Kiwiblog

Congrats to Trevor Mallard who won the 60 km bike race against Whale Oil by several kms at least. He’s just crossed the line. Trevor has done a very good job of downplaying expectations, and exceeding them on the day.

I did note earlier this month:

I’d have to say that Trevor would be considered the favourite and Cameron the underdog.

Trevor is basically a professional full-time cyclist, an amateur part-time blogger and an occasional MP. He did the 160 km Taupo cycle race in under 5 hours in 2009. Off memory he was in the top 5% of cyclists for his age group.

Cameron got on a bicycle around three months ago for the first time in 10+ years. Now Cameron has been training pretty hard, doing 20 km rides most days. But Trevor used to be able to do 20 kms in around half an hour. Whale does have a slight advantage with the course being local to him.

Now of course the big factor is Trevor’s bike crash and broken bones. If Trevor had not had his injury, it wouldn’t even be a contest. What we don’t know is to what extent Trevor is still injured. The crash was just over four and a half months ago which normally would be enough time to rebuild some of the leg muscles etc. And I suspect his overall level of fitness is still pretty good.

I was tempted to joke about what an achievement it is to beat a sickness beneficiary who hadn’t been on a bike for 10 years, until three months ago, but that would be unfair to Trevor who did have a pretty nasty injury to overcome. Full credit to him.

In one sense I think the race has been a win-win. It gave Trevor the motivation to get back on the bike seriously, and it gave Whale the motivation to get seriously into shape and be better both physically and mentally.

Anyway congrats to Trevor and Cameron, and I look forward to donating $1,000 to the CCS far more than I suspect Cactus will enjoy donating $1,000 to the Labour Party!

David Fisher in HoS:

In a year of mismatched and painful political races, tomorrow’s is likely to be the silliest.

The blogger known as Whaleoil will face off against the “bovver boy” of the Labour Party in a 60-kilometre bicycle race in Auckland’s eastern suburbs.

In a sport often called “chess on wheels”, the bike race between Cameron ‘Whaleoil’ Slater and Trevor ‘Duck’ Mallard will hear little mention of the word “mate’”.

There is mutual loathing.

That’s a little tough. More opponents than enemies.

The contest came after Slater goaded Mallard by calling him “cripple” over his badly broken leg.

The elder statesman of the Labour Party lashed back, calling the comfortably-padded Slater “blubber boy’”.

“I bet he is too chicken,” Mallard said.

Well, he did accept.

It is worth remembering that Trevor did challenge Whale and call him chicken. So Whale had little choice but to accept.

And Slater – known for obsessively hounding issues – has turned his compulsive nature to the race and cycled about 15kg off his frame.

Best thing Labour has ever done for Cameron.

Slater, who Mallard calls an “obsessive character”, is relentless.

“He is a cripple. And he’s running a crippled campaign.’”

Slater has been in training and, as his physical fitness improved, so did his mental health.

Slater had publicly struggled with depression, and credits getting off anti-depressants, good vitamin B levels and a good diet with the improvement.

I should see if Trevor would challenge me to a half marathon – could be just the motivation I need

Otago University zoologist Philip Seddon said whales in the wild would always be faster than ducks.

“Almost whatever kind of whale you thought about,” he says.

Seddon – who runs the university’s Wildlife Management Programme – said smaller whales were faster.

Slater’s time could, perhaps, dictate whether the blogger was truly small and dangerous.

“Maybe he’s an orca… a killer whale,” said Seddon.

I love how they went to a zoologist for a comment!

The race starts at 1.30pm tomorrow, at Musick Point reserve at Auckland’s Buckland Beach.

If you’re up in Auckland go along to view the fun!

Whale blogs that they have agreed terms.

On Friday Trevor Mallard got upset that Whale Oil had called him a cripple and challenged Whale to a bike race, saying Whale would be too chicken and if he accepted he would not have a chance.

Yesterday Whale accepted the challenge so long as he can get provided a bike and that there be a second sport of his choosing – preferably boxing or shooting.

Cactus Kate has also jumped in, and offered $1,000 prize money. It goes to Labour if Trevor wins and ACT if whale wins. Kate also challenged me to match her grand.

I’m not overly keen to donate to ACT or Labour, but have agreed to donate $1,000 to charity based on who wins.

My $1,000 donation is dependent on Whale and Trevor actually agreeing to details of the competition (such as whether it is one sport or two) and actually competing. No donation if one defaults and it doesn’t happen. I’d also insist on them agreeing on an independent Judge to determine the winner.

If Whale wins I will donate $1,000 to the Mental Health Foundation.

If Trevor wins I will donate $1,000 to the Crippled Children Society, now known as CCS.

Whale Oil blogs:

Trevor Mal­lard has issued a chal­lenge. As is usual for the crip­ple he has picked the one sport he is good at it (if you can all it a sport) and he has also picked on the wrong per­son for a challenge.

So Trevor, I accept your chal­lenge

Excellent, and this will give Trevor a real incentive to get back in shape.

Firstly, I need a bike, not just any bike the same bike you use. We have to race using exactly the same equip­ment. It is only fair. The only dif­fer­ence will be the rid­ers. A Crip­ple vs a Whale.

Sec­ondly, the race will be on August 15 and I pick 60kms for the dis­tance, if you are going to go, go big.

I suspect there will be a large media contingent following the race.

Thirdly, since you picked a sport that you excel at, it is only fair that there be a counter-challenge and I choose box­ing. You men­tioned your “fear” of my exces­sive bulk. I cur­rently weigh 105kg. You stated in the com­ments on Red Alert that if I got train­ing then I would lose 30kg and you’re are prob­a­bly right, there­fore there should be no rea­son other than your cow­ardice for reject­ing a box­ing match 8 weeks after our cycle race.

I understand that the boxing match will be pay per view, and that all proceeds from the match would go towards helping the recovery in Christchurch.

The Labour Party Campaign Manager has come up with a genius way for Labour to win the election.

Trevor has challenged Whale Oil to a cycle race.

