Operation: Minerva   2009-01-25 17:22

Daum Agora is one hell of a curious website. Basically, it's a collection of two dozen bulletin boards, where registered members can start threads and/or reply to them. Each member also gets a personal page that looks like a minimalistic blog, but which actually is no more than a collection of threads started by that user. So the focus is all on the bulletin boards, which look pretty damn elegant compared to the ones you find in most American websites. This is where the 1 million or so "Agorians" post and comment on over 7 million threads on all sorts of social and political as well as personal issues. It is not too difficult for a popular thread to record half a million views and several thousand comments; I've seen an occasional thread with over a million views and 100,000 user ratings (voted up or down).

All of this gets organized by a unique system named "Agora Best", which orders threads based on the number of views, comments, and ratings. The position of a thread in Agora Best, much like the position of a web page in a Google search result, is usually a good indicator of the popularity of the views expressed in the opening post. (Like many other online forums in Korea, Daum Agora strictly differentiates between the OP and the replies/comments.) This delicate system enables users to discuss and debate, much more effectively than with a traditional forum, issues requiring immediate attention -- such as, "Where do you think we should hold this afternoon's demonstration, now that the usual venue has been closed off?"

As a result, Daum Agora proved an indispensible device in planning and organizing many of last year's massive anti-government demonstrations. Armed with laptops and smart phones, Agora-based activists would seamlessly connect the online with the offline. Worthwhile ideas would instantly gain attention, relayed to the demonstrators at the front line, and appropriate action taken. For example, Agorians played an important role during the Styrofoam Debate of June 10, 2008 in informing protesters at the front line about the danger of climbing the grease-covered container boxes.

Since August, when it became rather difficult to organize large gatherings due to exhaustion and increased suppression, active members of Daum Agora have been contributing heavily to alternative means of protest, such as holding photo exhibitions and exposing the government's lies. Meanwhile, the global economy was taking a sharp downturn and the Korean economy was no exception. As the heat of the summer gave way to the chilling fear of depression, one particular Agorian gained everyone's attention.

He was known by his nickname "Minerva", but no more.

He described himself as an old man selling roasted sweet potatoes, or alternatively, as a high-ranking stock broker with lots of experience in Wall Street as well as in the Korean market. At one time, he even admitted to implication in the design of the American financial structure that gave rise to last year's subprime mortgage crisis.

Whatever his real identity, Minerva was a genius.

On July 14, Miverva wrote on Agora that consumer prices will increase sharply in the second half of the year, so that it would be best if people bought some items up front. He was right.

On August 25, Minerva predicted the fall of Lehman Brothers. At the time, Korea Development Bank was planning to buy a large chunk of Lehman Brothers; so Minerva's warning was primarily directed at some people in the government who supported the acquisition. He was right; Lehman Brothers filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy less than three weeks afterwards.

On August 29, Minerva predicted that the Korean Won would lose its value to trade at 1,125 won to the dollar by mid-September, and 1,180-1,200 won to the dollar by late September. He was right; the Korean won traded at 1,160 won to the dollar on September 16.

On October 6, Minerva predicted that the Korean Won would fall further to around 1,400 won to the dollar, if the government didn't inject at least 30 billion dollars of liquidity in to the market. It took only a fortnight for his predictions to come true.

By this time, Minerva had already saved the butts of countless individual investors who heeded his words, as most of the mainstream media was still giving rosy forecasts against all odds. (Later, some journalists confessed that they had been told by the government not to publish negative outlooks. See this report by Reuters.) Not only accurate predictions, but Minerva was also providing plain-worded yet detailed analyses of the Korean economy, instructing the general public to watch out for certain patterns and to associate such patterms to certain actions by certain institutions. By late October, Minerva had become a de facto icon of Daum Agora; every single post of his rose to the top of Agora Best. Nobody was listening to government officials anymore, whose untrustworthiness and incompetence had been proven beyond doubt by then. After all, Minerva's predictions were thousands of times more accurate than anything the government had ever said! But of course, this made the authorities unhappy.

