether or not he will actually be around for this. The state of his pending court decision -- potential extradition to Sweden to face allegations of sexual assault -- remains unknown until February 1st.

AFP reports:
WikiLeaks enraged the US government by releasing tens of thousands of confidential documents about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and then by dumping files revealing the thoughts of US diplomats on world leaders.

Mr Assange has been detained under a European arrest warrant by Swedish prosecutors over allegations that he sexually assaulted two women during a visit to Sweden in August 2010.
He denies the claims and is awaiting a hearing next week at London's supreme court for his appeal against extradition to Sweden.

Assange recently stated in an interview with Rolling Stone:
There's been an observation of how the rest of the world was choosing to make my myth, positively and negatively. That process has been fascinating, horrifying and comical all at the same time. It's caused many laughs from the people who know me well, a subject of great mirth in the team. We're dealing with a situation where we're engaged in a historic endeavor that has very serious consequences for people's lives and political systems. [...]

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/01/24-3

[Peter Lemkin]

Interesting, Very Interesting. I must admit - a surprise! If the US has its way he'll be in some secret prison under NDAA, if still breathing at all.

[Jan Klimkowski]

Television is expensive to make.

Air time is hard to secure.

Who's paying for this series?

Who is broadcasting it?

Or is it simply talking head Assange interviews talking head "visionary" on a cheap set to be disseminated free of charge via the interweb thingy?

[Peter Lemkin]

Jan, All yet undisclosed or unknown - Will explore more tomorrow on Wikileaks site itself. But for now...

The release didn't specify what networks will carry Assange's show, but it promised that it would be on-air by mid-March.
The AP spoke to Ellis Cashmore, an expert on celebrity culture at England's Staffordshire University, who wasn't too keen on endorsing Assange's TV skills.
"Assange has got a good, deep voice and agreeable Aussie accent, but he's a slow, deliberate talker and not especially televisual," Cashmore told the AP. "To be true to his image, he would have to make his proposed show subversive; and that might not appeal to many would-be guests."
The Guardian has started a list of politicians and celebrities they'd like to see spar with Assange. Among them: Tony Blair, Hillary Clinton and Rupert Murdoch.

That crud from the MSM. I don't think Assange would step in the same room with the above named - nor would they step into a room with Assange. But stranger things HAVE HAPPENED!

[Peter Lemkin]

New Assange TV Series

23 January 2012, 23:00 GMT

Julian Assange will be hosting a series of in-depth conversations with key political players, thinkers and revolutionaries from around the world. The theme: the world tomorrow.

Upheavals and revolutions in the Middle East have commenced an era of political change that is still unfolding. In the West, the deterioration of the rule of law has demonstrated the bankruptcy of once leading political institutions and ideologies. The internet has never been so strong, or so much under attack.

At this pivotal moment there is an awareness of the need to radically rethink the world around us.

WikiLeaks, as the world's boldest publisher, has been at the front line of this global movement for understanding and change. Its founder, Julian Assange, as the subject of an ongoing Grand Jury investigation in the United States for over 500 days now, is one of the world's most recognizable revolutionary figures.

Both a pioneer for a more just world and a victim of political repression, he is uniquely placed to catalyse a global discussion on how to go forward.

In recognition of this, Assange will draw together controversial voices from across the political spectrum - iconoclasts, visionaries and power insiders - each to offer a window on the world tomorrow and their ideas on how to secure a brighter future.

Julian Assange says: "Through this series I will explore the possibilities for our future in conversations with those who are shaping it. Are we heading towards utopia, or dystopia and how we can set our paths? This is an exciting opportunity to discuss the vision of my guests in a new style of show that examines their philosophies and struggles in a deeper and clearer way than has been done before."

The series will begin airing in mid-March, in ten weekly half-hour episodes. Initial licensing commitments cover over 600 million viewers across cable, satellite and terrestrial broadcast networks. To enquire about licensing the series for your region contact contact@quickrollproductions.com.

Press release authorized by Julian Assange

[Jan Klimkowski]

Here's part of the answer to my questions above.

I note that The Guardian, which initially published much of the wikileaks material, now frames the Assange series as essentially Russian anti-western propaganda and uses MSM's ultimate elite-sanctioned insult in describing Russia Today as having a record of broadcasting "conspiracy theory" material.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's TV show to be aired on Russian channel

State-run Russia Today buys rights to broadcast 10-part series of interviews with 'political players, thinkers and revolutionaries'
Miriam Elder in Moscow
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 25 January 2012 15.03 GMT


It's the television channel that has given voice to a thousand anti-western conspiracy theories, while avoiding criticism of the hand that feeds it. Now state-run Russia Today, the Kremlin's English-language propaganda arm, has forged an unlikely partnership with the self-proclaimed defender of truth and freedom Julian Assange.

