Hi, so as all of yall know i have spent a lot of time lately arguing with people about Glenn Grennwald, Pierre Omidyar, Newco, and the problems surrounding it. Im gonna try to clarify my stance on this with this pastebin. I apologize in advance if this comes off as rambling as im not a writer and this is really my first attempt to lay out any position i have like this.
	First lets start with some facts. In 2011 14 Anonymous activists were arrested for their participation in "Operation avenge assange" which was launched in response to Paypal, Visa, and Mastercard's decision to stop processing payments because Wikileaks was publishing the documents leaked to them by Chelsea Manning. This operation consisted of a 2 hour DDoS attack on paypal.com which took down the website but never disrupted the paypal service. These 14 activists have spent the last 2 years fighting to stay out of prison and on Thursday accepted a plea deal that would keep the majority of them out of prison. Details of their plea agreement can be found elsewhere or if you have questions feel free to ask me later as this isnt really about the agreement. During their prosecution Paypal/Ebay have done everything they can to help put these 14 people in prison including claiming millions in damages though they filed no damages with the SEC. Pierre wrote a piece in HuffPo a couple days before the paypal14 were due in court instead of making said statement when he couldve affected the plea negoitations or likely the indictment its self. In this statement Pierre made comments like "the paypal14 harnessed the power of LOIC which gave them the power that usually only 6 million people have in the streets" and similar comments that basically painted the paypal14 as criminals who werent protesting his companies decision to cut off donations to wikileaks but rather set out to "hurt millions of customers" even though the paypal service was never interupted according to statements and filings by his own company. Now about the Wikileaks blockade. Paypal, which is owned by Pierre's company Ebay, cutoff donations to Wikileaks in 2010  at the request of the government because they were publishing the leaks that Chelsea Manning is currently serving 35 years in military prison for providing. At the time a paper owned by Pierre put out a statement "condemning" the blockade. This blockade led to many attempts to get around the blockade including the founding of the Freedom of the Press Foundation that Greenwald currently sits on the board of. Also as im sure most of yall know by this point, back in June Edward Snowden began leaking documents about NSA spying to the public through Glenn Greenwald. These documents detail the massive spying done by various govts around the world. Eventually Greenwald would go on to leave the Guardian, where he had done most of the reporting on the leaks, to create a new media venture called NewCo that is funded by Pierre Omidyar, who is the founder and current chairman of ebay.
	Now my problems with this media venture are numerous and im gonna attempt to lay them out as best i can. First theres Pierre's complicity in his companies prosecution of the Paypal14. Paypal has helped the government every step of the way try to put these 14 activists in prison. This man couldve at any point helped the defense of these activists by stepping up and making public statements, providing aid to their prosecution, etc. He didnt. Instead he waited till 2 days before they plead guilty to make a statement about the case and his statement basically said they were criminals. Anyone who thinks that this man couldnt have helped their defense is ignoring many statements made by the lawyers involved in the case, including the interview Stanley Cohen did with Alexa O'brian. This man had it within his power to help prevent a prison sentence for activsts and yet waited till the very last minute to make a statement even though he had been presented with chance after chance to do so. He has even blocked people  on twitter rather than respond to the valid questions they have raised. Second Pierre has basically acted like we are all ignorant and stated that the blockade of Wikileaks was lifted after a few months after it was enacted even though paypal never made a statement or informed them of this blockade being lifted. Pierre has basically helped strangle the competition and then invested in his own media venture. How this is acceptable to the community which proclaims to care about freedom of the press is beyond me. Pierre has also stated that anyone who helps publish leaked information should not only not publish said info but also should help catch the thief (heres the tweet https://twitter.com/pierre/status/2666071620) and this is the man who is now helping publish the snowden documents. This is troubling as he has basically said that anyone in his position should help put snowden in prison. Now everyone is saying that all money is tainted but should we really turn a blind eye to this situation? Should we really compromise our values because Greenwald says he needs 250 million bucks to publish these documents? Think about it. Could you report on these documents without 250 million? Greenwald has done a pretty good job of doing it without Pierre's money so far why does he need it now? Should we help a man profit off of the snowden leaks who was complicit in the prosecution of 14 activists who were protesting the attempted censorship of Chelsea Manning? Does Greenwald get a pass for willingly entering into this agreement because his reporting is important? How would yall feel if this was the Koch brothers investing in NewCo? This man is complicit in attempting to silence Chelsea Manning, prosecuting the paypal14, should we support him lining his pockets off of snowden too? Do we really want to become the community that ignores these crimes because this man has money? Isnt that kind of against everything we have stated we stood against the last few years? Please if my statements havent been convincing enough ask yourself how you really feel? Just like absolute power money corrupts completely. Do you really feel like the man who has helped silence Chelsea Manning and attempted to put the Paypal14 in prison is going to do whats right when it comes to edward snowden?