Now Whale does not have a cycle, and isn’t going to buy one just for Trevor, but I understand he does like the idea of a sporting challenge between him and Trevor. He has proposed two sports, and is willing to let Trevor choose his preferred one – shooting or boxing.

David Fisher in the HoS reports:

A prominent blogger is planning a book exposing philandering politicians to coincide with the election.

Blogger Cameron Slater plans to dish the dirt on male and female MPs from across the political spectrum.

He said he had kiss-and-tell stories from women who claimed to have had affairs with male politicians, including one who said she had slept with three past and present ministers.

Other sources included drivers and security staff.

“If you’re an MP and you’re partying, it’s game over,” said Slater. “The benchmark will be unethical behaviour.”

The book should be called the help keep the legal profession afloat

The SST reports:

Left wing union leader Matt McCarten has performed a triple flip flop over endorsing a candidate for Auckland Council’s Albany ward.

McCarten formed the website supercitypicks.co.nz to help voters select a left-leaning Auckland Council in the upcoming local body elections. …

But yesterday McCarten withdrew his support for Williams entirely.

“Originally I thought progressives should support Andrew Williams. But my leftist and even centrist mates gave me a biff on two fronts,” McCarten wrote.

“That he’s made his city a laughing stock and  he’s totally self absorbed and even his own allies have deserted him. The other reason is that he knows he had no chance to win as mayor and is deliberately drawing votes away from the only other candidate Len Brown who can beat John Banks.

“Privately he claims to support Brown, yet is helping Banks by not telling voters his real position. On that basis he’s a fraud and shouldn’t be supported by progressives.”

McCarten said Slater was “the only other candidate I know in that ward with any chance of winning”. He said the blogger was right of politics but “has a social conscience, does volunteer work and has a good brain”.

Yep that’s right, Matt McCarten did endorse Whale Oil for Council. And he called Andrew Williams a fraud.

One can only imagine the howls of outrage and anguish on the left. Matt’s own UNITE staff probably threatened to picket him. And so he flipped again:

However less than 24 hours later McCarten had withdrawn his support for Slater and replaced it with a new endorsement. “My progressive advisors tell me I should be supporting John Kirikiri as the best of the rest”.

Position No 3.

But, when Stuff called McCarten today to ask why he was making constant changes to his Albany ward endorsements he said he would be removing his tick for Kirikiri and reinstating Williams as the preferred contender.

“I hadn’t done my homework but I have now read all of the candidates’ policies and have decided Williams is the man for the job.”

He said Williams had been “an embarrassment with his behaviour” but had the best policies “and policies are how we should judge the candidates”.

I disagree with Matt. Policies are important. But so is judgement, temperment, and rationality.

Following his removal from McCarten’s endorsement list Williams let rip on Facebook about the well-known union leader.

“He should know better than to make such irresponsible statements about me a sitting mayor. I don’t even know the man, have never had a conversation with him, so it’s extraordinary that he would comment like that. But very telling that he initially endorsed that disturbed psycho nutter Cameron Slater then withdrew it.”

When Williams does rants like that, the term “disturbed psycho nutter” seems like a form of projection.

Wonders never cease. North Shore Mayor Andrew Williams has complained to the Police because he does not like what Cameron Slater says at public meetings. He has also asked the Returning Officer to remove Slater from the ballot, because it seems Cameron is mean to the poor Mayor.

Williams said Slater’s whole campaign was a form of the “stalking” he had endured for over a year.

“He stands up at a meeting and says ‘I will not urinate on a tree, I will not use a credit card in a Takapuna bar, I will not send drunken texts’.”

What makes the Mayor think they are references to him?

“What he has put in his candidate profile is harassment. His whole campaign is focussed on attacking me.”

Yes it is. Labour’s entire 2008 campaign was focussed on attacking John Key. But I don’t think John Key tried to get Helen Clark arrested or struck off the ballot.

Wiliams urged the electoral officer to strike off Slater as a candidate.

Nice to have a Mayor with such a fine regard for elections.

Police confirmed they had received a complaint against Slater but had undertaken not to make comment to the media.

Here are some good question to ask the Police.

1. How many times in the last month has Mayor Williams e-mailed the Police District Commander urging him to arrest Slater?
2. How many of these e-mails were sent after midnight?
3. How many micro-seconds did the Police spend deciding what to do?

I’m in Auckland this afternoon, and going to an Albany Meet the Candidates Meeting. With Williams and Whale both invited to speak, it should be great fun. Come along, if you are free.

It starts at 5 pm in the Dove Theatre at Kristin School (cnr of Rosedale Road and 360 Albany Highway), Albany.

The meeting will hear from mayoral candidates, Albany ward candidates and Upper Harbour board candidates.

Mayor Williams has been talking it up on my Facebook page:

Well, well, well. What happened to Cameron Slater tonight at the Albany Candidates meeting at Paremoremo village? He was a no show. Didn’t turn up. Maybe being that close to a prison was a bit too scarey for Slater, being a convicted criminal as he is now. Or perhaps his WINZ benefit doesn’t stretch as far as petrol al…l the way from Howick to Paremoremo. Maybe he’ll have enough money for petrol to come to Albany tomorrow night. But then again???

Actually the answer quite simply was that Cameron wasn’t invited to speak at the Paremoremo meeting.

Incidentally I checked the timing, and looks like the Facebook post was made just after midnight – the traditional time for e-mails and texts from the Mayor – and now Facebook posts.

Have now had some time to go through the 70 page decision, which I blogged previously. There’s a lot of interesting issues there – some of which may affect other bloggers – and even the media.

This case is about whether or not a person behaved in a manner that breached the law and in doing so utilised some of the communications technologies associated with the Internet. It is not a case about whether or not the law should allow nonpublication orders. That debate must take place in another forum.

Such as blogs! The furore over Garrett is another example of the fading power to keep names suppressed. It seems that just because he admitted it in Parliament, doesn’t mean one can repeat what he said with immunity. But myself, along with every media outlet in NZ, decided the risk of prosecution was nil as it was the defendant himself who revealed what he had been charged with and got name suppression for.

And even if he had not, it was inevitable it would have ended up in the public domain, We saw this also in another recent case regard issues around a failed marriage of a political figure – the media never stated who it was, but made it very clear from heir reporting.

