27 ms·

Aaron, 5 years later

1009 points by bensw 9y ago

MollyR 9y ago
"Information is power. But like all power, there are those who want to keep it for themselves. The world’s entire scientific and cultural heritage, published over centuries in books and journals, is increasingly being digitized and locked up by a handful of private corporations." - Aaron I think about his quote quite a bit lately. I wonder what he would have thought about modern facebook, google, and the extreme consolidation of american corporations.
- CydeWeys 9y ago
  I think Aaron would've been happy with the developments in the field of scientific publishing over the last half decade, had he been able to see them. I've specifically got Sci-Hub in mind here. Sure, it's not exactly legal, but everyone uses it regardless.
  - pazimzadeh 9y ago
    It's too bad Aaron and Alexandra Elbakyan never met. They might have made a good team.
    - BlytheSchuma 9y ago
      Dang, I can't escape slash fiction even on Hackernews.
    - jacquesm 9y ago
      She's currently in hiding after Elsevier won an injunction. There's one company I'll be very happy to see the last of.
      - stryk 9y ago
        I still don't see why all the scientific paper publishing stuff is allowed to work in the way that it does. I mean, don't a large % of the people doing that research use funding from government grants? If public money was used to produce the research, then the public should have free and available access to it -- we already paid for it.
        jacquesm 9y ago
        Ostensibly you are not paying Elsevier to access the research, you are paying them because they obtained the right to copy the paper. That's the loophole that many of the writers use to publish pre-prints from their own homepages. That did not stop the publishers from suing them: http://www.wired.co.uk/article/elsevier-versus-open-access http://www.wired.co.uk/article/elsevier-versus-open-access
        sapper123 9y ago
        Is the right to copy the paper an agreement between universities and the publisher? If so, can't the universities just give a middle finger to the publisher, cancel those rights and allow the research to be publicized for free, in the interest of furthering research, or is money that they get from the publisher that significant?
        marvy 9y ago
        I'm not an expert in this area, but I'm pretty sure they get no money at all from the publishers. Other way around in fact: their libraries spend large fraction of budget subscribing to the journals.
        black_puppydog 9y ago
        Plus a one-time fee for every paper they publish. Whith the option to pay more and make it open access. And then the library of the same university will still pay to access this article.
        9y ago
      - Vinnl 9y ago
        Well, "in hiding" doesn't mean that much, I think. She's originally from Kazakhstan or Russia and, thus, can't really be touched by US court rulings. She probably shouldn't visit the US or many other countries, but otherwise probably hasn't had to change her lifestyle that much.
    - lambdadmitry 9y ago
      They won't because they have widely different worldviews. For one, Aaron believed in freedom, while Alexandra did it literally for the glory of Motherland. Please don't buy into the simplistic narrative pushed by most Western outlets, Alexandra is Putin's fan who vehemently represses any discerning voice on platforms she controls. Like, a few months back she outright banned Russian IPs from accessing sci-hub over what she perceived as a personal insult [1]. This is very, very different from what I know about Aaron. Tangential: the way she's covered by Western media is such a crying shame. [1]: https://medium.com/@alexandraborissova/sci-hub-banned-in-russia-by-its-founder-citing-bulling-by-liberal-81feca464863 https://medium.com/@alexandraborissova/sci-hub-banned-in-rus...
  - SwellJoe 9y ago
    I think Aaron had more than a little to do with those changes. I'm certain he inspired many within the academic world to think about where and how they published in ways they may not have in the past and helped trigger the pushback from public organizations that sponsor research in recent years. And, there have been numerous technical runs at the problem that were very likely inspired by Aaron's work. It's getting better, but not by accident. People like Aaron made it get better.
- narrator 9y ago
  The Egyptian and Babylonian religions of antiquity were dedicated to maintaining the status quo and they did so for centuries. They did this by carefully guarding who was allowed to have access to sacred knowledge to control who had power in their hierarchical societies. Those with access to specialized knowledge had to be limited in number and properly initiated. Unfortunately, it seems like this pattern of social organization in which knowledge is jelously guarded and only available to the vetted privileged few is a very durable pattern in the organization of human civilizations.
  - aaron-lebo 9y ago
    That comparison only holds if you consider those attending cheap state school on student loans as "the vetted privileged few". Not to mention, even at the state schools, we just download the PDFs off Google Scholar because searching the databases is annoying. Nothings's really changed other than rhetoric.
    - narrator 9y ago
      I'm just saying that Aaron in that quote is describing a very old civilizational anti-pattern. Obviously, things are a lot better than they were, especially after the invention of the printing press and the Internet. There is also a lot of information, such as how to make rockets capable of reaching orbit, that is covered by ITAR that is still jealously guarded knowledge available only to the initiated few.
    - thissiteblows 9y ago
      > That comparison only holds if you consider those attending cheap state school on student loans as "the vetted privileged few". As any sensible person would, consdering how few people do that.
  - ionised 9y ago
    "Beware he who would deny you information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master."
- madez 9y ago
  Have you ever had the feeling like "Uhm, I better not share this article even though I like it" or "I'm curious about a topic but I better not google it" or "I shouldn't have these files on my machine for somebody could find them". These thoughts often come out of social pressure to conform, an invisible ever-present behaviour regulation, that we never explicitly agreed upon. Social pressure is harmful to minorities, which is a problem, because we develop by minorities becoming the majorities. Feeling watched builds up social pressure immensely. Google and Facebook multiply social pressure, because watching is a fundamental and essential part of their business.
  - endlessvoid94 9y ago
    Ever-relevant: http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html
- toastking 9y ago
  Code as well, the other day I couldn't access code that was stored in Github because it was down. There was no mirror of it. The entire point of Git is that it's supposed to be decentralized and now we're even forgetting that.
  - indemnity 9y ago
    Git !=== GitHub.
luhn 9y ago
To clarify for anybody who may not know, "Aaron" in this blog post is Aaron Swartz. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Swartz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Swartz
- B4TMAN 9y ago
  He died so young.
- jotm 9y ago
  I envy him, he had the guts to take the fast way out.
  - antonkm 9y ago
    Please do not be so insensitive on HN, or in other forums. This is an actual person that took his life and you never know who ends up reading your comment.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - chris_wot 9y ago
      Or he could mean what he says.
  - watwut 9y ago
    If you think about suicide and are not just trolling, then don't. Just dont please and rather seek help.
MrQuincle 9y ago
A very moving story. To pick up your life and start living again is not easy. Importantly, to become relaxed and happy again without the feeling to have to become more and more productive or create legacy for ourselves or the ones we love is yet another even more difficult step. There are very few self-help methods that do not have as Target to "improve yourself". Take your time and remember the good times of the past. These times are never wasted.
- urda 9y ago
