Wow, just wow. Not only have they just invoked the Streisand effect, they threw some gasoline on it to boot. It’s all part of the Climate McCarthyism on display this week.

UPDATE: Ironically, Cook’s “97% consensus paper” was published one year ago today, under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license.

Data in the SI was added 16 days after publication, but not all the data, not sure if they have any legal basis to withhold the rest and still keep CCL license – Anthony

Brandon Shollenberger writes:

My Hundredth Post Can’t Be Shown

Dear readers, I wanted to do something special for my hundredth post at this site. I picked out a great topic for discussion. I wrote a post with clever prose, jokes that’d make your stomach ache from laughter and even some insightful commentary. Unfortunately, I can’t post it because I’d get sued.

You see, I wanted to talk about the Cook et al data I recently came into possession of. I wanted to talk about the reaction by Cook et al to me having this data. I can’t though. The University of Queensland has threatened to sue me if I do.

I understand that may be difficult to believe. I’d like to provide you proof of what I say. I’m afraid I can’t do that either though. If I do, the University of Queensland will sue me. As they explained in their letter threatening me:

That’s right. The University of Queensland sent me a threatening letter which threatens me further if I show anyone that letter.

Confusing, no? It gets stranger. Along with its threats, the University of Queensland included demands. The first of these is:

This demand is interesting. According to it, I’m not just prevented from disclosing any of the “intellectual property” (IP) I’ve gained access to. I’m prevented from even doing anything which involves using the data. That means I can’t discuss the data. I can’t perform analyses on it. I can’t share anything about it with you.

But that’s not all I can’t do. The University of Queensland also demanded I cease and desist from:

This fascinates me. I corresponded with John Cook to try to get him to assert any claims of confidentiality he might have regarding the data I now possess. I sent him multiple e-mails telling him if he felt the data was confidential, he should request I not disclose it. I said if people’s privacy needed to be protected, he should say so.

He refused. Repeatedly.

Apparently I badgered Cook too much. I tried too hard to get him to do his duty and try to protect his subjects’ privacy. The University of Queensland needs me to stop. If I don’t, they’ll sue me.

So yeah, sorry guys. I wanted my hundredth post to be interesting, but I guess it won’t be. Anything interesting I might have to say will get me sued. And maybe not just sued. The University of Queensland apparently wants me arrested too:

I don’t know what sort of hack they had investigate the supposed hacking, but this is silly. There was no hacking involved. The material was gathered in a perfectly legal way. I could easily prove that.

Only, proving it would require using the data I’ll be sued for using…

http://hiizuru.wordpress.com/2014/05/15/my-hundredth-post-cant-be-shown/

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