Diplomat Sir John Sawers is supposed to be taking over the Secret Intelligent Service (better known as Her Majesty's Secret Service) in October. What kind of information did Lady Shelley Sawers, his wife, let loose on in her Facebook profile?

For starters: their friends! 'Cause it's Facebook, right? Photos show relationships with other diplomats, British actors (don't worry, nobody cool), and family. Family like Lady Sawers' half-brother Hugo Haig-Thomas, a former British diplomat that John Sawers succeeded on his way to the top. Haig-Thomas is "an associate and researcher" of a historian.

Not just any historian, though: Holocaust Denier David Irving. Winner! From Irving's extensive Wikipedia page:

By the mid-1980s, Irving associated himself with the Holocaust-denying Institute for Historical Review, began giving lectures to groups such as the far-right German Deutsche Volksunion, and publicly denied that the Nazis systematically exterminated Jews in gas chambers during World War II.[103] Irving was a frequent speaker for the DVU in the 1980s and the early 1990s, but the relationship ended in 1993 apparently because of concerns by the DVU that Irving's espousal of Holocaust Denial might lead to the DVU being banned.[95] He also alleged that parts of The Diary of Anne Frank might have been forged by her surviving father.

Awesome. Haig-Thomas has noted that he "doesn't necessarily share (Irving's) views," but he sure as hell doesn't condemn them.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.What else is interesting? Well, the family likes Liza Minelli, as there's a picture of his wife and daughter re-enacting Caberet. But that's not nearly as interesting as, say, his codename, which was going to be "C" once he started working for MI-6. Read one awesome wall posting: "Congrats on the new job, already dubbed Sir Uncle "C" by nephews in the know!"

Theater Geeks, you'll appreciate this tidbit on their daughter, of whom there were also several pictures of on Sawers' Facebook profile:

Corinne, 22, a recent Oxford University graduate who is now an aspiring actress...recently began touring with Jenny Seagrove in the play Pack Of Lies, coincidentally about a middle-class household suddenly at the centre of an espionage drama when an MI5 spy turns up at their house.

Finally, location, location, location:

Despite the security implications, Lady Sawers revealed on Facebook the location of the London flat used by the couple and the whereabouts of their three children and of Sir John's parents.

Wow. The problem here, if you didn't notice, was that this guy's supposed to lead up one of the world's two most powerful secret service organizations. And serious secrets - like where the guy lives, who his friends are, who his family is, and what his wife's favorite Liza Minelli musical is - have been exposed (along with his Speedos, which terrorists and enemies of the British State everywhere will, at the very least, get a laugh out of). But politicians on both sides of the aisle in England don't think it's too cute: both liberals and conservatives are calling for his employment with MI-6 to be in question, which is funny, 'cause don't you think they'd just fire him? Eh, the Foreign Secretary doesn't think so:

Foreign Secretary David Miliband today dismissed allegations of recklessness. He told BBC1's Andrew Marr Show: 'It is not a state secret that he wears Speedo swimming trunks.' He added: ‘He was appointed 10 days ago to be the head of MI6; he's an outstanding professional who will do a really good job in an outstanding organisation that does a huge amount for this country'

At least we get to blame the outing of Valarie Plame on dumbasses like Robert Novak, who can't keep a good Beltway secret to themselves when they hear it. This is just piss-poor form. Also, if Chuck Barris can keep it a secret for twenty years and you can't, you've got problems. The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

MI6 chief blows his cover as wife's Facebook account reveals family holidays, showbiz friends and links to David Irving [Daily Mail]

If the conference jesters were encouraged to speak up, instead of letting yes-men and weak devil's advocates dominate Q&A sessions, would boring one-sided conference panels turn into real discussions?

Of course not. That's not how a conference gets speakers to come back, and we snarkers are too passive-aggressive to ask anyway. But this is what the class clowns should have asked the speakers at this week's Supernova conference.

• To Sun CEO Jon Schwartz: "The host just said he hopes you're at the company for a long time. How long will four to five thousand Sun employees be at the company? Until before or after lunch?"
• To AT&T exec Eric Shepcaro, who just said, "Our strongest asset is security" (honestly): "Eric, do you mean 'Security, except when the NSA wants to look at your data'? Is that how security fits into today's announcement that customer data belongs to you and the NSA?"
• To IBM exec Linda Sanford: "When you had this values discussion you talked about, did that involve whether you'd work with Nazi Germany again?"
• To Craigslist founder Craig Newmark: "How are the birds in your backyard doing? Cool. See you at Reverie tomorrow? Cool."

Apple drops out of India, cancelling 3000 planned jobs and sacking the staff, before CEO Steve ever got to visit. [CIOL]

Meanwhile, IBM moves into India. Tomorrow, IBM's CEO speaks in the former palace of a maharajah. A touch of symbolism? [NYT]

IBM, by the way, was convicted years ago for co-operating with Nazi Germany, something Yahoo CEO Terry Semel should worry about. [Sploid]

More wrap-up after the jump-down.

Terry Semel's new salary ($1, announced last week) is less the punishment he deserves and more a way to keep his taxes down as he collects millions in new Yahoo stock options. [Forbes]

Forbes admits what Google's CEO (pictured) won't: "But as charming as he is, [Eric] Schmidt runs Google about as much as much as the Dalai Lama runs the world's spiritual life." Oh snap. [Forbes]

Granted, the rest of that article gives a little too much credit to all the self-styled Googlestars manning the cubicles.