It is also to be noted that postings on a blog may come from a number of sources and usually include the administrator or supervisor of the blog site. However most administrators or supervisors of blog sites must hold some responsibility for the comments that are posted.

This is a warning that a blog owner can be held responsible for comments made on their blog. Unlikely to be held responsible if you are unaware of them, but if a comment is pointed out to a blog owner – and you refuse to edit or delete it – then you may face some liability.

This poses some dangers to blog owners. Let us say it is announced a politician got name suppression for urinating in public. Someone in General Debate might say “I reckon that is the sort of thing Simon Bridges would do”. Now as blog owner I have no idea who the politician is. If it turns out to be Simon Bridges, then I may be liable for the comment. If Crown Law contacts me and says you should take it down as it is Simon Bridges, then I’d take it down, but readers might then take that as proof it was him. And it means Crown Law have also spread the identity of the person with name suppression.

SO there may need to be some way blog owners can check out details of suppression orders, if they are to be liable for comments made on their sites. But do you allow all 200,000 blog owners to access some register of suppression orders? That may be self-defeating!

However the “conversation” differs from that which may take place over a cup of coffee or across a dinner table. The first difference is that the material that is posted upon the blog is posted primarily in the form of text.

Thus, unlike a conversation, the blog becomes a record which is preserved and available on the blog site until such time as it is removed by the person responsible for administering it.

And presumably this applies to Twitter and Facebook also.

Even if the blog were to be accessible by means of subscription
with a login and a password it could well in my view be subject to the same constraints.

At first I thought this was over-reach, but I then compared it to the Trans-Tasman newsletter which you need a login and password to access. If they broke a name suppression order, they would certainly be deemed a publication.

The Court has jurisdiction notwithstanding the fact that the server hosting Mr. Slater’s website is located in San Antonio Texas in the United States of America. This is because publication of information takes place where the material is downloaded and comprehended.

I don’t like this interpretation, as it effectively implies that if you publish material on the Internet, you are a publisher in every country on earth. This means I may have broken the laws of dozens of countries with my blog.

I believe that it should only be deemed to be published in the country in which the person responsible resides and or where the servers used reside. Otherwise you risk an Internet which ends up governed by the most repressive country.

Of course I can avoid travelling to certain countries, but I don’t want to travel to (for example) Indonesia and find myself arrested for something I said on my blog about Islam (for example).

In addition the evidence is that Mr Slater posted material to the Whaleoil site from New Zealand thus performing an act necessary for the commission of an offence pursuant to s. 7 of the Crimes Act 1961.

Cameron did not deny he uploaded the material. If the site was registered to someone not in NZ, and the uploading was done by someone not in NZ, then there would be little the legal system could do. Lance Wiggs blogs on ths point:

What if the author of the overseas site is unknown? What if the site is hosted in multiple places around the world? What if the site that received emails and published names was Wikileaks.org? What if there was a global site called NameSuppression.org, with a nz.NameSupression.Org sub-domain? The owners could be shadowy, the location ever in doubt and the publisher untouchable.

It can’t be long before this occurs, and then what shall we do in New Zealand? Block the site as the Australians tried to do with Wikileaks? Go after anyone that links to the site?

The issue of links is also interesting. Back to that later.

Constable Traviss also gave evidence of a “posting” on Mr Slater’s blog which is known by his “nom d’internet” of Whaleoil.

Heh I think we have a new legal term!

The internet allows everyone to be a publisher.

I do wish people would capitalise Internet.

Many bloggers prefer to differentiate themselves from mainstream media and rather than post what may be described as “hard news” prefer to post comment or articles that put a “spin” upon a particular story or alternatively offer an opinion (which may be of considerable strength and sometimes of pungent articulation).

Did Judge Harvey just call bloggers hot and spicy?

One feature however that differentiates a blog from say, a newspaper, is that a blog occupies a continuum of comment where a particular posting or item may start on one day but may continue and develop over a period of time. In many respects this continuum may have an impact upon the context of the publication or posting.

This is an interesting observation, as it meshes with something I had been reflecting on. Newspapers tend to always write stories to be read “stand alone”. So they will mention background context in every story. So even after their 20th story on David Garrett, they will re-state how he is an ACT MP elected in 2008 etc.

Blogs tends to assume that readers have read what they have said previously, and/or that they follow current affairs closely enough, that they don’t bother to supply all the background detail. This may be one reason why blogs are popular – you get to the meat of the issue.

But it does mean, as Judge Harvey stated, that blogs are more a continuum of comment, and posts can’t be treated as stand alone.

That comment seems to suggest that the effectiveness of an order made pursuant to s 140 is limited to publication in New Zealand. That is perfectly correct.

To suggest that a non-publication order pursuant to s 140 would have extra territorial effect is nonsense.

Of course such orders can not have extra-territorial effect, but in terms of futility, a publication on an overseas blog (or even newspaper) is just as capable of undermining the suppression order.

In the present case the availability of the material from a server located in San Antonio, Texas in the United States has little relevance. The evidence before me is that the material was able to be read and comprehended in New Zealand (thus constituting a publication) and the material was uploaded on the Whaleoil blog by Mr Slater present in New Zealand at the time.

What would be interesting is if Slater had a co-blogger who was based overseas. Would Slater as administrator be liable for what the co-blogger writes on a server is Texas? What if the co-blogger was the domain name registrant?

Judge Harvey himself gets into this:

But what of the person (A) who makes a suppressed name available to a person (B) beyond the jurisdiction, and B posts the name on a his or her blog or website in a country other than New Zealand? Without specifically deciding the point, according to the decision of Hammond J in Re X the communication between A in New Zealand and B overseas could fall within the concept of a private conversation between individuals and may therefore would not fall within the scope of s. 140(1).

This is not a definite ruling, but an interesting indication that merely telling someone overseas details of a suppression order might not be an offence. Even if it was, it would be incredibly hard to prove of course.

