As I type these lines, on June 3, 2013, Private First Class Bradley Edward Manning is being tried in a sequestered room at Fort Meade, Maryland, for the alleged crime of telling the truth. The court martial of the most prominent political prisoner in modern US history has now, finally, begun.

It has been three years. Bradley Manning, then 22 years old, was arrested in Baghdad on May 26, 2010. He was shipped to Kuwait, placed into a cage, and kept in the sweltering heat of Camp Arifjan.

“For me, I stopped keeping track,” he told the court last November. “I didn’t know whether night was day or day was night. And my world became very, very small. It became these cages… I remember thinking I’m going to die.”

I had an opportunity to interview WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he has been granted political asylum since June 2012. Assange is wanted for questioning in Sweden over sex allegations, although he has never been charged. Assange believes that if sent to Sweden, he would be put into prison and then sent to the United States, where he is already being investigated for espionage for publishing hundreds of thousands of classified diplomatic and military memos on the WikiLeaks website.

Throughout the past year, according to WikiLeaks’ editor-in-chief Julian Assange, the organization has been working on the release of more than one and a half million US diplomatic records from the period between 1973 and 1976. Over 200,000 of them relate specifically to former US Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger.

The media organization held a press conference on the release in Washington, DC. Spokesperson Kristinn Hrafnsson explained this was part of an effort to combat the reclassification of documents. In 2006, the National Archives and Records Administration reported that 55,000 pages of records from the CIA and other federal agencies had been reclassified.

The non-coverage of Wikileaks’ “Detainee Policies” on interrogation documents after their initial release is in itself astounding, but even more surprising is the fact that when examined some of the documents don’t appear to be what they are claimed to be. What follows is analysis, with response by both Wikileaks and DoD.

The administration of President Barack Obama released a strategy aimed at protecting trade secrets. As White House press secretary Jay Carney stated, the strategy aims to “protect the innovation that drives the American economy and supports jobs in the United States.” He said, “We know that trade secret theft can cripple a company’s competitive advantage in foreign markets, diminish export prospects around the globe, and put American jobs in jeopardy.” That was why the White House had put together a strategy.

Love them, hate them, fear them, mock them…however you feel about Anonymous, the notorious hacktivists, you can’t deny that they have changed things. From rickrolling, chocolate rain, and looooong cat to directed denials of service, defacing government websites around the world and exposing the names of millions of corporate customers online, Anonymous is a chaotic force for — well for lots of things. For teh lulz and for the win.

Last night Yoko Ono presented the 2013 Courage Award to Julian Assange, who accepted in absentia in New York.

Dreamworks announced that shooting began today on their Wikileaks movie entitled “The Fifth Estate.” The film stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Julian Assange and Daniel Brühl as Daniel Domscheit-Berg. The cast also includes Laura Linney, Anthony Mackie, and David Thewlis. Bill Condon, fresh off the Twilight: Breaking Dawn Series, will direct.

Though Assange is still embattled and although there is no sign that he will be able to leave the embassy and go to Ecuador any time soon, it was much more triumphal in spirit. In reminding the world of what WikiLeaks had accomplished in 2012, in noting how the organization appeared to be on the cusp of overcoming a financial blockade, one was left with the thought that WikiLeaks may thrive yet again in the new year.

Despite efforts to silence their publisher-in-chief and his confinement to the embassy in London, a crippling financial blockade, and the silence of the major media who once partnered with WikiLeaks and still use their material, the transparency group continues providing civilians all over the world with an honest record of what their governments do in their name.