On November 3, Minister of Justice Kim Kyeong-Han announced that he would not hesitate to look into Minerva's case if the occasion called for an investigation. What did Minerva do wrong, besides telling more truth than anyone else?

On November 11, several news articles cited an unnamed official from some intelligence agency that Minerva was a stock broker in his early 50s who had lived abroad for quite some time. Though unconfirmed, this was the first attempt by the authorities to identify Minerva.

On November 13, Minerva declared that he would no longer write on Agora. In his writing, he stated in a characteristically sarcastic tone that "the government had ordered silence of him".

On November 17, somebody claiming to be Minerva contributed a lengthy piece to the December issue of the news magazine Shin Dong-A. In his contribution, Minerva (or whoever it was) predicted that the KOSPI stock index would fall until it hit 500, that real estate prices in prestigious Gangnam district would fall by half, and that people should be prepared for a possible crisis in March 2009. Though these predictions were extremely pessimistic, lots of people took Minerva's words to heart. Also, by this time, it was clear beyond doubt that the world was looking at a very serious depression; closer to home, some condos in Gangnam were already trading at less than 60% of their usual value.

Since then, Minerva remained silent until December 29, when he (or somebody using his ID) returned with a no-frills, straightforward report that the Korean government had just ordered seven banks and major corporations to stop buying U.S. dollar, apparently in an attempt to stabilize the exchange rate. The Ministry of Finance immediately denied Minerva's claim; shortly afterwards, however, the government admitted that such a request was indeed made. Still, the government maintained that the message it sent out was meant to be a request and not an order. (Not a very meaningful distinction, given that you're not supposed to disregard a request by the government!) Anyway, this incident caused the currency exchange market to take one hell of a wild ride, prompting the government to spend $2 billion in an attempt to take control. Later that day, Minerva responded with a brief apology to the Minister of Finance.

On January 5, in his final post, Minerva confessed that he had been nothing but a spectator during the Asian financial crisis of 1997. In a much more sincere tone than in his December 29 post, he apologized for not doing his part back then, and called upon everyone to help rebuild the troubled economy.

On January 8, the Public Prosecutor's Office announced that they had taken into custody one Park Dae-Sung, charged with the crime of "disseminating false information" in his December 29 post, the same post as the one attributed to Minerva. According to the Public Prosecutor's Office, Park is a 31-year-old community college dropout with no experience of anything financial, except having read a few books on economics.

A huge controversy followed this announcement.

First of all, nobody seems to know if Park really is Minerva. Besides the obvious observation that it is extremely unlikely for someone with no formal education in economics let alone first-hand experience to know so much about the inner workings of world economy as Minerva seemed to do, the acute readers of Daum Agora quickly pointed out a number of contradictions in the official announcements.

Initial reports said that investigators had a hard time tracking down Park because he moved from one Internet cafe to another. But every reader of Minerva's posts knew that he wrote from only two IP addresses. (At one time, there had been over 30 clowns in Daum Agora pretending to be Minerva. Since part of the poster's IP address gets exposed in Daum Agora, users used to double-check it in order to distinguish the real Minerva from the fake ones.)

The Public Prosecutor's Office immediately replied that the Internet cafe thing was a misreport, and released a short essay, allegedly written by Park while in custody, in an attempt to prove that Park really knows a lot about economics. Again, this feeble attempt backfired when exposed to the Agorians' scrutiny. Park's essay not only directly contradicted Minerva's predictions at several points, it was also composed of long, winding, and ungrammatical sentences whereas Minerva used to write short and clear sentences.

(Edit: On February 10, it was revealed that the Public Prosecutor's Office had been monitoring Park since a long time before the problematic post of December 29. In fact, the government had obtained Park's identification from Daum Corp. as early as December 5, when Minerva had yet to write anything patently "false". It seems likely that the investigation had begun shortly after the Minister of Justice's statement in early November, and that the government was only waiting for an excuse to arrest Minerva.)