  > Importantly, to become relaxed and happy again without the feeling to have to become more and more productive or create legacy for ourselves or the ones we love is yet another even more difficult step. I still deal with this problem daily, I never feel that I'm good enough for my family to be happy for me.
jacquesm 9y ago
Hard to respond to this. Hard to believe it has already been five years. Thank you for writing that, not a week goes by that I don't see your brothers hand in something I'm using or that I read about. The whole open access movement and what has been achieved in those five years would have made Aaron both very happy and would have probably had him bouncing off the walls because 'it goes so slow'. Very few people appear to me to be all good but your brother was one of those. Cherish his memory and be proud, like any brother would be, and I'm pretty sure he'd be just as proud of you.
- sillysaurus3 9y ago
  We should also celebrate people's flaws. There's no such thing as an entirely good person. Aaron had mental issues. But those same issues were what gave him strength, because they were a part of him. If you took them away, Aaron wouldn't be Aaron. If we celebrate people's flaws, maybe people won't feel like they're not allowed to have flaws. And maybe that might help people who feel like ending it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16089930 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16089930 The response to that was overwhelmingly positive. Over 20 people reached out. It feels time to help people who are concealing problems. The internet gives us recourse. I don't know Aaron's motivations toward the end, but it feels true that if he had just kept talking, things might have turned out differently.
  - jacquesm 9y ago
    Mental issues are flaws but they don't make a person bad in my book.
    - sillysaurus3 9y ago
      Mm, yes and no. It's one of those things where if you reveal you have them, you feel like less of a person. People look at you differently. Be honest: If you were in a position of authority, would you place someone with known suicidal tendencies in a position of power? What if things went very badly? How about someone with outbursts of anger, or serious sleep issues that prevent them from showing up to work on time? When people feel pressure to conceal their problems, the pressure builds. Aaron had some political aspirations, and a felony conviction would've precluded him from running for certain offices. Maybe that, combined with his internal issues, may have made him feel like less of a person. I don't know. I just want people to feel okay with themselves, however they are. Once people realize that it's genuinely ok to have issues, hopefully society will relax a bit. Or maybe there is no solution, and people will eventually take their own lives for one reason or another. And that's ok too. We can remind them that it's not the only option, and give them some space to unwind. That seems like the crux of it: People are so hung up on doing well or being a good person or accomplishing their careers, that their whole self-worth is tied up in it. When it goes badly, it's easy to take it out on yourself. But there's no reason to. The chips fall wherever they fall.
NelsonMinar 9y ago
Some days it's hard to believe he's really gone.
calimac 9y ago
The arrogance of the bureau and academia killed Aaron
limeblack 9y ago
I lived in Highland Park when he committed suicide and attended the same high school he did(NSCDS). NSCDS talked a lot about Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. They also talked a lot also about Gandhi and other activists. It is a day school so they have an alternative form of teaching. I feel comfort saying this influenced his decisions for later in his life.
- contingencies 9y ago
  Good education is so important. Some high profile hackers such as Alan Kay have spent a lot of effort on tools for education and for children. We should all take a leaf out of his book and try to dedicate some resources to assist with free online public education and related technologies for the benefit of subsequent generations.
beardog 9y ago
Sci-hub and Library Genesis take a decent amount of inspiration from Aaron Swartz mission.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
failedartifact 9y ago
I first read this not knowing it was Aaron Swartz. When I read the comments and found out it was instantly heart dropping. I found Aaron to have fought very tough battles for humanity. I tried to get commission on doing an art installation on a side of an old university building. There was 5 wall sections where I want to place 5 inspirational famous people in B&W portrait format. The 5 people were: Elon Musk Neil deGrasse Tyson / Brian Cox (couldn't decide!) Angelina Jolie Malala Yousafzai Aaron Schwartz I made a proposal to my university (Dundee, Scotland), and really thought I had a chance since the building was derelict and that it was covered in shite graffiti. I was turned down because it was going to be torn down. People said I should have just done it, but I couldn't face the possibility of getting kicked out of uni because I graffitied the building.
Egidius 9y ago
I have nothing constructive to say except for that I was really touched by "The Internet's Own Boy". It made me feel related to something I did not experience. I think memories about unnecessary sad events like Aaron's death help us think about the significance of more profound, thoughtful analysis of problems at hand, that have direct impact on human beings.
KasianFranks 9y ago
Insight: http://www.mit.edu/hacker/hacker.html http://www.mit.edu/hacker/hacker.html
- teddyh 9y ago
  That link leads to a page with only this on it: > certificate error > A client certificate was invalid or not provided.
icelancer 9y ago
You're a good man, Ben. Always a privilege to share diner tables with you in Seattle. Happy to do it again if you're around.
firasd 9y ago
A touching note from Zephyr Teachout: "I miss Aaron Swartz. He died 5 years ago today. He was a friend and a rare, huge, soul, and oh did he ever believe in freedom and the possibilities of the future. Wish you were still on call for late night IM strategy sessions, or philosophy, dear friend. I think of you." https://twitter.com/ZephyrTeachout/status/951538523076792320 https://twitter.com/ZephyrTeachout/status/951538523076792320 I also appreciate this thought from a fellow HN poster: "'They say you die twice. One time when you stop breathing and a second time, a bit later on, when somebody says your name for the last time.' That was not even close to the ending of Aaron Swartz." https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11719398 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11719398
- alelefant 9y ago
  The quote about death seems very similar to David Eagleman's book "Forty Tales from the Afterlives". Here's an excerpt that you might find interesting: http://www.eagleman.com/sum/excerpt http://www.eagleman.com/sum/excerpt
  - wickawic 9y ago
    It is also a way of thinking about death prevalent in Jewish culture.
    - akoster 9y ago
      Indeed! It's why many Jews choose to name children after deceased relatives to honor and remember them. Also a similar quote by Irving Yalom: "Some day soon, perhaps in forty years, there will be no one alive who has ever known me. That's when I will be truly dead - when I exist in no one's memory. I thought a lot about how someone very old is the last living individual to have known some person or cluster of people. When that person dies, the whole cluster dies, too, vanishes from the living memory. I wonder who that person will be for me. Whose death will make me truly dead?" https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/153699-some-day-soon-perhaps-in-forty-years-there-will-be https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/153699-some-day-soon-perhap...
- 9y ago
peterwwillis 9y ago
Don't let your loss or grief manifest itself as guilt, because you have nothing to feel guilty about. Feel the loss, but don't blame yourself, or the victim. And don't feel like you have to live up to the image of someone else. Don't give yourself expectations on account of someone else. Set your own goals and expectations, from a place of self-compassion. And just like a good parent should never be hard on their child for failing to complete a project, neither should you be hard on yourself. I'm sure none of that is helpful right now. But the next time you feel pressure or guilt rising up: Gently let it go. You don't owe anyone your peace of mind.
