The actor Tom Cruise has been in damage control this week after a video showing him extolling the virtues of Scientology spread across the internet.
The appearance of the nine-minute clip coincided with the publication of Andrew Morton's book Tom Cruise: An Unauthorised Biography, which alleges that Cruise ranks second in command in the Church of Scientology.
On the video, Cruise is shown speaking about the religion while the soundtrack to his Mission: Impossible films plays in the background.
"It's rough and tumble, and it's wild and woolly and it's a blast," he says. "It's a blast. It really is fun, because ... there is nothing better than ... going out there and fighting the fight and, suddenly you see, things are better."
Scientology lawyers fired off letters to Morton's publisher and have demanded that Gawker.com - a website running the Cruise video - remove the clip, alleging breach of copyright.
Nick Denton, on Gawker.com, replied: "It's newsworthy, and we will not be removing it."
Scientologists did force YouTube to remove footage of Cruise's rant. YouTube posted a message above a still of the clip, saying: "This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim."
But by then millions of people had seen it and it had spread to other websites.
On the video, dressed in a black turtleneck sweater with a look of intensity in his eyes, the 45-year-old Cruise makes a series of impassioned claims about his religion, including its ability to help get people off drugs, rehabilitate criminals and "bring peace and unite cultures".
Here is a transcript of Cruise's remarks:
I think it's a privilege to call yourself a Scientologist, and it's something that you have to earn because a Scientologist does - he or she - have the ability to create new and better realities and improve conditions.
Ah, being a Scientologist you look at someone and you know absolutely that you can help them, so for me it really is KSW [keeping Scientology working] and it's just like it's something that, ah, I don't mince words with that, with anything, but that policy has really gone, boy, the first time I went through and went, you know what, when I read it I went, you know, this is it, this is exactly it.
Being a Scientologist when you drive past an accident it's not like anyone else, it's you drive past and you know you have to do something about it because you know you're the only one that can really help.
But that's what drives me. I know that we have an opportunity to really help for the first time effectively change people's lives and I am dedicated. I am absolutely uncompromisingly dedicated to that.
Orgs are there to help but we as the public, we have a responsibility, it's not just orgs, it's not just David Miscavige, not just me - it's you, it's everyone out there that's re-reading KSW and looking at what needs to be done and saying, 'Okay am I gonna do it or am I not gonna do it', period.
And am I gonna look at that guy or am I too afraid 'cause I have my own ethics to put in someone else's ethics, and that's all it comes down to, and I won't hesitate to put ethic in on someone else because I put it ruthlessly in on myself.
Man, I think that I respect that in others and I'm there to help. We are here to help. Look, either you're onboard or you're not onboard. Okay. But if you're onboard, you're onboard just like the rest of us.
We are the authorities on getting people off drugs, we are the authorities on the mind, the authority on improving conditions ... we can rehabilitate criminals, we are the way to happiness, we bring peace and unite cultures.
Once you know these tools and you know that they work then it's not good enough. And I'm just doing okay, travelling the world and meeting the people that I have met, talking with these leaders in various fields, they want help and they are depending on people who know and who can be effective and do it and that's us.
That is our responsibility to do that. It is the time now, now is the time, okay - it is being a Scientologist, people are turning to you so you better know it and if you don't, then, you know, go and learn it [laughs].
But don't pretend you know it and whatever - it's like we're here to help and if you're a Scientologist you see, like, you see things the way they are, in all its worth, you know, in all of its complexities, and the more you know as a Scientologist the more you become overwhelmed by it, and so when they said, you know, have you met an SP [laughs] ... I thought, what a beautiful thing - maybe one day it will be like that - you know what I'm saying, maybe one day it will be like that - wow SPs - they'll read about that in history books.
I just go through that tech and it's just literally - it's not how to run from an SP, it's PTS - it's how to confront, shatter suppression, you apply it and it's like, boom.
Because they don't come up to me and do that - they won't do it to me - not to my face you know or anywhere near my vicinity where they feel they can be confronted.
I wish the world was a different place. I'd like to go on vacation and go and romp and play and just do that. You know what I mean. I mean that's what I want it to be. That's how most times I'd like to do that but I can't.
You know, you can sit here and wish it was different and then you look at it and then you go, this is it alright. You know, I have to do something, I have to do it because I can't live with myself if I don't and that really is it. I don't care if someone thinks it's hard or easy. You are helping, you are contributing all you can or you're not, because I'm carrying my love alright.
And not only that, as much as I'm carrying I still feel I've got to give more - there's still a thing of let's go - you can see the look in her eyes, you know, the ones that are doing something and, you know, the spectators - the ones that are going, 'Well, it's easy for you.'
What am I doing? It's just that thing. I've cancelled that in my area [laughs]. Man, it's like you're in or you're out. As spectators it's something like we have no time for, so it's our responsibility to educate ...
We have a responsibility to say 'Hey, this the way it should be done' - do it this way and people are actually getting better and let's get it done.
Let's really get it done and have enough love and compassion and toughness that you're going to do it. And do it right ...
It's rough and tumble, and it's wild and woolly and it's a blast. It's a blast. It really is fun, because ... there is nothing better than ... going out there and fighting the fight and, suddenly you see things are better.
I want to know that I have done everything I could every day. When I think about those people out there who are depending on us, you know, we have more work. I need more help. You gotta get those spectators in the playing field or out of the arena. Really, that's how I feel about it.
DECIPHERING (POSSIBLY) CRUISE
* KSW Keep Scientology Working.
* PTS Potential trouble source.
* SP Suppressive person.
* Sea-orgs High-ranking Scientologists.
On the web
Gawker.com
Administrators for ''711chan.org'', one of the websites responsible for starting Project Chanology, a "raid" or attack against the Church of Scientology and their website, slowed down their "attack".