The fact that the information is available on the internet and accessible to people in New Zealand who may subscribe to the blog or know of the webpage does not present any element of novelty. In 2000 the day after the non-publication order was made in the Lewis Case, Mr. Lewis’ name was published in the Australian newspaper which, a couple of days later, was available in newspaper rooms in New Zealand and probably on the Australian website of the day.

A case Judge Harvey is well acquainted with.

While not relevant to the finding of fact in a particular case, it is relevant to our law makers when reviewing the law.

Following from that is the New Zealand based blogger who may embed a link to the off-shore blogsite which contains the suppressed name. One should be cautious in such circumstances that one does not become involved in “publishing” by way of hypertext link. In the case of Universal City Studios v Reimerdes and Corley, a Court made an order that the defendant’s website was prohibited from directly providing files which contained the DeCSS code which enabled the circumvention of copy protection algorithms on DVDs. When the defendants posted links on their websites to other sites that provided DeCSS either by way of direct download via the link or by means of an extra few websites, the Court held that utilising this device was a “distinction without a difference” to offering a direct download. I have no doubt this point or something like it will fall to be decided in this country in some future case.

This is the aspect that may have implications for bloggers and media. I raised this issue last year also at the R v Internet seminar. Consider a case where say Whale Oil again breaches a suppression order, and this is reported on by media and/or other blogs. In order of decreasing risk, you have possibilities:

1. You mention Whale has (allegedly) broken another suppression order provide a link through to the actual post which allegedly breaches a suppression order.
2. You mention Whale has (allegedly) broken another suppression order and provide a link through his blog, but not the actual post which allegedly breaches a suppression order.
3. You mention Whale has (allegedly) broken another suppression order and on your blogroll you have a link through to his blog.
4. You mention Whale has (allegedly) broken another suppression order and have no links to his site anywhere at all.
5. You mention a “notorious blogger” has (allegedly) broken another suppression order.

All of the above actions could lead to a large number of people finding out the name of a suppressed person.

(1) is something which to my mind does cross the line, and would be unwise to do. But how different is that to (2). If you provide a link to his blog, it will probably be on the front page and discoverable within seconds. So (2) may get you in trouble with the law also.

Then how about (3). The only difference between (2) and (3) is someone has to go from looking at the main body of your blog, to the sidebar with a blogroll, and click through to follow the link. (3) is not far from (2) and (2) is not far from (1).

So how about (4) and you provide no links at all, anywhere on your site. Well, 95% of people who do not know the URL of Whale Oil will go to Google, and his blog comes up first. Same thing if you search on his name only. So I am not sure (4) is very far removed from (3). This would mean that every media outlet that named Cameron or his blog, could be at some risk – especially if they have any links at all in their archives to his site.

But what if they don’t even mention his name, or his site’s name at all. Well even scenario (5) can lead to lots of people who will find out the identity of a suppressed name. You see in this example Whale Oil is so well know as the site which has breached previous orders, that there are probably 100,000+ people who upon reading in the newspaper “A controversial blogger has revealed the name of the /musician/politician/sportsman who did ….” that they will know exactly which site to go to to find out, and then of course tell all their friends.

So maybe the only way to stop it, is to have a law where it is illegal to even mentioned that a suppression order exists, let alone it has been breached. But that is draconian, and would not be accepted. So where do you draw the line?

Some of the charges have a name published under the heading “Interesting Name.” Mr Thwaite argues that this means nothing. Mr Burns responds by arguing that one must look at the context of that particular publication taking into account that further information is available on the blog site relating to the case involving the particular name which has been displayed in another place on the blog site.

Mr Burns argues that because the blog is in the nature of a continuum that it is clear to the reader that the name relates to another article on the site and it is merely a matter of marrying the two.

This brings up an interesting possibility. What if you never ever posted on the actual substantive story relating to a suppressed name, and just posted the name by itself?

Or you can find some other way to refer to the person with name suppression. The mainstream media do this quite often. In one story they report an entertainer has been granted name suppression, and in another they report that so and so has been dropped from TV. Will they get treated as a continuum  or only blogs?

Similarly with the pictogram. The information can be decoded in the same way that an aggregation of information may lead to the identification of a person by way of a process of elimination – another form of interpreting a particular code or solving a puzzle. The use of phonetically coded information (which is how the pictogram resolves the name) is not unknown to Mr. Slater. I venture to suggest that the words “Whaleoil Beef Hooked” on the “masthead” of his homepage provides an example.

Ha. I wonder how many times the Judge had to try it out loud with an Irish accent before he worked it out – it took me a few goes

Mr. Slater also maintains a certain amount of control over the content that is published. He was asked “You’ll just publish it anyway?” He replied “If I agree with it. I won’t publish something I don’t agree with” – an ironic answer in light of the freedom of expression argument which his counsel has advanced.

Not really ironic in my opinion. In the comments section, Cameron does allow contrary views to be posted all the time – in fact I’ve never known him to censor a comment. His comments were, I suspect, referring to what appears on the front page or main posts of Gotcha.

The evidence is also clear from some of the posts by Mr. Slater that his campaign was going to go beyond legitimate protest and criticism and was going to enter the realm of “electronic civil disobedience” by the publication of certain names that were the subject of non-publication orders.

I quite like that term “electronic civil disobedience”!

The judgement answers a number of questions about our name suppression laws and will I imagine be cited often in the future.

It does however leave unresolved potentially larger questions for the future – such as liability for linking, and whether communicating suppressed details to an overseas blogger would be an offence. Of course that is because those questions did not have to be answered in this particular case.

I look forward to seeing what changes to name suppression laws are proposed by the Government, in response to the Law Commission’s report.

iPredict have just launched two stocks on whether Cameron Slater or Andrew Williams will receive more votes in the Albany Ward, for the Auckland Council elections.

The Slater to win more votes stock is at 23c.

The Williams to win more votes stock is at 78c.

Will the incumbent Mayor actually get less votes than a rebel blogger? If you think you know the answer, there is money to be made.

Judge Harvey has found Cameron Slater guilty on nine of the ten charges relating to name supression. The judgement is here – Police v Slater. I’ll do a fuller post tonight or tomorrow analysing it n depth, and especially any implications for the wider blogosphere and media. It is pretty long for a district course case – 70 pages.