cvaidya1986 9y ago
Sometimes it’s the life in the years rather than the years in the life. Amazing impact although bright career cut short tragically.
aplorbust 9y ago
"I convinced Google to allow me to give their USENET archives to the Internet Archive." Thank you.
- a3_nm 9y ago
  I also thought this was interesting, but I don't see what this is referring to. Google has bought the DejaNews archive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Groups https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Groups and I haven't find any reference of the fact that they would have given it to Internet Archive, neither on the wikipedia article nor on places where it could have been mentioned like https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php/Usenet https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php/Usenet or https://archive.org/details/usenet https://archive.org/details/usenet. Does anyone know what this implies?
  - petercooper 9y ago
    I'd also be keen to know. I had assumed it was https://archive.org/details/usenethistorical https://archive.org/details/usenethistorical .. which is pretty good, but I just discovered comp.lang.javascript only goes back to 2001 there, so my posts from the 90s are not to be found :) Other groups do go back to the mid 90s, however.
  - aplorbust 9y ago
    https://archive.is/PUk3 https://archive.is/PUk3 <--- This posting describes the different collections that Google acquired or received. Is there irony in that one needs archive.is (archive.today) to access it? Maybe someone can find the original still accessible? http://web.archive.org/web/20110110080509/http://www.skrenta.com:80/rt/utzoo-usenet/ http://web.archive.org/web/20110110080509/http://www.skrenta... <--- This is the collection I am most interested in. 1981-1991. Thankfully, one does not need Google to get it.
    - zandorg 9y ago
      UT Zoo is indexed on my usenet site: http://www.dejadejadeja.com/ http://www.dejadejadeja.com/
pwaai 9y ago
His crime was scraping a website. The accusers killed an innocent man for violating Terms of Service. Who's the real criminal here? https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/01/ninth-circuit-doubles-down-violating-websites-terms-service-not-crime https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/01/ninth-circuit-doubles-...
- khazhoux 9y ago
  The prosecutors were in the wrong, but they did not kill him.
  - tomjen3 9y ago
    Still as a minimum we should make sure it never gets another position in power.
  - notthemessiah 9y ago
    They wanted to throw him in a federal prison for 50 years. How is that not robbing someone of their life?
    - tzs 9y ago
      It was around 7 years, and that only if it went to trail and basically everything at the trial when the prosecutor's way [1]. If the plea bargain had been accepted it would have been around 6 months. Here's a good article on how those ridiculously long, completely unrealistic, sentence claims come about so often for Federal cases [2]. [1] http://volokh.com/2013/01/16/the-criminal-charges-against-aaron-swartz-part-2-prosecutorial-discretion/ http://volokh.com/2013/01/16/the-criminal-charges-against-aa... [2] https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-eleventy-million-years/ https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc...
      - syshum 9y ago
        >If the plea bargain had been accepted it would have been around 6 months. I always love how people think the prision term is the only effect or punishment, 6 mos + a felony record for life which is not something that should be taken lightly. Any felony conviction is a life sentence, you are a 2nd class citizen, you are denied everything from housing to employment, you are denied your rights as a citizen, can not vote, can not own a gun, can not do many things. This moronic idea of "well it was really only 6mos" is bullshit.
petrikapu 9y ago
I'm happy he died for a good reason
- jacquesm 9y ago
  He did not die for a good reason.
  - ebcode 9y ago
    Think the parent might have meant "good cause." I'm not sure if Aaron really took his own life or not, and I don't want to say anything insensitive, but I'll share a thought I remember having around the time of his death, which was that if he did kill himself, he was acting out of concern for the greater good -- in that by killing himself, he escaped being "made an example of" by the prosecution, and instead made the prosecution look extremely heavy-handed, and even guilty themselves. The hope would have been that for other folks facing similar circumstances in the future, his case would be remembered and other prosecutors would therefore choose not to go down that same road of trying to make an example out of someone with extreme punishment, for fear of creating another martyr.
rokhayakebe 9y ago
The scariest thing to me is how fast people forget.
DaniFong 9y ago
Just in case it ever comes to this, if I die, it was NOT a suicide. RIP Aaron, I wish I knew you.
- andreyf 9y ago
  I don't consider Aaron's death a suicide, either. It was not exactly a Magnitsky-style beaten-in-prison death, but overly-zealous prosecutors trying to "make an example" of him had more to do with his death than mental illness. Note what happened, in that context, when someone who was not an American political activist did what criminal prosecutors were going after Aaron for: https://www.sciencealert.com/this-woman-has-illegally-uploaded-millions-of-journal-articles-in-an-attempt-to-open-up-science https://www.sciencealert.com/this-woman-has-illegally-upload...
  - tzs 9y ago
    The scihub woman isn't doing any of the thing Swartz was being prosecuted for. All she's doing is copyright infringement.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
- mentalhealth 9y ago
  This is a reasonable statement to want to make, but (with a vanishingly small number of exceptions), suicide is not a choice. It's the result of depression combined with loss of inhibition (due to stress, chemical imbalance, or other factors). Your rational state of mind now has no bearing on whether you are capable of taking your own life under certain circumstances.
  - 0xBA5ED 9y ago
    I'm sorry, but then nothing is a choice. This may technically be true, but it's no way to think.
irq 9y ago
I really like this piece, but your font size is WAY too small, especially on mobile.
andreyf 9y ago
What did SOPA have to do with Net Neutrality?
- r3bl 9y ago
  Doesn't take too big of a stretch to see the connection. No net neutrality: Big companies will be able to afford paying to ISPs to get into "fast lanes", smaller companies will not. SOPA: Big companies will be able to afford scanning user generated content for piracy, smaller companies will not. End result is pretty much the same.
  - wooter 9y ago
    I dont see that connection at all. In fact, it is the 'benevolent' government that has abused surveillance, tried to corruptly enable large companies to censor the internet under the guise of 'anti-piracy' (SOPA), and pushed Aaron to suicide through prosecutorial overreach which Net Neutrality proponents want to grant more control over the ISPs over fear-mongering (like piracy) of prices/throttling. (despite the obvious failures of government-enabled regional monopolies)
    - omnimus 9y ago
      So you think Aaron would be against net neutrality?
      - Profragile 9y ago
        Yes, for obvious reasons. If they are not obvious to you, you have a lot to learn.
of 9y ago
Well, this transformed from a sad story into a comedy. I didn't even know Aaron Swartz had a yuppie startup bro brother. That's probably why he killed himself. lol, i crack myself up.
mylons 9y ago
i had no idea he was your brother. sorry for your loss.
jimnotgym 9y ago
I didn't know Aaron, I don't remember being that aware of him while he was alive, but I did see the SOPA campaign of course, even in the UK. One day I watched the 'Internets own boy' documentary and was profoundly moved. All of a sudden open source, access to information, freedom from surveillance etc really started to matter to me. In fact that is how I found HN! When the snoopers charter came in to the UK it was Aarons story (and what I read afterwards) that made me recognise the danger in such legislation. I wrote to my MP for the first time. Aaron in lots of ways changed my life in that way. Ben I really appreciate your post.