In an exclusive interview with ''Wikinews'', an administrator of ''711chan'' states that they will "probably stay away from the CoS Church of Scientology."

"We're probably just going to stay away from the CoS raid. It was poorly managed. We could've brought down a lot more if we weren't just a bunch of unorganized brats," said 'Plasma', an administrator on ''711chan.org''.


"Many people from 711chan still want to raid, but the administration is sick of it," added Plasma who also stated that "Partyvan IRC actually has decided to remove the raid."

Much of the reason stems from the fact that the attack on the Church was meant to stay within ''711chan'' and that users were to stay "anonymous." An e-mail was leaked on the internet when the attack began exposing the script used to attack the Church's website.

"This is not what the raid originally started as. Partyvan declares this as a threat to the network, and Anonymous alike. We have been under constant botnet attacks, 711chan hacked, and tons of drama over this. You guys did a very poor job of staying Anonymous. It's obvious that a lot of you broke rules 1, and 2," said a statement on ''711chan's'' website.

The rules they refer to, according to Plasma, mean the "Rules of the Internet" and are:

Both key rules were broken by users, according to Plasma.

The attack on Scientology was launched on Wednesday January 16 by a group labelled "Anonymous", on the website "Insurgency Wiki", a spinoff of 4chan which is also affiliated with ''711chan''. The "History" section of the site explains, in a satirical fashion, that the incident was prompted by the Church of Scientology's attempts to remove a promotional video featuring Scientologist Tom Cruise from YouTube. Though YouTube complied with the Church of Scientology's requests to take down the video, other sites such as Gawker.com stated that they will keep hosting the video.

One poster admitted to being a part of the effort, writing in a blog post "I have myself, as per instructions, loaded up Gigaloader and started bombarding the Scientology homepage. Theres ''sic'' something in the hilarious anarchy of the net that produces these 'events' every now and again." The poster wrote that "Prompted I think by the Tom Cruise video, a new obsession is taking hold on the internet. An insurgency against The Church of Scientology."

Not long after their attack, a previously unknown group called ''The Regime'' used keylogging to gain an administrator password to 711chan.org.

"I was actually away from home when I noticed my personal dedi was compromised (my bash_history file had lots of strange entries), so I informed Partyvan IRC staff (the CoS raid room as well as 711chan's IRC room are there) and minutes later, 711chan's machine was also compromised. I arrived home around an hour later, and immediately restored the contents of the 711 machine back to a previous state. I also got the passwords reset on my dedi and that was back in order. I went to bed shortly after that," said Plasma in regards to ''The Regime's'' attack on ''711chan''.

"The next morning I wake up to hundreds of MSN windows and emails telling me both servers have been compromised again, and our backups for 711 have been removed. The software we use to run 711chan's machine got bugged up somehow and make it difficult for me to fix things, which is why the site didn't respond at all for most of the day. At the time of writing this I still haven't got the backups reloaded onto the machine," added Plasma.

Plasma states that ''711chan.org'' will be off line at least until the end of January, possibly longer, but the site is not expected to change.

"I shut down our server to prevent any more damage. Right now, our plan is to lay low and get stuff started up on a more secure machine. We'll be back up by the end of the month, hopefully. 711chan will probably be staying the same it is, however," said Plasma.

But they didn't go down without a fight adds Plasma.

"As who the "Regime" is? I took a look at one of the things they planted on my machine, which lead me to #

regime on GameSurge IRC. `immortal' and about 30 drones were in that channel. Members of the g00ns community (allies of 711, also linked to Partyvan IRC) found out they had dox (documents such as phone numbers, addresses, SSN numbers, names, that sort of thing) on `immortal' and his wife. I actually have these details and attempted to call him, but it went unanswered," said Plasma.

The information that ''711chan.org'' obtained was later posted on the website operated by ''The Regime''. ''Wikinews'' has attempted to contact ''The Regime'' a second time regarding the incident, and they have only replied with "your articles are bullshit."