The last thing humanity needs is a bunch of angsty teenagers throwing a fit because their favorite website has to change providers. WikiLeaks violated their contract with Amazon. It is a BUSINESS matter. Get the fuck over it, pick up your toys and go to school.
I disagree. I don't think Wikileaks violated their contract. Amazon's response is here: http://aws.amazon.com/message/65348/ . Their arguments are
a) Wikileaks doesn't control the rights to the content. This is an interesting assertion. Wikileaks has as much control over the rights of the content as the New York Times did when it published the Pentagon Papers, i.e. they were publishing classified documents that were illegally obtained by a third party. However, the US Government couldn't stop the Times from publishing. This would lead to pretty strong case that they *do* have some control as to the rights of the content. The US Government certainly doesn't have a copyright over the diplomatic cables (they being produced by government officers or employees as part of their official duties are not eligible for copyright), and since Wikileaks was never under any agreement with the US Government regarding access to the cables, there is nothing stopping them from publishing, just like there was nothing stopping the Times from publishing. Yes, it was a crime for the documents to be exposed, but once exposed, there is nothing illegal about holding or distributing the documents. The documents are now public domain. To get technical, Amazon requires that you own or control all of the rights to the content you host. If they are arguing that Wikileaks doesn't own or control the content, it can only be because the content is public domain. Therefore, all public domain documents should be disallowed on Amazon AWS systems.
b) Wikileaks release of the documents could hurt people, because it is not possible for WIkileaks to have redacted the documents in such a way as to put people in jeopardy. They cite as evidence that some human rights organizations asked for Wikileaks to exercise caution in their releases. They ignore the fact that those same organizations also asked Wikileaks to continue doing what they are doing, regarding the documents. In neither of those cases are any actual specific cases where someone has been put in jeopardy cited. In fact, no cases have been reported where someone has been put in danger because of Wikileaks releases (excepting, of course, the death threats Julian Assange has received...). They are also making some pretty large leaps to say that people are being put in danger (remember, Wikileaks was booted because of the diplomatic cables, not the Afghanistan documents, which, by the way, are what those human rights organizations were referring to...Amazon is in fact using evidence from a completely separate situation and trying to pass it off as relevant...). The documents are government cables, meaning information like names and actions had to have been pretty well known to have made it as far as the people sending the cables. If they weren't known, then diplomats had to be in direct communication with the human rights activists, which leads to questions about whether they were activists or government operatives. Not that that changes much regarding whether they should be protected, but if they were operatives, it would seem that the government officials should have been protecting them even within the cables, so redaction shouldn't be that big of an issue.
Also if any content that could put people at risk should be banned, then do they ban chemistry books that explain explosives, or Dianetics (it's available on Amazon.com...)? Hell, Amazon.com sells "The Anarchist Cookbook" for goodness' sake! Search for it on Amazon and you get pages of books with bomb instructions, improvised weapon instructions, techniques to cause havoc, etc...
I simply can't take Amazon's argument seriously when it is so flimsy, if not downright fraudulent, and full of hypocrisy to begin with.
It is a business matter, but not because Wikileaks violated a TOS. It is a business matter because Amazon realized that, in a lot of other areas, remaining on Wikileaks' side here could have serious business repercussions... (remember: http://it.slashdot.org/story/10/12/11/1940252/Feds-To-Adopt-Cloud-First-IT-Policy)
And I know that's not your IP address. That's the FBI's address, according to the IRC friends I asked to look at my webserver logs.