Dangissuchacunt 9y ago
Blah blah blah. You all are all cunts who won't do anything but will idolize someone who actually tried. None of you cunts did anything to help him when he was alive.
chris_wot 9y ago
Carmen Ortiz is still in office. Now that is a tragedy.
- pacifist 9y ago
  She apparently resigned after Trump won. That she wasn't run out of office is a tragedy.
ilamont 9y ago
Ortiz continued to pursue the case, comparing Swartz’s transgression to that of a common thief. The lead prosecutor on the case, Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Heymann, compared Swartz to a rapist who had “revictimized” MIT by not taking a plea bargain, according to a later MIT investigation. Heymann was also bothered that Swartz launched a “wild Internet campaign” in his own defense. (He had not done so.) https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/carmen-ortiz-us-attorney-marty-walsh-prosecution_us_577a7ddce4b09b4c43c0e29a https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/carmen-ortiz-us-attorne... Swartz’s attorney Elliot Peters accused Massachusetts assistant U.S. attorney Stephen Heymann of pursuing federal charges against Swartz to gain publicity. Heymann was looking for “some juicy looking computer crime cases and Aaron’s case, sadly for Aaron, fit the bill,” Peters said. Heymann, Peters believes, thought the Swartz case “was going to receive press and he was going to be a tough guy and read his name in the newspaper.” Heymann, the deputy chief of the criminal division in the Boston-based U.S. Attorney’s office, also headed the computer crimes task force there, a position Peters said “doesn’t carry much prestige and respect unless you have computer crimes cases.” https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/14/aaron-swartz-stephen-heymann_n_2473278.html https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/14/aaron-swartz-steph... MIT’s behavior throughout the case was reprehensible, and this report is quite frankly a whitewash. Here are the facts: This report claims that MIT was “neutral” – but MIT’s lawyers gave prosecutors total access to witnesses and evidence, while refusing access to Aaron’s lawyers to the exact same witnesses and evidence. That’s not neutral. The fact is that all MIT had to do was say publicly, “We don’t want this prosecution to go forward” – and Steve Heymann and Carmen Ortiz would have had no case. We have an institution to contrast MIT with – JSTOR, who came out immediately and publicly against the prosecution. Aaron would be alive today if MIT had acted as JSTOR did. MIT had a moral imperative to do so. http://tarensk.tumblr.com/post/56881327662/mit-report-is-a-whitewash-my-statement-in http://tarensk.tumblr.com/post/56881327662/mit-report-is-a-w...
- gech 9y ago
  I'm sure on HN there are both alumni of MIT hit up for donations as well as high school students considering applying, who could bring this into consideration.
- vardump 9y ago
reificator 9y ago
Thanks for everything you've done since, and everything he was proud of you for before. Aaron Swartz was a rolemodel for me when I was really starting to understand the internet and the value it provided beyond chatting with friends and playing games. When I heard what happened I was angry more than anything, and it reminded me to not take progress for granted. I hesitate to bring this up because it'll probably sound more like criticism than a heads up, and I definitely mean it just as a heads up: It was very jarring to get to the end of the post and have it followed up by "You should follow me on Twitter." I checked another post and it looks like it's just the footer on the blog, but without that knowledge it jumps out at you.
joering2 9y ago
RIP. Glad to see at least Carmen Ortis [1] is out so she won't hurt anyone anymore with the long stretch of government arm she used as a overzealous prosecutor. Fun fact: For a little while she wanted to run for Governor of Massachusetts (good grief!), but the past of butchered prosecution of Mr. Swartz hunted her and she changes her mind. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carmen_Ortiz#Prosecution_of_Aaron_Swartz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carmen_Ortiz#Prosecution_of_Aa...
dakomind 9y ago
The USA doesn't deserve intelligent people. The USA is a crackhouse run by psychopaths. The USA is run by traitors. The USA hunts nerds like dogs.
newscracker 9y ago
If you haven’t watched “The Internet’s Own Boy”, [1] I’d recommend that you do. If you think about freedom, privacy, surveillance, abuse of power and related things, this will make you both sad and angry. We cannot truly have a better world without fighting for these and keep the struggles alive, because the powerful ones are good at retaining their power and at finding ways to keep people’s memories brief. I’m glad that Sci-Hub exists. Though I’m not in research as such, it’s a painful exercise to find relevant information that’s useful and goes into some detail. I struggle with getting full papers from PubMed sometimes. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Internet%27s_Own_Boy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Internet%27s_Own_Boy
Improvotter 9y ago
I'd like to wonder what Aaron would be doing right now with Net Neutrality. He'd be at the forefront of all of these things against the Trump administration. He's the hero we need, that we deserve, but have tragically lost. RIP
- Profragile 9y ago
  He would be on the same side as Wikileaks like he always was. Libtards killed him because he was going to expose them and made the story about totally something else like they always do.
numbers 9y ago
I didn't personally know Aaron but I've read a lot of his blog posts and I was extremely sad to hear about his passing. His blog posts are filled with a lot of information, insights, and thoughts that I usually don't get from other people. Whenever I go back and read his posts, they sound like a friend of mine talking to me.
fjabre 9y ago
I hope the Massachusetts based AG who prosecuted him rots in hell.
Fuckthisboard 9y ago
If I kill myself, please blame dang
gimmeayrwlt 9y ago
All hate speech people are violating freedom of speech. Why someone would like to be against mainstream opinions? Lock them up! Facebook, twitter and google are the mainstream biggest outlets. Why someone would call them "fake news"? Google fired whole lot of hate speech people from they organisation. They simply needed to go out with they outraged, damaging opinions. Lock them all up. Let's keep Germany clean of hateful speech and let's get rid of so called "freedom of speech" also.
bluepandacode 9y ago
For those unfamiliar with him, feature length documentary https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vz06QO3UkQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vz06QO3UkQ
johnnydoe9 9y ago
Just like everyone here Aaron has had a huge impact on my life. I don't have much to say here, just hope you're doing well.
whisk 9y ago
I will always remember Aaron Swartz. I was a student when he leaves. His story really shocked me and taught me what is free, taught me what should I do with my knowledge. I didn't aware it has been five years since then. But now I gaze at the past five years, I'm glad that I'm on the right way which I expected five years ago.
heyok 9y ago
Thanks Ben, I learned a lot from Aaron.
glacials 9y ago
Ben, every point I've been lucky enough to witness you argue at Twitch has alway shone this Neutral Good seed behind it. Unjustified process, user-harmful acts, and any worsening of free speech cause you to interject, never to "wait and see" forever and never to disagree without speaking up. I honestly have become better at this skill by being nearby when you exercise it. And I believe I have spread that to others in my life in turn. I absolutely would be a different person had our desks not happen to end up across from each other through three office shuffles. And I never met Aaron, but I believe by influencing those around you in this way you've done so much more to honor him than the two big ticket items you give yourself credit for.
subcosmos 9y ago
RIP Aaron. You had a profound influence on my life, and I'm sad we never got to meet.

