>It is irrelevant whether Aaron is bad or good; the law addresses only guilt and leaves morality to others. Legally, what matters is (1) whether he committed the alleged acts and (2) whether those acts (which are currently crimes) should be crimes.
We are not in a court of law. We are in the court of public opinion, where it is very relevant whether Aaron is bad or good.
>there's not a snowball's chance in hell that you will convince other people (i.e., the tecnically illerate supermajority of America) that what he did was "good" once they understand that what he did is considered hacking.
Half the point of this exercise is to make those people understand that "hacking" doesn't mean what they think it means. By these prosecutors' definitions, what they each do every morning by logging into a website using an ad blocker in violation of its terms of service or filling in a fake name to a web form is just as much considered "hacking" -- which is the problem. These laws are asinine. They make us all felons. Normal people can understand that without having to know what curl is.
>People in SV keep saying that, and then they churn out yet another social network or photo sharing app. At this point, I'll believe statements like that, even if made on HN, once they are backed by actual action and not just words.
I read your other post where you attributed the SOPA defeat to lobbying rather than activism. I don't agree with you. If you talk to Congressional aids, it was the volume of letters and the phone calls from real people who did it. It broke records.
If you don't agree with that, how about the Arab Spring? The activists themselves attribute their success to social media. Granted many of them are now learning that being citizens in a new democracy is harder than it looks, but you can't deny that there are actions there rather than just words.
What kind of actions are you looking for anyway? We are not going to have that sort of semi-violent revolution in the United States. That just isn't in the cards. But we can have political change without violence -- which is going to involve a lot more "words" than "actions" but is more than capable of getting results.
And what do you care? If we're willing bust our butts trying to change things, why do you have to shit on the attempt?
I want to fix things. Other like minded people want to fix the same things. We have ideas. We have resources. We are going to try. You can help if you want, but if you don't want to help then please go away and if you encounter anyone more helpful on your way out the door then kindly send them back this way.
And let me say this: If you're arguing that we haven't been living up to our potential, I agree with you. We don't need "another social network or photo sharing app." But we are capable of more than that. So don't tell us that we can't do it -- it helps nothing for you to convince anyone to believe you and have them go back to making more social networks and photo sharing apps. This is more important than that.