The fine is $750 per charge plus $130 costs, so total cost is $7,920.

There are some proposals from the Law Commission that are with the Government, which are worth implementing. One of them makes it harder for people to get name suppression, and the other will make it easier for media (and bloggers I hope) to access details of suppression orders so that you are less likely to accidentally breach a suppression order (as has happened to me on occassion).

I hope we do see some law changes in the near future. While I don’t endorse deliberately breaking the law, I do endorse the intent of the campaign – which is to to have a more open justice system.

UPDATE: Have also placed the pdf on Scribd, below:

Police v Slater

Cactus Kate has a brilliant idea:

I have previously endorsed Cameron Brewer as a candidate for the Auckland Supercity. I now add two more endorsements but only if you vote for them together. What the Supercity needs is checks and balances. There can be no greater check and balance for the incumbent candidate “Mayor” Andrew Williams than to elect in Albany, Cameron Slater aka Whaleoil.

What genius. Can you imagine it – Williams and the Whale having to sit around the same table for three years. Either they’ll become good mates (unlikely) or the Auckland Council will resemble live episodes of the Jerry Springer show. One could televise Council meetings on a pay per view channel.

Cactus also compares their vital stats:

Age: 51 v 41
Born: Hawkes Bay v Fiji
Weight: 110kgs with body paint, 95 without v fighting weight of 100kgs
Height: Scarcely taller than a parking meter v 5 foot 11
Drugs of choice: Alcohol and various prescription drugs v Melatonin and off depression meds
Mental State: Allegedly mad v certifiably mad
Education: Advanced Marketing Management Diploma from the International Marketing Institute of New Zealand v Whaleoil who hasn’t bothered making one up
Religion: Worships at the Gods of Caroma v Christian
Credit Card: Now only a personal one v no credit
Looks: Chubby preppy cheek v Angry Chopper Read
Spouse: Angry Jane v Angrier Spanish Bride
Work history: Diplomat to country where English is not a first language v IT and security
Drives: Black Nissan Maxima v Whaleoil Truck
Children: 24, 21 and 17 vs 14 and 12
Internet Presence: Hasn’t quite got used to it after 6 days blogging v Dominant
Supercity concept: Hates it v Loves it
Walking Style: wobbly lines utilising entire ratepayer resource of pavement v straight line won’t move for anyone
Favourite Attire: Custom fitted short man’s suit v Whaleoil t-shirt
Current employment: Bludging off the ratepayer v Campaigning to bludge off the ratepayer
Favourite Tipple: Anything on stock at GPK v Only when Cactus is in town
Favourite Hobbie: Gardening with his mate Little Andrew v Gardening on Spanish Bride’s orders with a chainsaw and round-up
Favourite MP: Winston Peters v Crusher Collins
Favourite restaurant: GPK v Daikoku looking down on GPK
Pet Hates: Cameron Slater v Winston Peters and Andrew Williams (those two really should have a drink together at GPK sometimes)
Nicknames: Clown/Cock of Campbells Bay, Mad Mayor v Whaleoil
Pets: Cute dog named Rimu v the Black Dog and David Farrar
Favourite Journalist: Late night calls with Jonathan Marshall v Jonathan Marshall……..Finally some common ground
PR/Media handling style: Combative v Combative
Weasel words: “Reducing rates – In the first year as Mayor we reduced the rates increase to 5.9%” v no weasel words
Pressure release: Late night abusive emails v All day abusive internet posts

Whether you’re from the right, the left or the centre – doesn’t the thought of Andrew Williams and Cameron Slater as fellow Albany Councillors for three years tempt you as proof there is karma?

Michele Hewitson interviews Cameron Slater for her weekly interview.  Some extracts:

spoke to him during the lunch break on Wednesday and, during that phone conversation, he said he thought the judge would reserve his judgment, which proved to be the case.

He then proceeded to say, mildly for him, rude things about the judge.

When we met on Thursday (he’d suggested we meet at the zoo, which was tempting but he would have enjoyed being photographed outside the monkey cage far too much) I asked whether it was clever to slag off a judge to a journalist.

He said: “He’s been rude to me!” But was being rude about him clever?

“Probably not. But then again, you know, do I trust … the justice system and that the judge will put aside personal feelings … ? Am I stupid? Probably.”

I’m quite sure the Judge will put aside personal feelings.

I asked if he was a bully and he said: “Yep. I admit that.” That’s not an attractive trait to admit to. “No, it’s not.” He says the drugs he was taking for his depression caused the “self-limiting mechanism” that most people have to “disappear”. …

He used to earn, he says, probably $150,000 a year and did so for years and now he’s on a sickness benefit and the family home has gone.

He is in a prolonged battle with his insurance company over a cancelled income protection policy.

He says he has been “a complete arsehole to live with” and “rude, abrupt, thoughtless, uncaring” to his wife.

He hasn’t been happy and hasn’t liked himself for years now. He is working on happiness and is now off the drugs he says his insurance company “made” him take and which he believes made him madder.

He said, perhaps hopefully, that he thinks the blog has become more temperate. “I’m not using nicknames and derogatory terms.” (He was still calling North Shore mayor Andrew Williams a “clown” last time I looked, but that’s almost affectionate for him.)

I’m not sure most people would term “corpse fiddler” temperate, but that was off-blog.

For Cameron, corpse fiddler is temperate!

The TV3 blog has the most details of the day’s proceedings. The Herald also carries an NZPA story.

But neither detail in full, what was probably the funniest exchange. The Police played their DVD of the interview with Whale, and it contained discussion of Whale’s depression, and medications.

Judge Harvey asked the defence lawyer whether he would like those parts of the DVD evidence suppressed. Mr Thwaite replied instantly that normally he would check with his client as to their wishes, but in this case he feels confident that he can answer forcefully that his client will not be seeking a suppression order

For those who are wondering, what happens next:

Judge Harvey says he does not intend to present a decision now. He proposes to remand Slater at large until 10am on September 14 when he will have his decision. Judge says he can make a finding on the no case issue and he can find there is no case to answer and the whole thing evaporates. Or he finds there is a case to answer, he can articulate that and he can give Mr Thwaite an opportunity to address the judge on liability. Or he can proceed to determine the no case argument, if there is a case to answer he can consider the elements have been proven beyond reasonable doubt.