1009 points by bensw 9y ago

"Information is power. But like all power, there are those who want to keep it for themselves. The world’s entire scientific and cultural heritage, published over centuries in books and journals, is increasingly being digitized and locked up by a handful of private corporations." - Aaron I think about his quote quite a bit lately. I wonder what he would have thought about modern facebook, google, and the extreme consolidation of american corporations.

CydeWeys 9y ago
I think Aaron would've been happy with the developments in the field of scientific publishing over the last half decade, had he been able to see them. I've specifically got Sci-Hub in mind here. Sure, it's not exactly legal, but everyone uses it regardless.
- pazimzadeh 9y ago
  It's too bad Aaron and Alexandra Elbakyan never met. They might have made a good team.
  - BlytheSchuma 9y ago
    Dang, I can't escape slash fiction even on Hackernews.
  - jacquesm 9y ago
    She's currently in hiding after Elsevier won an injunction. There's one company I'll be very happy to see the last of.
    - stryk 9y ago
      I still don't see why all the scientific paper publishing stuff is allowed to work in the way that it does. I mean, don't a large % of the people doing that research use funding from government grants? If public money was used to produce the research, then the public should have free and available access to it -- we already paid for it.
      - jacquesm 9y ago
        Ostensibly you are not paying Elsevier to access the research, you are paying them because they obtained the right to copy the paper. That's the loophole that many of the writers use to publish pre-prints from their own homepages. That did not stop the publishers from suing them: http://www.wired.co.uk/article/elsevier-versus-open-access http://www.wired.co.uk/article/elsevier-versus-open-access
        sapper123 9y ago
        Is the right to copy the paper an agreement between universities and the publisher? If so, can't the universities just give a middle finger to the publisher, cancel those rights and allow the research to be publicized for free, in the interest of furthering research, or is money that they get from the publisher that significant?
        marvy 9y ago
        I'm not an expert in this area, but I'm pretty sure they get no money at all from the publishers. Other way around in fact: their libraries spend large fraction of budget subscribing to the journals.
        black_puppydog 9y ago
        Plus a one-time fee for every paper they publish. Whith the option to pay more and make it open access. And then the library of the same university will still pay to access this article.
        9y ago
    - Vinnl 9y ago
      Well, "in hiding" doesn't mean that much, I think. She's originally from Kazakhstan or Russia and, thus, can't really be touched by US court rulings. She probably shouldn't visit the US or many other countries, but otherwise probably hasn't had to change her lifestyle that much.
  - lambdadmitry 9y ago
    They won't because they have widely different worldviews. For one, Aaron believed in freedom, while Alexandra did it literally for the glory of Motherland. Please don't buy into the simplistic narrative pushed by most Western outlets, Alexandra is Putin's fan who vehemently represses any discerning voice on platforms she controls. Like, a few months back she outright banned Russian IPs from accessing sci-hub over what she perceived as a personal insult [1]. This is very, very different from what I know about Aaron. Tangential: the way she's covered by Western media is such a crying shame. [1]: https://medium.com/@alexandraborissova/sci-hub-banned-in-russia-by-its-founder-citing-bulling-by-liberal-81feca464863 https://medium.com/@alexandraborissova/sci-hub-banned-in-rus...
- SwellJoe 9y ago
  I think Aaron had more than a little to do with those changes. I'm certain he inspired many within the academic world to think about where and how they published in ways they may not have in the past and helped trigger the pushback from public organizations that sponsor research in recent years. And, there have been numerous technical runs at the problem that were very likely inspired by Aaron's work. It's getting better, but not by accident. People like Aaron made it get better.
narrator 9y ago
The Egyptian and Babylonian religions of antiquity were dedicated to maintaining the status quo and they did so for centuries. They did this by carefully guarding who was allowed to have access to sacred knowledge to control who had power in their hierarchical societies. Those with access to specialized knowledge had to be limited in number and properly initiated. Unfortunately, it seems like this pattern of social organization in which knowledge is jelously guarded and only available to the vetted privileged few is a very durable pattern in the organization of human civilizations.
- aaron-lebo 9y ago
  That comparison only holds if you consider those attending cheap state school on student loans as "the vetted privileged few". Not to mention, even at the state schools, we just download the PDFs off Google Scholar because searching the databases is annoying. Nothings's really changed other than rhetoric.
  - narrator 9y ago
    I'm just saying that Aaron in that quote is describing a very old civilizational anti-pattern. Obviously, things are a lot better than they were, especially after the invention of the printing press and the Internet. There is also a lot of information, such as how to make rockets capable of reaching orbit, that is covered by ITAR that is still jealously guarded knowledge available only to the initiated few.
  - thissiteblows 9y ago
    > That comparison only holds if you consider those attending cheap state school on student loans as "the vetted privileged few". As any sensible person would, consdering how few people do that.
- ionised 9y ago
  "Beware he who would deny you information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master."
madez 9y ago
Have you ever had the feeling like "Uhm, I better not share this article even though I like it" or "I'm curious about a topic but I better not google it" or "I shouldn't have these files on my machine for somebody could find them". These thoughts often come out of social pressure to conform, an invisible ever-present behaviour regulation, that we never explicitly agreed upon. Social pressure is harmful to minorities, which is a problem, because we develop by minorities becoming the majorities. Feeling watched builds up social pressure immensely. Google and Facebook multiply social pressure, because watching is a fundamental and essential part of their business.
- endlessvoid94 9y ago
  Ever-relevant: http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html
toastking 9y ago
Code as well, the other day I couldn't access code that was stored in Github because it was down. There was no mirror of it. The entire point of Git is that it's supposed to be decentralized and now we're even forgetting that.
- indemnity 9y ago
  Git !=== GitHub.

luhn 9y ago

To clarify for anybody who may not know, "Aaron" in this blog post is Aaron Swartz. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Swartz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Swartz

B4TMAN 9y ago
He died so young.
jotm 9y ago
I envy him, he had the guts to take the fast way out.
- antonkm 9y ago
  Please do not be so insensitive on HN, or in other forums. This is an actual person that took his life and you never know who ends up reading your comment.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - chris_wot 9y ago
    Or he could mean what he says.
- watwut 9y ago
  If you think about suicide and are not just trolling, then don't. Just dont please and rather seek help.