And then, the person who had contributed to the December issue of Shin Dong-A claimed, in his contribution to the February issue, that he is the real one and Park is a fake. According to Shin Dong-A, Minerva is not one man but a committee of seven, made up of experts from various sectors of the economy. This, said Shin Dong-A, is why Minerva had so much knowledge to draw upon.

Around the same time, someone talking a lot like Minerva logged into Daum Agora and left a short thank-you note for all of his supporters. This curious post also encouraged young Koreans to stand against the oppressive government, while at the same time making it very clear that Minerva will not return to Daum Agora any more.

Other well-known Agorians chimed in, accusing the government of cooking up a fake Minerva to use as a scapegoat and discount the popularity and influence of Daum Agora. Things got dirtier when the news corporation Chosun Ilbo, in its own monthly magazine, began to attack Shin Dong-A for creating a "fake Minerva". Threats were exchanged between the two companies, both of which are usually supportive of the current administration. Onlookers were rather amused to see the allies growling at each other.

(Edit: On February 17, Shin Dong-A announced that "their" Minerva was fake. Oh my god, the plot thickens.)

Monthly Chosun vs. Shin Dong-A: Who's got the real Minerva?

The Public Prosecutor's Office, however, maintains to this date that they absolutely have the right guy. According to them, Park had admitted to writing every single post attributed to Minerva. Soon afterwards, Park got himself a first-class lawyer and began to argue -- as he should -- that his constitutional right of free speech was being violated. He faces a long and complicated trial.

Minerva's arrest (or rather, Park's) made headlines not only in Korea but around the world. In addition to the Reuters article linked above, here is an LA Times story on Minerva's arrest; and here's a Washington Post story published just today. Most of the articles only seem to focus on the remarkable accuracy of Minerva's predictions; but some touch upon the real problem here: the Korean government is trying (again) to censor online speech it disagrees with!

The prosecution's only evidence of Minerva's "crime" is that, in his December 29 post, he conflated "request" and "order". Does his post qualify as "dissemination of false information"? Technically, yes. Should a person be put in jail for making such a (slightly misleading) comment? To this I say: Are you out of your mind?

If it were a crime to "disseminate false information", all the people who own those tabloid magazines should be put in jail long before anyone else. We should put in jail all the reporters and news agencies who make mistakes in their reports from time to time. Does anyone know what happened to the reporter who brought up the IP address issue (mentioned above) in his or her initial report? Heck, we should put President Lee in jail, too; he used to predict that the stock index would go all the way up to 3,000 (or even 5,000) if he became President, and look what's happening, the stock index is barely hanging at 1,000.

By all means, dissemination of false information shouldn't be a legal issue at all, unless the person responsible knew it was false and still "disseminated" it for the purpose of harming somebody! And even in that case, it should normally be a matter between the affected parties. If somebody tells a lie to hurt you, you sue him for damages. (No, we're not talking about fraud, which is an altogether different kind of thing.) I mean, this is all basic stuff. No democratic country that I know of has a law against "dissemination of false information". Especially if the "information" at stake concerns the government, because otherwise the government just ends up saying, "You said something we don't agree with, so we'll put you in jail".

In essence, that's exactly what Lee Myung-Bak's government is trying to do. Minerva seems to have been nothing more than a convenient scapegoat for them, because he was right, because he was popular, and because he was an icon of Daum Agora -- the center of today's anti-government movements. And as long as the government remains willing to accuse citizens of this ridiculous crime, anyone could be next.

(Edit: A nearly complete collection of Minerva's posts from July 2008 until January 2009 are now available at http://invisible.economist.free.fr/dm/ thanks to the contribution of another well-known Agorian. Note that the authenticity of the last few are highly controversial.)

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