66 quotes
Attention is not merely the ability to concentrate on a task. It is also a way of being in the world. There is a vast difference between task-oriented attention to a machine and mindful, loving awareness of another being.
Substack Newsletter - What’s Love got to do with Social Media? (2026)
The success of any freedom of information regime depends on two main factors: A tightly drawn law with a clear statement of intent that makes clear statement of intent that makes clear a presumption of openness, and a bold regulator who is tough and not afraid to exert his authority and challenge government interests.
By making everything secure [governments] have degraded the quality of secrecy.
Attributed
It is scrutiny by the general public that keeps the powerful honest.
Attributed
I get it. It is always easier to go after the person raising a problem than to deal with the problem itself, especially if that problem is systemic.
Attributed
The survival of journalism in the digital age rests on its unique selling point: serving this public interest. Fail or forget to do that, and it has no future.
Attributed
The movement of radical transparency and accountability is not about putting a new person in charge, it’s about getting rid of the whole idea of hierarchal politics. It’s about decentralizing power.
Attributed
I want to put paid to this idea that if you've nothing to fear, you've nothing to hide.
Attributed Chatham House Talk (2011)
This is the information war we are now engaged in. Governments are seeking to militarise cyberspace while citizens fight for the right to communicate and assemble freely online without state surveillance.
Attributed
Knowing how public money is spent by public officials seemed the bare minimum for a functioning democracy.
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Secrecy, in the hands of the powerful, is too easy a tool to abuse. The distance from protection to cover-up is short, and a tool initially intended to help can quickly morph into causing harm. That’s why it should never be a default for anyone in power, but rather an exception.
Attributed
We need to codify our values and build consensus around what we want from a free society and a free internet. We need to put into law protections for our privacy and our right to speak and assemble.
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What I call the ‘information war’, where through the control of information our society is being radically transformed.
Attributed Chatham House Talk (2011)
Even when transparency reveals uncomfortable truths, it is still the better path. Problems don’t disappear when buried - they deepen.
Attributed
The first thing is that you’re always at a disadvantage, because a bureaucracy is funded by the public to have permanent people there who can relentlessly advocate for their own interest. And that’s the problem: when bureaucracy stops working for the public interest.
Attributed
It was that whole Wizard of Oz moment. We all look at these politicians – oh wow, they're so powerful - and then it was the little dog pulling the curtain away.
Attributed
There doesn’t seem to be any law that’s there to protect the citizens from massive State surveillance. We have to collectively come up with some fundamental values around people’s right to privacy, the right to be left alone from government, and rights to free speech.
Attributed
This is the problem with the argument that if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear: it ignores the issue of power. If we are not careful, transparency can be used to increase, rather than reduce, the information asymmetry between ruler and ruled.
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Journalists are, or ought to be, the public's hired guns sent out to collect information, question it, verify it and distil it to what is important and true. This takes time and skill, and is the only thing a journalist does that marks him or her out as a professional. It's also the reason why anyone would choose well-known newspaper's website over an unknown blog.
Attributed
To be successful, a campaign to maintain the free internet and freedom of information has to go beyond vandal hackers. Stunts designed not to provoke dialogue or persuade the public of the rightness of the cause but simply to throw up a middle finger to authority are more hindrance than help.
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