MrQuincle 9y ago

A very moving story. To pick up your life and start living again is not easy. Importantly, to become relaxed and happy again without the feeling to have to become more and more productive or create legacy for ourselves or the ones we love is yet another even more difficult step. There are very few self-help methods that do not have as Target to "improve yourself". Take your time and remember the good times of the past. These times are never wasted.

urda 9y ago
> Importantly, to become relaxed and happy again without the feeling to have to become more and more productive or create legacy for ourselves or the ones we love is yet another even more difficult step. I still deal with this problem daily, I never feel that I'm good enough for my family to be happy for me.

jacquesm 9y ago

Hard to respond to this. Hard to believe it has already been five years. Thank you for writing that, not a week goes by that I don't see your brothers hand in something I'm using or that I read about. The whole open access movement and what has been achieved in those five years would have made Aaron both very happy and would have probably had him bouncing off the walls because 'it goes so slow'. Very few people appear to me to be all good but your brother was one of those. Cherish his memory and be proud, like any brother would be, and I'm pretty sure he'd be just as proud of you.

sillysaurus3 9y ago
We should also celebrate people's flaws. There's no such thing as an entirely good person. Aaron had mental issues. But those same issues were what gave him strength, because they were a part of him. If you took them away, Aaron wouldn't be Aaron. If we celebrate people's flaws, maybe people won't feel like they're not allowed to have flaws. And maybe that might help people who feel like ending it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16089930 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16089930 The response to that was overwhelmingly positive. Over 20 people reached out. It feels time to help people who are concealing problems. The internet gives us recourse. I don't know Aaron's motivations toward the end, but it feels true that if he had just kept talking, things might have turned out differently.
- jacquesm 9y ago
  Mental issues are flaws but they don't make a person bad in my book.
  - sillysaurus3 9y ago
    Mm, yes and no. It's one of those things where if you reveal you have them, you feel like less of a person. People look at you differently. Be honest: If you were in a position of authority, would you place someone with known suicidal tendencies in a position of power? What if things went very badly? How about someone with outbursts of anger, or serious sleep issues that prevent them from showing up to work on time? When people feel pressure to conceal their problems, the pressure builds. Aaron had some political aspirations, and a felony conviction would've precluded him from running for certain offices. Maybe that, combined with his internal issues, may have made him feel like less of a person. I don't know. I just want people to feel okay with themselves, however they are. Once people realize that it's genuinely ok to have issues, hopefully society will relax a bit. Or maybe there is no solution, and people will eventually take their own lives for one reason or another. And that's ok too. We can remind them that it's not the only option, and give them some space to unwind. That seems like the crux of it: People are so hung up on doing well or being a good person or accomplishing their careers, that their whole self-worth is tied up in it. When it goes badly, it's easy to take it out on yourself. But there's no reason to. The chips fall wherever they fall.

NelsonMinar 9y ago

Some days it's hard to believe he's really gone.

calimac 9y ago

The arrogance of the bureau and academia killed Aaron

limeblack 9y ago

I lived in Highland Park when he committed suicide and attended the same high school he did(NSCDS). NSCDS talked a lot about Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. They also talked a lot also about Gandhi and other activists. It is a day school so they have an alternative form of teaching. I feel comfort saying this influenced his decisions for later in his life.

contingencies 9y ago
Good education is so important. Some high profile hackers such as Alan Kay have spent a lot of effort on tools for education and for children. We should all take a leaf out of his book and try to dedicate some resources to assist with free online public education and related technologies for the benefit of subsequent generations.

beardog 9y ago

Sci-hub and Library Genesis take a decent amount of inspiration from Aaron Swartz mission.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

failedartifact 9y ago

I first read this not knowing it was Aaron Swartz. When I read the comments and found out it was instantly heart dropping. I found Aaron to have fought very tough battles for humanity. I tried to get commission on doing an art installation on a side of an old university building. There was 5 wall sections where I want to place 5 inspirational famous people in B&W portrait format. The 5 people were: Elon Musk Neil deGrasse Tyson / Brian Cox (couldn't decide!) Angelina Jolie Malala Yousafzai Aaron Schwartz I made a proposal to my university (Dundee, Scotland), and really thought I had a chance since the building was derelict and that it was covered in shite graffiti. I was turned down because it was going to be torn down. People said I should have just done it, but I couldn't face the possibility of getting kicked out of uni because I graffitied the building.

Egidius 9y ago

I have nothing constructive to say except for that I was really touched by "The Internet's Own Boy". It made me feel related to something I did not experience. I think memories about unnecessary sad events like Aaron's death help us think about the significance of more profound, thoughtful analysis of problems at hand, that have direct impact on human beings.

KasianFranks 9y ago

Insight: http://www.mit.edu/hacker/hacker.html http://www.mit.edu/hacker/hacker.html

teddyh 9y ago
That link leads to a page with only this on it: > certificate error > A client certificate was invalid or not provided.

icelancer 9y ago

You're a good man, Ben. Always a privilege to share diner tables with you in Seattle. Happy to do it again if you're around.

firasd 9y ago

A touching note from Zephyr Teachout: "I miss Aaron Swartz. He died 5 years ago today. He was a friend and a rare, huge, soul, and oh did he ever believe in freedom and the possibilities of the future. Wish you were still on call for late night IM strategy sessions, or philosophy, dear friend. I think of you." https://twitter.com/ZephyrTeachout/status/951538523076792320 https://twitter.com/ZephyrTeachout/status/951538523076792320 I also appreciate this thought from a fellow HN poster: "'They say you die twice. One time when you stop breathing and a second time, a bit later on, when somebody says your name for the last time.' That was not even close to the ending of Aaron Swartz." https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11719398 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11719398

alelefant 9y ago
The quote about death seems very similar to David Eagleman's book "Forty Tales from the Afterlives". Here's an excerpt that you might find interesting: http://www.eagleman.com/sum/excerpt http://www.eagleman.com/sum/excerpt
- wickawic 9y ago
  It is also a way of thinking about death prevalent in Jewish culture.
  - akoster 9y ago
    Indeed! It's why many Jews choose to name children after deceased relatives to honor and remember them. Also a similar quote by Irving Yalom: "Some day soon, perhaps in forty years, there will be no one alive who has ever known me. That's when I will be truly dead - when I exist in no one's memory. I thought a lot about how someone very old is the last living individual to have known some person or cluster of people. When that person dies, the whole cluster dies, too, vanishes from the living memory. I wonder who that person will be for me. Whose death will make me truly dead?" https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/153699-some-day-soon-perhaps-in-forty-years-there-will-be https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/153699-some-day-soon-perhap...
9y ago

peterwwillis 9y ago

Don't let your loss or grief manifest itself as guilt, because you have nothing to feel guilty about. Feel the loss, but don't blame yourself, or the victim. And don't feel like you have to live up to the image of someone else. Don't give yourself expectations on account of someone else. Set your own goals and expectations, from a place of self-compassion. And just like a good parent should never be hard on their child for failing to complete a project, neither should you be hard on yourself. I'm sure none of that is helpful right now. But the next time you feel pressure or guilt rising up: Gently let it go. You don't owe anyone your peace of mind.

cvaidya1986 9y ago

Sometimes it’s the life in the years rather than the years in the life. Amazing impact although bright career cut short tragically.

aplorbust 9y ago

"I convinced Google to allow me to give their USENET archives to the Internet Archive." Thank you.