One day after the WikiLeaks founder said he was launching a 10-part series of interviews with "key political players, thinkers and revolutionaries", Russia Today announced it had won exclusive first broadcast rights for the show, titled The World Tomorrow, and was due to begin airing the show in March.

"Our viewers are open to the discussions that will be presented through Julian's show on our channel," the channel's editor-in-chief, Kremlin loyalist Margarita Simonyan, said in a statement.

That may well be true, unless the guest comes from Russia. The channel, launched in December 2005 as part of a government campaign to boost Russia's lagging global influence, remains slavishly pro-Kremlin, revelling in the antics of Vladimir Putin and avoiding sensitive topics, such as the prime minister's rumoured wealth and his growing authoritarianism.

"Shame on you, Mr Assange!" Alexander Lebedev, the Russian owner of the Independent and London Evening Standard, wrote on his Twitter and Facebook accounts. "Hard to imagine [a] more miserable final[e] for [a] 'world order challenger' than employee of state-controlled 'Russia Today'."

It's doubtful that any Russian "revolutionaries" will make the show's guestlist. While Russia Today, or RT as it prefers to be known, has delved deep into protest movements around the world, with a particular focus on Occupy Wall Street, it has given cursory coverage to the upheavals that have shaken Russia in the wake of disputed parliamentary elections in December.

It has smeared some of the protest leaders, including Alexei Navalny, the opposition activist whose anti-corruption website has been likened to WikiLeaks.

An article on RT's website attempting to introduce Navalny to western viewers did so by simply comparing him to Emma West, whose racist rant on a London tram went viral in November, in a nod to the Russian activist's nationalist views.

Assange fits Russia Today's profile of giving airtime to views and experts it says are avoided by the mainstream media. But that strategy has meant giving voice to bloggers and self-proclaimed pundits who come appeared on air to proclaim that Freemasons were behind the revolution in Egypt or that repeated showings of the film Deer Hunter in Stockholm were a sign of Sweden being a US pawn.

The channel, like the Russian government, has been very supportive of Assange since his arrest for allegedly sexually assaulting two women in Sweden in August 2010. The interviews will be filmed at Ellingham Hall in Norfolk, where Assange has been under house arrest as he awaits a UK supreme court hearing on his extradition to Sweden. The names of the guests have not yet been disclosed.

[Peter Lemkin]

Hmmm...Interesting development. RT does some good work, as does Al Jazeera. Neither will say anything bad about their sponsoring government - and as long as you keep that in mind.......I don't see a big problem. They provide some balance to the Western MSM. They have their own blind-spots which must not be forgotten.

[Magda Hassan]

Those interested in licensing the Assange show for large audiences may email contact@quickrollproductions.com

[Keith Millea]

Published on Friday, April 13, 2012 by Common Dreams

Julian Assange TV Show to Premiere: 'Very Controversial' First Guest

'The World Tomorrow' aiming 'to get the maximum political impact possible'

- Common Dreams staff

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is promising more controversy in his highly anticipated television series "The World Tomorrow". The show premiers this coming Tuesday on RT.

Assange on set (Photo: RT)

The show will feature Assange in conversation with "iconoclasts, visionaries and power insiders."
"First of all, being under house arrest for so long, it's nice to have an occasional visitor and to learn more about the world. And given that the conversations we were having are quite interesting, why not film them and show other people what was going on," Assange stated. The show, "revealed sides of very interesting and important people that are not normally [sic] because they are not dealing with a standard interviewer, they are dealing with someone who is under house arrest, who has gone through political problems that they can sympathize with."

The first-episode will feature a 'particularly controversial guest' who's identity is yet to be revealed and premieres on the 500th day of the financial blockade on Wikileaks.

The show starts Tuesday, April 17, 3:30 pm Moscow time, 11:30 GMT, 7:30 am Eastern.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/04/13-1

[Peter Lemkin]

Well, I for one am looking forward to it, no matter who the guest is. While I think Assange/Wikileaks have made some false steps, I'm not of the belief they are a Trojan horse for any intel service. As someone said recently, it is not a problem we have something like Wikileaks; the problem is we don't have many more like Wikileaks!