Assange Has Signed Book Deals Worth $1.5 Million+ 452
cold fjord writes "Julian Assange has signed a major book deal for his autobiography worth more than one million pounds (1.2 million euros, 1.5 million dollars).
Assange told Britain's Sunday Times newspaper that the money would help him defend himself against allegations of sexual assault made by two women in Sweden.
'I don't want to write this book, but I have to,' he said. 'I have already spent 200,000 pounds for legal costs and I need to defend myself and to keep WikiLeaks afloat.' The Australian said he would receive 800,000 dollars (600,000 euros) from Alfred A. Knopf, his American publisher, and a British deal with Canongate is worth 325,000 pounds (380,000 euros, 500,000 dollars).
Money from other markets and serialisation is expected to raise the total to 1.1 million pounds, he said.
Assange is currently out on £240,000 bail under what his lawyer refers to as not so much 'house arrest' as 'manor arrest', fighting extradition to Sweden for questioning. The Telegraph adds, 'Mr Assange said he regarded himself as a victim of Left-wing radicalism. Sweden is the Saudi Arabia of feminism,' he said. 'I fell into a hornets' nest of revolutionary feminism.' .... A full extradition hearing is due in London on February 7th."
Mr Assange? Say hello to... (Score:1, Insightful)
...Uncle Sam's undercover female spy/setup network, you've been had.
Of course announcing your "deals" for books and whatever wasn't a bright move neither, Uncle Sam will be busy going after that next.
Clearly you don't play chess much.
Re:Without specifics, I think we should be wary... (Score:5, Insightful)
Innocent until proven guilty.
All we know is that a controversial figure is being charged with "sex by surprise" after being accused by two women who didn't decide to report him until after they met each other. Even then, charges were filed, then dropped, then filed again.
He may be guilty, but I don't see any evidence. If this is all they can put in front of the jury, he should be found not guilty.
Re:Without specifics, I think we should be wary... (Score:2, Insightful)
Even if he is guilty does that matter? The guy has an ego but is that really surprising? To openly defy the biggest bully on the planet you need to be a bit crazy/weird/different.
I don't care about his sexual exploits as long as it doesn't stop the great work that Wikileaks is doing.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:1.2 million euro (Score:4, Insightful)
No-one cares. The point was communicated, that's what counts. Language is a fluid thing -- despite the futile attempts by those from Dr Johnson onwards to bend it into conformity. It's arbitrary, and artificial. Bending and breaking words to suit worked for Shakespeare. Conformity is the enemy of creativity.
Grammar nazis may wish to live in a sterile world -- but most of us don't. Give it a rest.
Re:Rape allegations (Score:5, Insightful)
Please don't let your admiration for Assange's work with Wikileaks prevent you from taking seriously an accusation of rape. Rape is a serious crime, and accusations of rape need to be taken seriously, even ifperhaps especially ifthey are made against people we otherwise consider to be heroic.
Look, I know that in this day and age we are not supposed to say it, but a line does have to be drawn somewhere when it comes to defining rape. If the women claimed that they had been drugged, or that they never consented to have sex with Assange, I would be a bit more willing to hear their claims of rape. However, both women did consent, but are claiming that Assange went "too far" and failed to stop on command -- continuing to have sex with a broken condom, having sex while one of them was asleep, etc. If we start to call these things rape, then a lot of people out there are going to be implicated, including an ex-girlfriend of mine (to be clear, I would not even consider accusing her of raping me).
Either "rape" means violence, or it does not. I agree with the Huffington Post piece quoted in that blog post you linked to: we should not conflate what Assange did the sort of violent crime that most people think of when they think "rape." The last thing we need is for "rape" to refer to things that are so commonplace that people forget that there are truly dangerous rapists out there.
Re:Rape allegations (Score:5, Insightful)
The rape allegations are true and Assange should be held to account.
The problem is that people keep using that word - "Rape". It has an enormous number of negative connotations. Read the link you provided at kateharding.info - how many times does she use the "R" word? Rape, rape rape... From what we know of the Assange case, the women who he is accused of "raping" both continued to see him afterwards. One took him out for breakfast the next day, and paid for his train ticket back into Stockholm. Another arranged a party for him the next day, during which she twittered "Sitting outside; nearly freezing; with the world's coolest people; it's pretty amazing." These are not the actions of women who have been raped - at least, not in the sense of what the majority of people consider the word "rape" to mean. Calling whatever supposedly happened between Assange and these women "rape" diminishes the word, and is grossly offensive to both men and women who have genuinely been the victims of forced sexual intercourse.
Re:Without specifics, I think we should be wary... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Rape allegations (Score:4, Insightful)
What an amazing turn of words. To say that circumstances around claims and actions by those making the accusations are merely "tactics used to discredit rape victims everyday" is abhorrent. That's a shameless attempt to equate it to saying "she was probably asking for it". The truth is that those "tactics" are used to discredit all sorts of accusations about everything all the time. If you don't take these things into consideration when judging the validity of an accusation, then what the fuck else *is* there?
It's a horrible and sickening crime and that's why the accused should always be given full benefit of doubt and investigation of validity of such weighty claims must be thorough and unquestionable.