So tune back on the 14th.

Tv3 have a live blog of proceedings at Whale Oil’s trial. Well not quite live, as Judge Harvey has placed a ten minute delay on tweeting and reporting, in case evidence has to be suppressed.

Judge Harvey is probably the Judge who is the most knowledgeable on Internet issues. I’m not sure if he volunteered for the trial, or was given it as punishment

Some extracts:

Judge Harvey describes Whale Oil’s blogs as like a shotgun blast, it hits the person and then other people he doesn’t want to hit.

Heh, not a bad analogy.

Mr Slater is sitting at the back of the courtroom; wearing his usual white long-sleeve shirt with dark blue sleeves. He is bearded, arms folded and watching the trial unfold with apparent nonchalance. He writes the occasional note on his hands but remains impassive.

Heh. I look forward to seeing the TV.

Ms Murray asks him about articles he posted about the Olympian. He says he wrote an article about celebrity name suppression and said he published some pictures to go with the article for ‘interests sake’. He says they were ‘interesting pictures’ and says people have had guesses at what they meant. He says ‘they could mean anything’. It was one image that contained four images. He says he doesn’t believe the Olympian should have name suppression because he is a ‘violent criminal’. He says he understood that no one was able to publish his name, age or occupation. He says he did not mention his occupation nor his age nor his name. He says he quoted from the NZ Herald and put up a random image – ‘you can take it anyway you want’.

The court judgement will be very interesting.

The Herald on Sunday had a story on Whale Oil today, and his wife was on TV3 news tonight. It’s difficult to see someone’s personal life and challenges laid so bare.

Cactus Kate has done a post on this, which says things so well, I’m going to do something I almost never ever do, and quote it in its entirety.

HoS appears to have been reading the sad plight of my mate and the mate of many bloggers, Whaleoil aka Cameron Slater.

Today is probably the most truthful article yet on Whaleoil because it was written with cut and pasted words from his wife and best mate aka Spanish Bride from his blog.

I’ve only known Cameron for a few years and all the time I have known him has been under the mantra of Whaleoil. Unlike SB, I have not known him as Cameron, before his spiral into depression.

I don’t know all the background of his fight with Fidelity and what led up to his depressive state, because I wasn’t there. SB was. She remarks that he was a different man before the events leading to his illness. I believe that now totally.

There is no one else I have ever met quite like Cameron as Whaleoil. His behaviour is outrageous. Friends compared notes and said that this is just him. It is not. What makes me astonished though with Fidelity’s conduct is that they do not seem to have at any stage lead him to get help. That is medical help and counselling for rehabilitation. It used to be humourous watching Whaleoil be outrageous. It is now not so fun anymore once everyone has worked out he has a genuine problem.

The answer with Doctors has always been to prescribe more bloody pills. Whaleoil is on more pills than patients at mental homes. I know this because unknown to him I checked his dosage on his pillpackets and asked someone I know who works at an actual mental hospital. He is sedated by a cocktail of these pills which leave him tired, moody and disconnected with the world. When I realised his dosage, I knew the seriousness of the black hole he had fallen into. He’s tried to come off the pills, that too has had bad consequences.

I hate pills as a solution for depression. They are not and they are over-prescribed. I hate watching all too many friends zombie around on them. They are not real people while sedated under the latest and greatest profit minded cure to make everyone “happy”. The underlying problem still remains and I can’t see any joy on being reliant on a pill to be happy, or even stable enough to get out of bed. It takes away the human nature of being happy and sad and managing both states.

Whaleoil does not think consequences, SB has highlighted that all too clearly. He will be fine sitting with you in a bar watching you drink (contrary to popular opinion he does not drink regularly and I’ve only seen him drunk once) then the slightest irritant across the bar and he will be talking about smacking another person’s head in. Change the topic and his attention away and he’s forgotten five minutes later of even being angry.

While medicated and unassisted emotionally with any form of therapy, he simply cannot work. The easiest question for doubters that he can be integrated into the workforce for a 40 hour week is this: would you want Whaleoil working in your office? Five minutes with him and any HR representative would instantly dismiss his job application. Fidelity’s treatment has turned an otherwise creative, intelligent mind into a zombie who now firmly believes he cannot work. At the moment I am on the side of stating that he cannot.

Whaleoil is a great friend because he cares about his friends, but an unreliable one. That is, even the slightest task you know he may not do it on time. As the reliable party in the relationship you have to organise everything around Whaleoil not being able to perform his part. This frustrates him when he realises what has happened.

Insurance companies are not paid to care. I feel however they are paid to follow contracts and assist their clients back into the workforce so they are not made to rely on payouts. There’s no doubt in my mind that Cameron Slater as Whaleoil is one of the most clinically depressed people I have ever met. While the original event leading to this depression may have been minor in the scheme of things Fidelity and the medical professionals who treated him from that point in time have failed miserably and created Whaleoil as we all read him today on his blog.

Fidelity created the monster that is Whaleoil. There is no doubt about that after watching him the past few months. Even when Fidelity were still paying him, the posts were written when he wasn’t actually getting better. On a few good days, a Whaleoil post can be brilliantly coherent, well-reasoned and rational. On a bad day a Whaleoil post can be the most offensive thing on the internet.

There is only so much that friends and family can do for Whaleoil. The frustrating thing is that no one can wave a magic wand and make him better. It has gone past that and I’ve seen everyone try. His close family we can see have tried everything. His wife and kids are amazing in the circumstance, their love is unconditional.

Whaleoil needs serious medical attention from medics without a conflict of interest from working for an insurance company or more medics who border on being criminals in my view – the depression script writers. They should be given Oscars for their script writing abilities. He needs a time out, away from the stresses of modern life getting back to basics of routine and normality. But most of all he needs help and therapy to re-connect with himself, his old self. The one that his wife speaks of but most bloggers would never have seen.