Google CFO George Reyes's brother, Greg Reyes, gets in the Merc News. Congrats, Greg! The former Brocade Communications CEO is being investigated for securities fraud to the tune of a few million bucks. [Mercury News]

As far as we know, Microsoft president Bill Gates still hasn't replied to the open letter from ZDNet writer Steve Gillmor, in which Steve: 1. asks Bill to retire, and 2. asks Bill to use Steve's product. (Some...trust...product...thing; I don't know, I didn't pay attention.) [ZDNet]

When the New York (behind-the-)Times says teens are leaving MySpace, it means they're already out of the building. [NYT]

At the D Conference this week two of the most important executives in the world—Bill Gates and Terry Semel—were total honest and blunt about the issues facing their companies.

Really? Terry Semel? Because, as we've been reporting, the Wall Street Journal says:

One attendee asked Mr. Semel if Yahoo would have cooperated with Nazi Germany the same way it has with China. His response: "Yahoo has a basic obligation not to have a point of view on basic content, and to present content ... and aggregate things and to allow people to make their own choices. I don't know how I would have felt then."

How many times should I run this quote before the implication sticks?

Jeff Bewkes calls bull——! [Calacanis.com]
Earlier: Terry Semel would have appeased Nazi Germany [Valleywag]

"I was pretty shocked with his answer," Shervin told me. "It was pretty scary asking that question. But I had a sense in the back of my mind that he'd be poorly prepared."

"He was definitely unprepared for that line of logic. His line of logic is so nonchalant." Shervin described the scene — the D Conference, held by the Wall Street Journal, where Terry Semel is on stage with WSJ columnist Walt Mossberg. "It's a roomful of reporters, and he would put them all in jail if the government told him."

What was the reaction like? "It was complete stunned silence."

After the jump, Shervin calls for a boycott. Meanwhile, China started blocking Freewebs pages two days ago.

"I'm not saying China is Nazi Germany. My point is, where does it stop?"

Pishevar compares Internet publishing companies like Freewebs and Yahoo to hands-off editors. "We can't edit people's content, we have to give them a platform to express themselves, and if they say something that the government doesn't like, we can't go delete it. We can't give the guy's IP address to the government."

Freeweb has refused requests from the Chinese government to turn over records. Two days ago, Chinese users started reporting that they couldn't access the site. "My thirst for traffic is not going to make me go against my principles," says Pishevar. "We're talking to the Chinese embassy. Any words like 'Falun Gong', they want us to not have that. I'm not gonna have that. I'm not gonna get rid of people's freedom."

I ask him how he thinks Yahoo will spin the Semel Nazi incident. "They're probably gonna hire fake blogger people to say something supportive. The're probably gonna attack me for asking the question...It's starting to escalate, which is good. There needs to be a massive response."

Pishevar is pissed — but he's also just shocked that Semel couldn't answer his question with a clear "No." "The CEO of Yahoo said 'I don't know what I'd do.'" Pishevar laughs incredulously. "And Google too, at least they're kind of up front, whereas these guys are just giving information."

So what's the course of action? "Americans should boycott Yahoo products until they get the message that freedom is an American ideal, and we're not going to give it up."

Earlier: Meet the man who asked Yahoo's CEO about Nazi collaboration [Valleywag]

Shervin wasn't asking this for kicks — he has a history as a human rights activist. He told Valleywag so, right from his Blackberry while traveling. In an e-mail oh-so-discreetly CC'd to Freewebs' PR firm, Shervin wrote:

One thing you should know about me is that I believe in entrepreneurial activisim.

I was a big human rights activist at berkeley and published in jama when I was 20 re: doctors involvement in torture in turkey which led to the istanbul protocal banning doctors from involvement in torture. Please prep nick at valleywag re: this background. We are big champions of freedom and freedom of expression as an inherent human right.

"Please prep nick"? No, Shervin, forget the PR peeps; we like talking to you. More of Shervin's manifesto is after the jump. Fun activity: guess how much of this makes it into his upcoming newspaper op-ed piece!

I believe that technology must be a force for good and freedom. I believe tech companies need a hippocratic oath never to do harm to their users. I would like our fellow tech leaders to band together and come up with a set of protocals similar to the istanbul protocal banning our involvment in anything that will lead to harm based on the simple right to express oneself.

We had millions of visitors from china. Globally we have 18 million visitors a month and are growing really fast in asia. We are 2nd only after geocities in global pageviews. However, I will never, ever give up on another human being who has trusted me simply because they want to express their opinion. Freedom trumps all other aims.

We have to take a stand.

Earlier: Terry Semel would have appeased Nazi Germany [Valleywag]

One attendee asked Mr. Semel if Yahoo would have cooperated with Nazi Germany the same way it has with China. His response: "Yahoo has a basic obligation not to have a point of view on basic content, and to present content ... and aggregate things and to allow people to make their own choices. I don't know how I would have felt then."

"Po-tay-to, po-tah-to. You say 'Nazis,' I say 'business partners.'"

Yahoo Defends China Cooperation [WSJ]