a3_nm 9y ago
I also thought this was interesting, but I don't see what this is referring to. Google has bought the DejaNews archive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Groups https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Groups and I haven't find any reference of the fact that they would have given it to Internet Archive, neither on the wikipedia article nor on places where it could have been mentioned like https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php/Usenet https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php/Usenet or https://archive.org/details/usenet https://archive.org/details/usenet. Does anyone know what this implies?
- petercooper 9y ago
  I'd also be keen to know. I had assumed it was https://archive.org/details/usenethistorical https://archive.org/details/usenethistorical .. which is pretty good, but I just discovered comp.lang.javascript only goes back to 2001 there, so my posts from the 90s are not to be found :) Other groups do go back to the mid 90s, however.
- aplorbust 9y ago
  https://archive.is/PUk3 https://archive.is/PUk3 <--- This posting describes the different collections that Google acquired or received. Is there irony in that one needs archive.is (archive.today) to access it? Maybe someone can find the original still accessible? http://web.archive.org/web/20110110080509/http://www.skrenta.com:80/rt/utzoo-usenet/ http://web.archive.org/web/20110110080509/http://www.skrenta... <--- This is the collection I am most interested in. 1981-1991. Thankfully, one does not need Google to get it.
  - zandorg 9y ago
    UT Zoo is indexed on my usenet site: http://www.dejadejadeja.com/ http://www.dejadejadeja.com/

pwaai 9y ago

His crime was scraping a website. The accusers killed an innocent man for violating Terms of Service. Who's the real criminal here? https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/01/ninth-circuit-doubles-down-violating-websites-terms-service-not-crime https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/01/ninth-circuit-doubles-...

khazhoux 9y ago
The prosecutors were in the wrong, but they did not kill him.
- tomjen3 9y ago
  Still as a minimum we should make sure it never gets another position in power.
- notthemessiah 9y ago
  They wanted to throw him in a federal prison for 50 years. How is that not robbing someone of their life?
  - tzs 9y ago
    It was around 7 years, and that only if it went to trail and basically everything at the trial when the prosecutor's way [1]. If the plea bargain had been accepted it would have been around 6 months. Here's a good article on how those ridiculously long, completely unrealistic, sentence claims come about so often for Federal cases [2]. [1] http://volokh.com/2013/01/16/the-criminal-charges-against-aaron-swartz-part-2-prosecutorial-discretion/ http://volokh.com/2013/01/16/the-criminal-charges-against-aa... [2] https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-eleventy-million-years/ https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc...
    - syshum 9y ago
      >If the plea bargain had been accepted it would have been around 6 months. I always love how people think the prision term is the only effect or punishment, 6 mos + a felony record for life which is not something that should be taken lightly. Any felony conviction is a life sentence, you are a 2nd class citizen, you are denied everything from housing to employment, you are denied your rights as a citizen, can not vote, can not own a gun, can not do many things. This moronic idea of "well it was really only 6mos" is bullshit.

petrikapu 9y ago

I'm happy he died for a good reason

jacquesm 9y ago
He did not die for a good reason.
- ebcode 9y ago
  Think the parent might have meant "good cause." I'm not sure if Aaron really took his own life or not, and I don't want to say anything insensitive, but I'll share a thought I remember having around the time of his death, which was that if he did kill himself, he was acting out of concern for the greater good -- in that by killing himself, he escaped being "made an example of" by the prosecution, and instead made the prosecution look extremely heavy-handed, and even guilty themselves. The hope would have been that for other folks facing similar circumstances in the future, his case would be remembered and other prosecutors would therefore choose not to go down that same road of trying to make an example out of someone with extreme punishment, for fear of creating another martyr.

rokhayakebe 9y ago

The scariest thing to me is how fast people forget.

DaniFong 9y ago

Just in case it ever comes to this, if I die, it was NOT a suicide. RIP Aaron, I wish I knew you.

andreyf 9y ago
I don't consider Aaron's death a suicide, either. It was not exactly a Magnitsky-style beaten-in-prison death, but overly-zealous prosecutors trying to "make an example" of him had more to do with his death than mental illness. Note what happened, in that context, when someone who was not an American political activist did what criminal prosecutors were going after Aaron for: https://www.sciencealert.com/this-woman-has-illegally-uploaded-millions-of-journal-articles-in-an-attempt-to-open-up-science https://www.sciencealert.com/this-woman-has-illegally-upload...
- tzs 9y ago
  The scihub woman isn't doing any of the thing Swartz was being prosecuted for. All she's doing is copyright infringement.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
mentalhealth 9y ago
This is a reasonable statement to want to make, but (with a vanishingly small number of exceptions), suicide is not a choice. It's the result of depression combined with loss of inhibition (due to stress, chemical imbalance, or other factors). Your rational state of mind now has no bearing on whether you are capable of taking your own life under certain circumstances.
- 0xBA5ED 9y ago
  I'm sorry, but then nothing is a choice. This may technically be true, but it's no way to think.

irq 9y ago

I really like this piece, but your font size is WAY too small, especially on mobile.

andreyf 9y ago

What did SOPA have to do with Net Neutrality?

r3bl 9y ago
Doesn't take too big of a stretch to see the connection. No net neutrality: Big companies will be able to afford paying to ISPs to get into "fast lanes", smaller companies will not. SOPA: Big companies will be able to afford scanning user generated content for piracy, smaller companies will not. End result is pretty much the same.
- wooter 9y ago
  I dont see that connection at all. In fact, it is the 'benevolent' government that has abused surveillance, tried to corruptly enable large companies to censor the internet under the guise of 'anti-piracy' (SOPA), and pushed Aaron to suicide through prosecutorial overreach which Net Neutrality proponents want to grant more control over the ISPs over fear-mongering (like piracy) of prices/throttling. (despite the obvious failures of government-enabled regional monopolies)
  - omnimus 9y ago
    So you think Aaron would be against net neutrality?
    - Profragile 9y ago
      Yes, for obvious reasons. If they are not obvious to you, you have a lot to learn.

of 9y ago

Well, this transformed from a sad story into a comedy. I didn't even know Aaron Swartz had a yuppie startup bro brother. That's probably why he killed himself. lol, i crack myself up.

mylons 9y ago

i had no idea he was your brother. sorry for your loss.

jimnotgym 9y ago

I didn't know Aaron, I don't remember being that aware of him while he was alive, but I did see the SOPA campaign of course, even in the UK. One day I watched the 'Internets own boy' documentary and was profoundly moved. All of a sudden open source, access to information, freedom from surveillance etc really started to matter to me. In fact that is how I found HN! When the snoopers charter came in to the UK it was Aarons story (and what I read afterwards) that made me recognise the danger in such legislation. I wrote to my MP for the first time. Aaron in lots of ways changed my life in that way. Ben I really appreciate your post.

