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The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

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Re: The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

#11

Post by burke »

danso wrote: post #5
theevocater wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only that but the actual trespassing charge was dropped. So it wasn't even part of the case!

I didn't even realize that. The most salacious and unsympathetic of the allegations is how Swartz got physical access...othherwise, how different is what he did than what people who go to Starbucks and torrent illegally? Just magnitude?

The difference in this case is that it could reasonably be argued he had an implied license to all the content he downloaded.

The millions of kids downloading music have done more wrong by the letter of the law than Aaron did.

Re: The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

#13

Post by todayiamme »

The only conclusion I can draw from his life and the events leading up to his demise is that he must have upset someone deeply entrenched in the circles of power. Otherwise the witch-hunt just doesn't make any sense. After all ask yourself what motive did the prosecutor possess for going after him like that?

Re: The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

#14

Post by mayneack »

ghshephard wrote: post #2

I wasn't aware the closet was unlocked. And apparently used by a homeless guy to store his stuff. So, even the bare minimum real crime that I thought he was guilty of (Breaking into a closet) which is a crime serviceable by community service in this context - turns out not to have occurred. I've been sad all morning. Reading this article just makes me angry.

MIT is very open. They just put ID card readers on the student center in the last month or so. I used to see homeless people in the computer labs around campus and the student center all the time.

Re: The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

#15

Post by erichocean »

jzone3 wrote: post #12

Did Aaron release the articles, or just download them? If he released them, using what medium?

He returned all of the articles he downloaded to JSTOR when he was asked to. He did not distribute them.

UPDATE: Here's JSTOR's confirmation of the above: http://about.jstor.org/statement-swartz

Re: The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

#16

Post by larrys »

"I know a criminal hack when I see it, and Aaron’s downloading of journal articles from an unlocked closet is not an offense worth 35 years in jail."

Prosecutors regularly ask for outrageous sentences which from my observation are rarely granted.

Here is the case of Mark Drier. Government asked for 150 years, he got 20 years:

http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2009/07/13/breaking-marc-dreier-sen...

Michael Miliken theoretically could have faced 520 years:

http://www.nytimes.com/1989/03/30/business/junk-bond-leader-...

This is what happened (he got 10 and that was reduced):

http://www.nytimes.com/1992/08/06/business/milken-s-sentence...

Re: The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

#17

Post by nateware »

doe88 wrote: post #9

It's even lower than what I expected. I remember having read one time there was allegedly a copied cookie involved (which already wasn't what I would call a hack), but it seems that's not even the case. I'm astonished how such a small offense could bring such huge charges.

Agreed, if that article is accurate those charges are ludicrous. There are plugins for every major browser that basically do the exact same thing, which any average layperson can use. What's next, claiming that AdBlock is inspecting and subverting Internet traffic, and hence a crime under the Wiretap Act?

Re: The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

#18

Post by VikingCoder »

I can't remember a specific incident, but I'm fairly certain I've done things more "inconsiderate" than this.

Cripes, this reads like something Larry and Sergey would have done in the early days of Backrub (later Google), not something that you get prosecuted for and face the possibility of 35 years in jail for.

Re: The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

#19

Post by andrewtbham »

todayiamme wrote: post #13

The only conclusion I can draw from his life and the events leading up to his demise is that he must have upset someone deeply entrenched in the circles of power. Otherwise the witch-hunt just doesn't make any sense. After all ask yourself what motive did the prosecutor possess for going after him like that?

Yeh I have thought the same thing. So, who could it be?

Re: The Truth About Aaron Swartz's "Crime"

#20

Post by todayiamme »

andrewtbham wrote: post #19
todayiamme wrote: post #13

The only conclusion I can draw from his life and the events leading up to his demise is that he must have upset someone deeply entrenched in the circles of power. Otherwise the witch-hunt just doesn't make any sense. After all ask yourself what motive did the prosecutor possess for going after him like that?

Yeh I have thought the same thing. So, who could it be?

I doubt it if we'll ever know. Where I'm from such influence is exercised discreetly in back rooms over bottles of blue label, and I have a feeling that the US isn't too different. It is not my intention to sound conspiratorial or expound conspiracy theories, I'm simply try to state the underlying truism that this world isn't as neat, fair or rational as we would like it to be. It feels very uncomfortable to admit this, but the harsh truth is that it isn't just about who you are, it's also about who you know.

In a just, rational world, Aaron would have been lauded as a hero, but our world isn't that world. Our world is one where influence carries more weight than the power of ideas and even though ideas may win in the long term, the effect of power wielded by certain individuals is more immediate and almost always more corrosive.

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