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“We believe that based on past experience of Anonymous and on certain threats the government made, saying they’ve got their top people investigating us.… Many Anons are no longer with us. They’ve been jailed, chased out of the hive or, in some unfortunate cases, died. And we have to do this to protect not only ourselves but those that we are working with.”

But his anonymity is also about internal politics.

“We enjoy the theatrics and dramatics too, but there is also the side that Anonymous doesn’t want to have anybody be the leader, or get all the attention or steal the show,” he said.

In some sense everything we’re doing is for the lulz. There is something that gives us a great charge out of leaking documents that get so far under the skin of the rich and the powerful

It reveals the duality of Anonymous — caught somewhere between prankster and ideologue; court jester and truth teller. Some previous Anon operations from around the globe seem immature and malicious, while others seem high-minded and helpful. They’ve hacked gaming sites and supported the Arab Spring uprising.

While Procastin8r and other Anons seem deeply earnest on their core issues, he maintains much of their motivation is “the lulz” — Internet slang for amusement.

“In some sense everything we’re doing is for the lulz. There is something that gives us a great charge out of leaking documents that get so far under the skin of the rich and the powerful and those who run the militaries and police forces and intelligence agencies of the world. So, to us, even the most serious stuff we’re doing is something of a prank.”

As a veteran of previous Anon campaigns, he said increased government attention now makes mounting subversive operations much more difficult and dangerous.