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For me, all that Aaron Swartz's story is for me, is a reminder if how broken and corrupted the judicial system is. I couldn't really care less about what he did

For me, all that Aaron Swartz's story is for me, is a reminder if how broken and corrupted the judicial system is. I couldn't really care less about what he did when he was alive, just about the horrific things that others did along the way.

Esau 11y ago
Don't act like Swartz was an innocent lamb.
- chris_wot 11y ago
  He's not. You can accept Schwartz broke the law in downloading a bunch of case law that probably would have cost a maximum of $10,000, if that. You don't have to forgive Carmen Ortiz or Stephen Heyman for prosecutorial overreach, or the complete and utter misuse of public resources in prosecuting a crime the supposed victim, JSTOR, had resolved was no longer an issue.
  - oldmanjay 11y ago
    The real problem is accepting that he broke into MIT property and tampered with their network as if he had some sort of moral high ground that granted him a right to do so. Private property does not belong to the hacking class simply because they can get to it, and that aspect of the lionization of Aaron Swartz is distasteful at best. This was not just "Robin Hood" freeing research for the poor, it was a man violating the rights of others based on strong desires. Hardly noble. Hardly heroic. That he couldn't face the consequences of the actions once he realized that desire did not translate into a right just cuts down the last tree in that forest, to me. My heroes aren't cowardly.
    - chris_wot 11y ago
      Really? I'm curious here, who was injured? Seriously, tell me the exact person who was harmed by him hooking up his laptop into the MIT network.
      - foldr 11y ago
        JSTOR had to shut down temporarily, which hurt everyone who uses it. And MIT would certainly be harmed if they made it known that anyone who liked was allowed to break into their property and hook into their network.
        rek0j 11y ago
        "had to shut down" It didn't have to shut down any more than you'd have to burn your own house down after a burglary. If somebody broke into my house and was caught I supposed I could overreact and go into massive debt fortifying it with castle walls, a moat, and alligators. But I don't think the legal system should side with parties doing damage to themselves just because they don't understand computer networks.
        foldr 11y ago
        I don't think it's credible to suggest that JSTOR would have shut down if they didn't think it was necessary. I dislike this victim-blaming mentality that some people seem to have in relation to computer-related crimes. JSTOR appear to have done their best to handle the situation, bearing in mind that they cannot be seen to condone violations of the licenses which they have negotiated with publishers.
        chris_wot 11y ago
        Both JSTOR and MIT declined to pursue civil litigation. They clearly didn't consider themselves to have been materially harmed. Where did you get the information that the entirety of JSTOR was shut down, even temporarily?
        foldr 11y ago
        >Both JSTOR and MIT declined to pursue civil litigation. They clearly didn't consider themselves to have been materially harmed. The second statement doesn't in any way follow from the first. There are call kinds of reasons why JSTOR might have decided not to pursue civil litigation. Swartz quite possibly didn't have enough money to make it worthwhile, and it would have been bad publicity. On top of that, given that Swartz was already facing criminal prosecution, there was no need to pursue civil litigation as a deterrent to others. >Where did you get the information that the entirety of JSTOR was shut down, even temporarily? http://swartz-report.mit.edu/faq.html http://swartz-report.mit.edu/faq.html ("This activity was in violation of MIT's licensing agreement with JSTOR, and its scale threatened JSTOR's network so profoundly that JSTOR blocked all MIT access for three days in October 2010.") My original post was open to the interpretation that JSTOR shut down everywhere for everyone, which is not the case. But anyway, it's clear that Swartz's activities were significantly disruptive. What you seem to be missing is that Swartz's actions were a direct challenge to JSTOR's entire business model. The only way that JSTOR can make money out of scanning old journal articles is to charge fees to someone or other for access to those articles. If the entire JSTOR database becomes freely available, then this income stream is cut off. It's worth considering what the effects would have been if Swartz had succeeded in doing what he intended to do, i.e. release JSTOR's entire database of articles. This wasn't merely a prank or a protest. It was something that had the potential to destroy JSTOR entirely. (And JSTOR isn't even evil -- it's a non-profit that does a lot of great work.)
- wolfgke 11y ago
  He was a (rather) innocent lamb, but the law system is not.

