RT: Playing with Fire

[don]

Exclusive TV series hosted by Julian Assange to premiere on RT in March

Cyberspace's most famous activist, Julian Assange, is launching his own talkshow, to be broadcast on RT. The program, written and hosted by the founder of whistle-blowing site Wikileaks, will focus on his favorite topic: controversy.

*The show, arguably the most anticipated news series of 2012, will feature ten "iconoclasts, visionaries and power insiders" – people Assange can clearly identify with, being a rather controversial figure himself. The 40-year-old Australian media and internet entrepreneur will get to talk about the issues of the day with those he believes will shape "the world tomorrow."

In his own words, the world-famous Wikileaks founder is "a pioneer of a more just world and a victim of political repression" which is why he promises to deliver a new type of television. Many are already wondering whether it will be as explosive as the biggest mass disclosure of secret documents in US history, also orchestrated by Assange and his team.

The show will be filmed at the very location that Julian Assange has been under house arrest for the last year and a half, with the first episode to be shot just a week before Assange's Supreme Court hearing in the UK. He has been on conditional bail for 414 days, with no charges officially filed, as he fights extradition to Sweden.

““Assange to record TV series for RT while under house arrest – I am sure it will be an amazing show!” RT’s editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan posted on her Twitter on Wednesday. ““I’ve never waited for a show on RT with such excitement.””.

RT news executive Nikolay Bogachikhin held talks with Assange to secure the show. He is convinced working with Assange would be any channel’s dream right now, as the new host is full of fresh ideas.

“When we talked, Julian was very calm and relaxed about it all, which you wouldn’t expect from someone who’s been under house arrest for more than 400 days. He was very full of ideas, some of them were born as we talked, so I think this will be a very hard-hitting show,” he stated.

http://rt.com/news/julian-assange-rt-exclusive-617/

RT is the #1 viewed network in the world.

[dcarrigg]

Re: RT: Playing with Fire

I find RT interesting. News from a Russian point of view. That Russia - a country with little monetized intellectual property due to its recent Soviet past - would seem to push forward a pro-information position that's economically disruptive to the dying behemoths in the West should surprise nobody.

That RT would serve this purpose by so consistently coming down on a side of the issue that is so undeniably popular with western netizens and youth is a fantastic double-bonus. This, combined with the audacity of allowing Marxist economic scholars to speak to an audience, which the MSM in the West was never comfortable with, gives the network an aire of honesty and forthrightness that has vaulted it to online popularity exceeding any other network, including Al-Jazeera, the BBC and CBS.

This move to create a show with Assange will no doubt enhance this position further. Moscow, in phoenix-like fashion, is back in the information war. Within twenty years, it will probably be winning.

[Thailandnotes]

Re: RT: Playing with Fire

I had occasionally seen RT called "Kremlin TV," but with the announcement of Assange's program, everyone's doing it. There must have been a memo.

NPR: Kremlin TV To Air Julian Assange's New Show

[don]

Re: RT: Playing with Fire

Within twenty years, it will probably be

. . . self - censoring.

[dcarrigg]

Re: RT: Playing with Fire

. . . self - censoring.

Don't get me wrong here. RT has every right to air what it does. And it's successful at it. Calling it Kremlin TV is the equivalent to calling the BBC Westminster TV or CBS Pentagon TV. The generalizations somewhat true and somewhat false. All I mean to be saying is that RT is on the same side of an argument as both youth and technology, while BBC/CBS et. all are not.

If you're comment was to mean that RT is already winning, then perhaps you are right, for at least they are gaining ground. This much is empirically true.

[don]

Re: RT: Playing with Fire

Just a reference that sources of information wax and wane in their usefulness, generally based on their agenda, which changes over time. One of the best windows on the sixties and seventies Soviet Union was from its internal dissidents. Guys like Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov provided the details on the Gulag. It seems whomever is not sharing in power in one form or another (political, economic, cultural) often provides the clearest analysis of what's goin' on. We see the inverse of that in spades here in the US MSM.