Dangissuchacunt 9y ago

Blah blah blah. You all are all cunts who won't do anything but will idolize someone who actually tried. None of you cunts did anything to help him when he was alive.

chris_wot 9y ago

Carmen Ortiz is still in office. Now that is a tragedy.

pacifist 9y ago
She apparently resigned after Trump won. That she wasn't run out of office is a tragedy.

ilamont 9y ago

Ortiz continued to pursue the case, comparing Swartz’s transgression to that of a common thief. The lead prosecutor on the case, Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Heymann, compared Swartz to a rapist who had “revictimized” MIT by not taking a plea bargain, according to a later MIT investigation. Heymann was also bothered that Swartz launched a “wild Internet campaign” in his own defense. (He had not done so.) https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/carmen-ortiz-us-attorney-marty-walsh-prosecution_us_577a7ddce4b09b4c43c0e29a https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/carmen-ortiz-us-attorne... Swartz’s attorney Elliot Peters accused Massachusetts assistant U.S. attorney Stephen Heymann of pursuing federal charges against Swartz to gain publicity. Heymann was looking for “some juicy looking computer crime cases and Aaron’s case, sadly for Aaron, fit the bill,” Peters said. Heymann, Peters believes, thought the Swartz case “was going to receive press and he was going to be a tough guy and read his name in the newspaper.” Heymann, the deputy chief of the criminal division in the Boston-based U.S. Attorney’s office, also headed the computer crimes task force there, a position Peters said “doesn’t carry much prestige and respect unless you have computer crimes cases.” https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/14/aaron-swartz-stephen-heymann_n_2473278.html https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/14/aaron-swartz-steph... MIT’s behavior throughout the case was reprehensible, and this report is quite frankly a whitewash. Here are the facts: This report claims that MIT was “neutral” – but MIT’s lawyers gave prosecutors total access to witnesses and evidence, while refusing access to Aaron’s lawyers to the exact same witnesses and evidence. That’s not neutral. The fact is that all MIT had to do was say publicly, “We don’t want this prosecution to go forward” – and Steve Heymann and Carmen Ortiz would have had no case. We have an institution to contrast MIT with – JSTOR, who came out immediately and publicly against the prosecution. Aaron would be alive today if MIT had acted as JSTOR did. MIT had a moral imperative to do so. http://tarensk.tumblr.com/post/56881327662/mit-report-is-a-whitewash-my-statement-in http://tarensk.tumblr.com/post/56881327662/mit-report-is-a-w...

gech 9y ago
I'm sure on HN there are both alumni of MIT hit up for donations as well as high school students considering applying, who could bring this into consideration.
vardump 9y ago

reificator 9y ago

Thanks for everything you've done since, and everything he was proud of you for before. Aaron Swartz was a rolemodel for me when I was really starting to understand the internet and the value it provided beyond chatting with friends and playing games. When I heard what happened I was angry more than anything, and it reminded me to not take progress for granted. I hesitate to bring this up because it'll probably sound more like criticism than a heads up, and I definitely mean it just as a heads up: It was very jarring to get to the end of the post and have it followed up by "You should follow me on Twitter." I checked another post and it looks like it's just the footer on the blog, but without that knowledge it jumps out at you.

joering2 9y ago

RIP. Glad to see at least Carmen Ortis [1] is out so she won't hurt anyone anymore with the long stretch of government arm she used as a overzealous prosecutor. Fun fact: For a little while she wanted to run for Governor of Massachusetts (good grief!), but the past of butchered prosecution of Mr. Swartz hunted her and she changes her mind. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carmen_Ortiz#Prosecution_of_Aaron_Swartz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carmen_Ortiz#Prosecution_of_Aa...

dakomind 9y ago

The USA doesn't deserve intelligent people. The USA is a crackhouse run by psychopaths. The USA is run by traitors. The USA hunts nerds like dogs.

newscracker 9y ago

If you haven’t watched “The Internet’s Own Boy”, [1] I’d recommend that you do. If you think about freedom, privacy, surveillance, abuse of power and related things, this will make you both sad and angry. We cannot truly have a better world without fighting for these and keep the struggles alive, because the powerful ones are good at retaining their power and at finding ways to keep people’s memories brief. I’m glad that Sci-Hub exists. Though I’m not in research as such, it’s a painful exercise to find relevant information that’s useful and goes into some detail. I struggle with getting full papers from PubMed sometimes. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Internet%27s_Own_Boy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Internet%27s_Own_Boy

Improvotter 9y ago

I'd like to wonder what Aaron would be doing right now with Net Neutrality. He'd be at the forefront of all of these things against the Trump administration. He's the hero we need, that we deserve, but have tragically lost. RIP

Profragile 9y ago
He would be on the same side as Wikileaks like he always was. Libtards killed him because he was going to expose them and made the story about totally something else like they always do.

numbers 9y ago

I didn't personally know Aaron but I've read a lot of his blog posts and I was extremely sad to hear about his passing. His blog posts are filled with a lot of information, insights, and thoughts that I usually don't get from other people. Whenever I go back and read his posts, they sound like a friend of mine talking to me.

fjabre 9y ago

I hope the Massachusetts based AG who prosecuted him rots in hell.

Fuckthisboard 9y ago

If I kill myself, please blame dang

gimmeayrwlt 9y ago

All hate speech people are violating freedom of speech. Why someone would like to be against mainstream opinions? Lock them up! Facebook, twitter and google are the mainstream biggest outlets. Why someone would call them "fake news"? Google fired whole lot of hate speech people from they organisation. They simply needed to go out with they outraged, damaging opinions. Lock them all up. Let's keep Germany clean of hateful speech and let's get rid of so called "freedom of speech" also.

bluepandacode 9y ago

For those unfamiliar with him, feature length documentary https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vz06QO3UkQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vz06QO3UkQ

johnnydoe9 9y ago

Just like everyone here Aaron has had a huge impact on my life. I don't have much to say here, just hope you're doing well.

whisk 9y ago

I will always remember Aaron Swartz. I was a student when he leaves. His story really shocked me and taught me what is free, taught me what should I do with my knowledge. I didn't aware it has been five years since then. But now I gaze at the past five years, I'm glad that I'm on the right way which I expected five years ago.

heyok 9y ago

Thanks Ben, I learned a lot from Aaron.

glacials 9y ago

Ben, every point I've been lucky enough to witness you argue at Twitch has alway shone this Neutral Good seed behind it. Unjustified process, user-harmful acts, and any worsening of free speech cause you to interject, never to "wait and see" forever and never to disagree without speaking up. I honestly have become better at this skill by being nearby when you exercise it. And I believe I have spread that to others in my life in turn. I absolutely would be a different person had our desks not happen to end up across from each other through three office shuffles. And I never met Aaron, but I believe by influencing those around you in this way you've done so much more to honor him than the two big ticket items you give yourself credit for.

subcosmos 9y ago

RIP Aaron. You had a profound influence on my life, and I'm sad we never got to meet.