Cameron Slater.

Heard that he is a fucking great bloke.

If Fidelity Insurance found that bloke, I’m sure they would have a case closed and not look like the bunch of cunts they will be made to look like when it is disclosed they haven’t done a single thing, other than medication, to try and find him.

Cactus has said it all.

Whale Oil blogs:

The unthink­able has hap­pened, I have made a mis­take. Being a firm believer in own­ing your own shit I have apol­o­gised to Chris Carter and to his sis­ter. A short time after I sent my apol­ogy email (below) Chris rang me and we had a pleas­ant chat about the whole inci­dent. I thank Chris for tak­ing the time to ring me, he cer­tainly didn’t have to, the fact that he did and con­ducted him­self in such a polite man­ner shows the mea­sure of him.

And part of the e-mailed apology is:

Chris,

I would like to unre­servedly apol­o­gise to you for the last cou­ple of days. I was mis­led about the exact details of the sit­u­a­tion and have now clar­i­fied that the Mrs Carter in ques­tion is not in any­way related to you.

Fur­ther the whole issue was a hor­ri­ble mis­take from begin­ning to end start­ing with the Telco and the CEO of that telco con­cerned and end­ing with me. The phone issue is in fact legit­i­mate use of par­lia­men­tary resources.

Once again I sin­cerely apol­o­gise and will remove the posts about your­self and your sis­ter. I will also post this apol­ogy on my blog.

Please also pass on my sin­cere apolo­gies to your sister.

Sincere kudos to Chris, and his sister, for accepting the apology and in fact thanking Cameron for it – very classy. And also to Cam for such a unreserved apology.

I’m not a fan of posting details of Judges who issue suppression orders, as Cameron has threatened to do. Likewise I would not personally breach suppression orders as I am more an advocate of lobbying against stupid laws, rather than breaking them.

I do strongly support the Law Commission’s recommendation to make suppression orders much more difficult to achieve for those convicted of a crime.

But hell when I read about the recent case in Palmerston North, my blood boils and I am half tempted to join Whale in direct action. If you don’t know the case I am talking about, this is the Manawatu Standard on it:

If there were any lingering doubts that the guidelines for suppressing names in this country needed strengthening, the case detailed in today’s Manawatu Standard should shatter them.

The creeping secrecy pervading our justice system has long since passed what the public should accept as a reasonable restriction on their freedom of expression in order to safeguard the administration of justice.

The decision to suppress the name of a prominent Manawatu man convicted of downloading pornographic images of children is a salient example of how the principle of open justice has been reduced to little more than a passing mention before a judge abdicates his or her duty to ensure our public court system belongs to the people.

What if this man does not just download child pornography, but seeks to create some of his own? Parents are blocked from being able to protect their kids..

For Judge Fraser to say publication of the man’s identity was not required because none of the thousands of children pictured were New Zealanders is logically outrageous. Such an argument requires one to believe this man investigated the background of each of his young victims to determine they were not from this country. Does Judge Fraser believe that had the man known the children were New Zealanders he would have not downloaded the images?

An appalling lack of logic.

The Maori Party have attacked the decision:

Maori Party MPs have joined the chorus of condemnation at the permanent name suppression given to a prominent Manawatu man who downloaded more than 300,000 pornographic images, many of them picturing children.

“The decision to permanently suppress this man’s name is outrageous as is the decision to give him a few months home detention,” Maori Party justice spokeswoman Rahui Katene said.

“We urge the prosecution to appeal the sentence so this man can never ever again be allowed to continue his sick actions in a veil of secrecy.”

I hope it is appealed. But I also hope the Government puts a law change on the fast track.

The SST reports:

Controversial blogger Cameron Slater is again under police investigation, this time for identifying on his website a primary school teacher accused of sex crimes against children.

And Slater last night stepped up his name suppression campaign, telling the Sunday Star-Times he was set to post the names, phone numbers and addresses of judges who award name suppression without “good reason”.

Slater is already facing five charges of breaching name suppression orders, after he published on his website the names of several high-profile New Zealanders before the courts, but whose identities were suppressed.

Justice Minister Simon Power said Slater’s threats to expose the personal details of judges on his website were “probably not helpful”.

But Slater said our officers of the court were making “improper” decisions and he wanted to take a stand.

“These judges are the people perpetrating the expansion of the original suppression laws beyond what was envisaged by parliament,” Slater said. “They are trying to rewrite the law by judicial meddling.”

I’ve often joked with Whale that he will beat me in the ratings, even if he has to do it from D Block!

He seems to be well on the way to both aspects

In the Alexa ratings, Gotcha is ranked 124th most visited site by NZers. The previous weeks it was 118th and 112th. Kiwiblog is 122nd, and previously 121st and 117th, so in the weeks ending 17 January and 24 January, Gotcha was ahead of Kiwiblog in the Alexa rankings for New Zealanders.

As for making D Block, I’d say declaring war on Judges will help achieve that goal!

The Herald reports:

High-profile blogger Cameron Slater is to launch a new anti-suppression lobby group called Shame.

Slater made the announcement this morning, several hours before he was due back in court for breaching suppression orders.

Shame, which stands for Suppression Helps Abusers Make Excuses, would lobby for a change in suppression laws, he told TV One’s Breakfast.

Slater said he was approached by a number of people, including Wanganui Mayor Michael Laws, to “affect change”.

“There’s a lot of support for my stance,” he said.

“The first day after I appeared in court I had 400 emails, a lot of them from victims as well saying we support your stance, we want to name the people who abuse us.”

You can join SHAME on Facebook.

I have been thinking further on the name suppression issue.  I understand that the legislation applies automatic name suppression to alleged sexual offenders in cases where a minor is involved, or where the relationship with the accused means that the victim can be identified (or when you are really really famous).  Why?

Why does being the victim of a sexual attack mean that an individual shouldn’t be identified?  If the attack had been of a physical nature would name suppression be put in place?  And, just to exaggerate the point further, is the honour killing of rape victims by relatives in some countries (to cover up the attack and the way it tarnishes the family) just a more brutal version of a similar moral instrument in our society.

