Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died • Hacker News Board

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#101

Post by 0xcde4c3db » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 4:46 AM UTC

drag0nite wrote: post #67

Why has anybody not commented on the bizarre behavior outlined in this tweet? He stayed on the phone for over an hour, while this person was presumably hanging themselves, without trying to help in any way whatsoever? If this story is true, then they didn't intervene during a key time that person could've been saved. Quite frankly, I am not believing this until there's confirmation.

With some effort, I can sort of understand how one might have that reaction. But the tl;dr is that there's history here that makes it all tragically plausible. More specifically:

1) The persona "Near" was relatively new, following a partial "infosuicide" with respect to their previous pseudonym (which involved a degree of detachment from singular achievements in SNES emulation and preservation benefiting projects ranging from Snes9x to MiSTer to Analogue Super NT), which ties into the fact that

2) invective against Near has been an ongoing phenomenon for literally decades. Many people in the broader SNES emulation scene considered Near's pursuit of console-compatibility (for hacks/translations) and console-accuracy (for emulators) to be a kind of counterproductive pedantry rather than a contribution to the field. From there, it spiraled into a vicious cycle of Near being exploited as a "lolcow", a tradition with a long and ugly history of disproportionately preying on the insecurities of people who hold on to earnest desires to contribute to society despite being marginalized for being neurodivergent and/or gender-nonconforming.

3) marcan is, in the grand scheme of things, uncommonly credible. He's well-known as part of multiple ambitious reverse engineering efforts (e.g. Team Twiizers/fail0verflow, OpenKinect) and is known for his no-bullshit approach to a wide variety of infosec and opsec issues. His word carries well-earned weight to people who follow those scenes.

(NB: I'm not here to debate any of these points with you. I'm simply injecting some background. Please don't confuse yourself as to what's happening here.)

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#102

Post by Lord_Nightmare » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 4:46 AM UTC

colanderman wrote: post #58

Klonoar wrote: post #41

I'm sure some will disagree, but I'd argue this should be a black bar moment. So many of us grew up in the early-to-late-2000s internet, likely on many of the forums that touched on emulation. Near/byuu's achievements in emulation/game preservation are insane and arguably unmatched, and they also posted here from time[1] to time[2]. So sad to see this all unfold. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=near

Another vote for black bar. Near was inspirational and a true hacker. @dang, can we get one?

I second this.

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#103

Post by swsieber » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 4:47 AM UTC

What would be necessary to bring a lawsuit against KW? Who would do it, and what would the charges be?

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#104

Post by ta2162 » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 5:12 AM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #84

ta2162 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not the definition of murder though, even if you feel like it is. I know we're in a post-fact world, but you don't get to magically decide what words mean.

> That's not the definition of murder though It’s usually, when criminally charged, been charged as a lesser degree of homicide (typically some form of manslaughter), but that's because its hard in that kind of case to prove premeditation, as the causation element is the same between murder and manslaughter. If there is actual premeditation, it fits within the definition of murder.

So, not the definition of murder/manslaughter, and the concept of "premeditation" doesn't even apply here. Got it.

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#105

Post by superfamicom » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 5:30 AM UTC

razodactyl wrote: post #48

I only discovered higan a couple days ago. What a loss of talent, especially the loss of someone who dedicated so much time to a passion project with tremendous contribution to the community. Is there a way to keep their home page online?

I believe the hosting and domains have been taken care of.

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#106

Post by Dracophoenix » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 5:35 AM UTC

GPerson wrote: post #88

ALittleLight wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it is the same as murder or should be illegal. Just yesterday YouTube recommended me a video about an Australian YouTuber facing legal trouble for being mean to an Australian government figure. The laws he may, or may not, have run afoul of use similar language about online harassment. The YouTuber claims to be calling attention to corruption and poor governmental practice. To me, the Australian YouTube…

The original thread seems to exhibit gray area stalking. Look at post #84. https://kiwifarms.net/threads/byuu-byuu_nyan-setsunakun0.430... Looking through that thread, I wouldn’t be surprised if a cyberbullying case could be made in many states. There are early comments predicting and mocking the victim’s suicide far in advance of it. With all the evidence we’ve got, it seems like this cyberbullying has some culpabil…

IANAL, but the Michelle Carter case never made it to federal court as the Supreme Court declined to take the case. As a result, the case did not set a de jure precedent for how similar cases should be conducted outside Massachusetts. In addition, Kiwifarms is protected by §230 and the suicide took place in Japan. Under federal law, neither Null nor KF bear any responsibility for the decisions of the site's respondents and it is unlikely that any IP logs are kept. There's also the fact that any such a case would be thrown out for lacking territorial and subject matter jurisdiction. In other words, there's no case.