Esau 11y ago

Don't act like Swartz was an innocent lamb.

chris_wot 11y ago
He's not. You can accept Schwartz broke the law in downloading a bunch of case law that probably would have cost a maximum of $10,000, if that. You don't have to forgive Carmen Ortiz or Stephen Heyman for prosecutorial overreach, or the complete and utter misuse of public resources in prosecuting a crime the supposed victim, JSTOR, had resolved was no longer an issue.
- oldmanjay 11y ago
  The real problem is accepting that he broke into MIT property and tampered with their network as if he had some sort of moral high ground that granted him a right to do so. Private property does not belong to the hacking class simply because they can get to it, and that aspect of the lionization of Aaron Swartz is distasteful at best. This was not just "Robin Hood" freeing research for the poor, it was a man violating the rights of others based on strong desires. Hardly noble. Hardly heroic. That he couldn't face the consequences of the actions once he realized that desire did not translate into a right just cuts down the last tree in that forest, to me. My heroes aren't cowardly.
  - chris_wot 11y ago
    Really? I'm curious here, who was injured? Seriously, tell me the exact person who was harmed by him hooking up his laptop into the MIT network.
    - foldr 11y ago
      JSTOR had to shut down temporarily, which hurt everyone who uses it. And MIT would certainly be harmed if they made it known that anyone who liked was allowed to break into their property and hook into their network.
      - rek0j 11y ago
        "had to shut down" It didn't have to shut down any more than you'd have to burn your own house down after a burglary. If somebody broke into my house and was caught I supposed I could overreact and go into massive debt fortifying it with castle walls, a moat, and alligators. But I don't think the legal system should side with parties doing damage to themselves just because they don't understand computer networks.
        foldr 11y ago
        I don't think it's credible to suggest that JSTOR would have shut down if they didn't think it was necessary. I dislike this victim-blaming mentality that some people seem to have in relation to computer-related crimes. JSTOR appear to have done their best to handle the situation, bearing in mind that they cannot be seen to condone violations of the licenses which they have negotiated with publishers.
        chris_wot 11y ago
        Both JSTOR and MIT declined to pursue civil litigation. They clearly didn't consider themselves to have been materially harmed. Where did you get the information that the entirety of JSTOR was shut down, even temporarily?
        foldr 11y ago
        >Both JSTOR and MIT declined to pursue civil litigation. They clearly didn't consider themselves to have been materially harmed. The second statement doesn't in any way follow from the first. There are call kinds of reasons why JSTOR might have decided not to pursue civil litigation. Swartz quite possibly didn't have enough money to make it worthwhile, and it would have been bad publicity. On top of that, given that Swartz was already facing criminal prosecution, there was no need to pursue civil litigation as a deterrent to others. >Where did you get the information that the entirety of JSTOR was shut down, even temporarily? http://swartz-report.mit.edu/faq.html http://swartz-report.mit.edu/faq.html ("This activity was in violation of MIT's licensing agreement with JSTOR, and its scale threatened JSTOR's network so profoundly that JSTOR blocked all MIT access for three days in October 2010.") My original post was open to the interpretation that JSTOR shut down everywhere for everyone, which is not the case. But anyway, it's clear that Swartz's activities were significantly disruptive. What you seem to be missing is that Swartz's actions were a direct challenge to JSTOR's entire business model. The only way that JSTOR can make money out of scanning old journal articles is to charge fees to someone or other for access to those articles. If the entire JSTOR database becomes freely available, then this income stream is cut off. It's worth considering what the effects would have been if Swartz had succeeded in doing what he intended to do, i.e. release JSTOR's entire database of articles. This wasn't merely a prank or a protest. It was something that had the potential to destroy JSTOR entirely. (And JSTOR isn't even evil -- it's a non-profit that does a lot of great work.)
wolfgke 11y ago
He was a (rather) innocent lamb, but the law system is not.