Merely googling phrases like "woman admits false rape claim" produce more than enough news articles for me to justify never merely accepting an accusation without intense scrutiny and certainly never believing the accused is guilty until proven well beyond any doubt. Of course, we protect accusers in this country, without affording the same right to the accused -- and their life is ruined forever after merely by the accusation, even if it is found to be false.
Remember the beginning of this year, when two women accused a man of rape . . . because they said the consensual sex wasn't very good?
The delicious irony of it all (Score:2, Insightful)
That can buy him a lot prison commissary and some over priced phone calls.
Unless the money is guaranteed, maybe not, since his biggest fans are the very ones most likely to steal... ahem, "share" the Kindle version.
Re:Rape allegations (Score:4, Insightful)
In addition, the circumstances surrounding the allegations, as well as certain actions by the women who made them, have been used to discredit those women. But these are, as Kate Harding puts it, "tactics used to discredit rape victims every day, and not Really Convincing Special Facts About This Particular Case."
In a case with no physical evidence, the only defense is to try to discredit the witness! Yes, the guilty do this, but so must the innocent. To exclude the only possible defense--as the law often requires--means that justice is impossible. No wonder many dismiss the legal process in these cases outright.
The real problem is that a crime that produces no evidence and makes no impression on reality should not be such a serious matter. With less at stake the guilty can admit their wrong and accept a minor punishment; and the innocent need not be destroyed by the allegation itself.
Re:Rape allegations (Score:2, Insightful)
From what I've read this seems to boil down to a he said she said case from two women that discovered they were sleeping with the same man. Rape is a serious charge and should be only upheld with serious evidence there is far to much ambiguity from my perspective with these cases. The filing charges and dropping them and refiling seems fishy I wonder if Sweden has a filing false reports law or similar they could have used to compel these women to stick to there version of events? Further extradition for questioning? Sorry this just smacks of overreaching and punitive they are free to contact his lawyer and get a no response to any questions they might have there is no need to extradite him, charge him or drop it.
Re:Rape allegations (Score:2, Insightful)
Rape doesn't mean violence
If "rape" does not mean "violence," then we should not throw rapists in prison. Are you arguing that rapists should be free to walk around, because they are not violent criminals?
Are you arguing that once a woman gives consent, she's no longer allowed to change her mind?
Are you trying to say that one women can be raped? What if a man changes his mind about having sex?
My original point can be summarized as this: Assange did things that a lot of people do, and that few people would call "rape" or would even consider to be criminal. If you are going to say that what Assange did is "rape," then there are a lot of rapists out there, far more than anyone should be comfortable with. Like I said, a line has to be drawn somewhere, and in my opinion, we are being far too liberal with the use of the word "rape" when it comes to Assange's actions.
Re:Rape allegations (Score:1, Insightful)
Insane feminist double-think.
It's right up to the point that any "evidence" in court other than say-so becomes meaningless. Basically... if you've got your cock in her and spooged, and then she changes her mind... what fucking meaning does a rape charge have? It's an accusation that can (and does, frequently) ruin a man's life out of spite and revenge... and all because people like you want to count angels dancing on the head of a pin.
Re:Without specifics, I think we should be wary... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Without specifics, I think we should be wary... (Score:0, Insightful)
In an attempt to explain the only possible reason soldiers might kill someone in a war zone, "Killing people is fun." - Julian Assange [youtube.com]
You will not find a credible mental health professional who agrees with his assessment. That's a really fucking scary view into his psyche. His own admission is that video games are fun. He likes video games. Killing people is like playing a video game. Therefore, "Killing people is fun." At best, he's a sociopath.
Re:Without specifics, I think we should be wary... (Score:5, Insightful)
> Your advice comes down to: avoid pre-marital sex
Fuck you. My guess is either you are a born again Christian or the kind of guy who can't get laid anyway so pretends its about a moral 'high ground' rather than admitting to being a loser.
I really think people should avoid pre-sexual marriage. If people got laid enough before choosing a life partner there would be fewer divorces and fucked-up children around, the world would be a better place.
Re:Without specifics, I think we should be wary... (Score:5, Insightful)
If your wanted for rape and they know your location the same thing would happen to you or me.
I can guarantee that if it happened to "you or me", neither of us would have made it to Interpol's most wanted list, nor had to produce a quarter-million-quid's worth of bail in the face of a complete lack of evidence, or even formal charges. Unless there's something about you you're not telling ?
That's is the kind of thing that happens to violent serial offenders with a long history of crimes and victims, not people accused for the first time of - and not even by the victim, but the state - relatively low-grade sexual assault.
he can't stop talking to the media so it was simple to actually find him. If they know of your location it is easier to find you.
He didn't need to be "found" because he wasn't trying to be "lost". He co-operated fully with the Swedish authorities before - with their permission - leaving Sweden and then fully with the UK authorities when there was actually cause to do so.
My personal favorite part was when the guardian published (leaked) the police reports from the ladies on Julian, and Julian and his lawyers cried foul as leaking private information about a private case like that is wrong.
And it is.
Testimony in a ongoing legal proceeding against a private individual is a completely different ballgame to historical record of Government dealings. If you cannot figure that out, you shouldn't be commenting.