On the matter of byuu's/Near's suicide, the (or at least one) motivation wasn't from bullying per se, but from Null's refusal to take down the 3 year old discussion thread regarding byuu.

Source:https://kiwifarms.net/threads/byuu-byuu_nyan-setsunakun0.430...

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#107

Post by drag0nite » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 5:37 AM UTC

emodendroket wrote: post #94

drag0nite wrote: post #67

Why has anybody not commented on the bizarre behavior outlined in this tweet? He stayed on the phone for over an hour, while this person was presumably hanging themselves, without trying to help in any way whatsoever? If this story is true, then they didn't intervene during a key time that person could've been saved. Quite frankly, I am not believing this until there's confirmation.

I'm not sure what you can do in that situation if you don't know where the person lives and they're in a foreign country whose language you don't speak. Who do you even contact?

The person who wrote the note said they had coffee with Near in Akihabara on June 9th. That would imply they both are in Japan, so none of that thinking would apply here.

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#108

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 5:41 AM UTC

0xcde4c3db wrote: post #101

drag0nite wrote: post #67

Why has anybody not commented on the bizarre behavior outlined in this tweet? He stayed on the phone for over an hour, while this person was presumably hanging themselves, without trying to help in any way whatsoever? If this story is true, then they didn't intervene during a key time that person could've been saved. Quite frankly, I am not believing this until there's confirmation.

With some effort, I can sort of understand how one might have that reaction. But the tl;dr is that there's history here that makes it all tragically plausible. More specifically: 1) The persona "Near" was relatively new, following a partial "infosuicide" with respect to their previous pseudonym (which involved a degree of detachment from singular achievements in SNES emulation and preservation benefiting projects ran…

[deleted]

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#109

Post by chalupa-man » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 5:51 AM UTC

TheFreim wrote: post #29

Very sad that they are gone, byuu's work on emulators has been very useful. Weird to hear about things like this and realize that people are real on the other end of the computer. Skimming through, I don't see a reason why they were harassed by Kiwi Farms. I don't get it, what caused that?

They were on the autism spectrum, and had written about feeling emotionally sensitive and easily overwhelmed. Unfortunately, that's all it takes for bullies who just want to have an impact on someone -- knowing you're vulnerable to it. Then they came out as non-binary and made some political posts, which elevated it to hatred for many of those bullies.

Re: Near, the emulator developer of bsnes, higan, and more, has died

#110

Post by GPerson » Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 5:57 AM UTC

Dracophoenix wrote: post #106

GPerson wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The original thread seems to exhibit gray area stalking. Look at post #84. https://kiwifarms.net/threads/byuu-byuu_nyan-setsunakun0.430... Looking through that thread, I wouldn’t be surprised if a cyberbullying case could be made in many states. There are early comments predicting and mocking the victim’s suicide far in advance of it. With all the evidence we’ve got, it seems like this cyberbullying has some culpabil…

IANAL, but the Michelle Carter case never made it to federal court as the Supreme Court declined to take the case. As a result, the case did not set a de jure precedent for how similar cases should be conducted outside Massachusetts. In addition, Kiwifarms is protected by §230 and the suicide took place in Japan. Under federal law, neither Null nor KF bear any responsibility for the decisions of the site's respondent…

This Twitter thread strongly suggests the motivation was largely due to bullying from the Kiwi Farms forum, in addition to the owner’s refusal to do anything about the thread.

https://mobile.twitter.com/near_koukai/status/14089400572353...

I was arguing that the event could be considered more than nothing, possibly something like manslaughter due to possibly analogous events being considered as such. Not that the actors would be prosecuted under any particular law.