And, no, I’m not suggesting that we specifically name victims… just that using possible victim identification as the reason for perpetrator name suppression is… well… trite.

It seems that we as a society (and through our legislation) have applied a moral code.  We have decided that to be sexually abused or attacked means to be broken in a way that is unsuitable for others to have knowledge of.  As a society we have decided that people who are sexually abused might have their reputations besmirched by being a victim of such an attack.  Of course to move away from that would mean allowing victims (or an adult in their place) to have more say as to whether perpetrators (and potentially they as victims) are named.

Again, I ask you if it would be different if a well-known man had allegedly physically beaten his step-daughter?  Would he require the same sort of name suppression?

Name suppression (of the alleged or convicted perpetrator) has the possibility of actually putting sexual abuse victims in more of a box, to isolate them further and to effectively make it clear that we as a society don’t want to talk about that sort of thing.

I’m not saying there isn’t a place for name suppression… more challenging the reasons behind it being a necessary or automatic measure in some cases.

I’d also like to place some faith in the justice system so do think it is important that a person has the potential for a  level playing field before they go through trial to be found guilty or otherwise.

The Dom Post editorial today is on blogs and name suppression. Extracts:

As the internet has transformed the world, the blogosphere within has become pervasive. Anyone with a computer can either read the opinions of people who craft blogs – sometimes, merely illiterate streams of consciousness – or pen one themselves.

That some who cannot spell, let alone write, think that the world is gagging to know their business is as presumptuous as tweeters who think everyone is interested in their self-absorbed lives. Be that as it may.

Some blogs demand attention, in this country those by, for example, David Farrar, Russell Brown and Cameron Slater.

I’m not sure if that means we are excluded from the description of merely being illiterate streams of consciousness!

Attention Slater has now got.

Last month, police charged him with breaching name suppression orders when, on his WhaleOil blog, he posted pictorial clues identifying the accused in two high-profile sexual offence cases. This week, he revealed by way of binary code the identity of a former national figure accused of a sexual attack on a 13-year-old girl.

Nelson police, who laid the latest charges, call Slater’s actions irresponsible, because they fear they might lead to public identification of the victim, whom the suppression order was intended to protect.

Slater is on a mission. He has said, outside the courtroom, that he believes everyone should be equal before the law, that celebrities and the wealthy have their identities suppressed more often and more easily than do ordinary Kiwis, and that the law needs changing.

The Dominion Post agrees. But there are better ways to lobby for a more open court system than by putting at risk the future of a teenage girl.

I agree, but point out a newspaper had already effectively done the same thing.

At the same time, Slater has forced police, perhaps the solicitor-general, possibly Justice Minister Simon Power, Courts Minister Georgina te Heu Heu, and Attorney-General Chris Finlayson, and maybe, later, the judiciary, to confront the fact that the Criminal Justice Act, which gives judges the power to suppress certain information relating to cases before them, needs revision.

Which I believe is likely, on the basis of the Law Commission report and the comments at the time from Simon Power.

In the meantime, it is reassuring to see the Crown Law Office has decided that it can no longer apply the law relating to suppression unequally. At times of egregious breach, the solicitor-general has been keen to go after those in the mainstream media who have broken suppression orders or otherwise committed contempt of court.

For the most part, however, inhabitants of the blogosphere have been merely warned about their cavalier disregard of suppressed information or other transgressions, notably during Clayton Weatherston’s trial for murder.

Either everyone who breaches this law is prosecuted, or no-one is. And were the latter to become the reality, those sections of the Criminal Justice Act pertaining to suppression orders need to be repealed.

I find it quite funny that yesterday we had bloggers such as myself saying that the media are getting away with transgressions, while today the media are saying the bloggers are getting away!

An excellent summary of the whole issue has been done by Steven Price. I won’t do extracts because people should read the whole thing.

Law Professor Andrew Geddis has done a second post on the issue.

Also a number of posts from media lecturer Martin Hirst at Ethical Martini.

The Press reports:

A blogger faces fresh charges after he revealed the name of a national figure charged with indecently assaulting a 13-year-old girl.

Cameron Slater already faces charges over alleged breaches of name suppression, and he said yesterday that he had no doubt his latest effort would land him in more trouble.

Slater, who writes the WhaleOil blog, yesterday posted a blog entry that stated the name of a man charged with indecent assault. The name had to be deciphered by translating a code the blog was written in.

I think it was hexadecimal converted into binary. Now Cameron will find out in due course, whether or not that is seen to identify the ex-MP with name supression, but if they do prosecute the Whale, the question has to be asked whether newspapers should be charged also?

The man’s name was suppressed when he appeared in the Nelson District Court on Thursday.

A Sunday newspaper published details about the man, which Slater said had narrowed the field of possible accused to three.

He wanted to clarify who the accused was so the other two men were not unfairly accused.

Now I am not gunning for the Herald on Sunday. But I would say that far more people worked out from their story, who the accussed is, than the handful of people who were capable of working out the code Cameron had used, and reverse engineering it into hexadecimal and finally the  alphabet.

I am not saying that one justifies the other, or two wrongs make a right. I am saying that the Police should be very careful not to be selective. The Herald on Sunday article told us the following:

• An ex-MP in Nelson – narrows it down to around four people
• A “national figure” – probably eliminates around two of the four people as now very low profile
• He has a partner
• Has a firearms licence (implied)
• Implies the victim is the partner’s daughter
• Implies the ex-MP has been in more than one party by referring to the leader of “a” party he represented in Parliament

I would say that identifies the accused far more easily to many more people than the hexadecimal and binary code did.

You can argue that Whale’s post left no doubt, once you cracked his codes, while the newspaper story only allows you to make an intelligent guess. However the law in s139(2) says:

No person shall publish … the name of the person accused or convicted of the offence or any name or particulars likely to lead to the person’s identification.

Were the particulars in the newspaper story enough to be likely to lead to identification of the accused? They certainly were for me, and most political observers.

Now again, I am not advocating that the newspaper be charged. I would prefer no one be charged. But I would be interested in how one could conclude that the blog post is a breach, but the newspaper story is not.