It’s up on the MIT website too: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/letter-on-death-of-aaron-...
MIT President on Aaron Swartz
41–50 of 223 posts
Re: MIT President on Aaron Swartz
#42Aaron Swartz was mentally ill and committed suicide as a direct result of his mental illness. He comtemplated suicide in 2007 long before any of this DOJ stuff happened. http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/dying Furthermore the "glorification" of his suicide is doing nothing more but encouraging other suicidal "hackers" to go over the edge so they have their "story" and inconsequential blog posts plastered all of Hacker Ne…
nope. the outpouring is motivating places like MIT to look into their actions, and others to look into the actions of the US Attorney. that's not 'nothing.'
looking the other way in order not to encourage copycats doesn't sound right.
a Chinese official would say media attention just encourages people to set themselves on fire in Tienanmen Square, so we should pay no heed to them or to root causes.
fair warning to would-be suicides, if you're not an Internet / tech leader HN isn't going to front-page you.
the media circus surrounding mass killers is more problematic.
Re: MIT President on Aaron Swartz
#43Aaron Swartz was mentally ill and committed suicide as a direct result of his mental illness. He comtemplated suicide in 2007 long before any of this DOJ stuff happened. http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/dying Furthermore the "glorification" of his suicide is doing nothing more but encouraging other suicidal "hackers" to go over the edge so they have their "story" and inconsequential blog posts plastered all of Hacker Ne…
Yes, and if you looked carefully you'll notice that he didn't actually do anything until he was threatened with spending a life in jail and being bankrupted , without the option to get off without pleading guilty. And all that for trying to do something good. You describe yourself as a 'public interest lawyer'. I suggest you try to live up to that title and have the public interest at heart. The subject of your littl…
So from what I've read, he had the option to plead guilty to some charges and I'm sure spend very little time in jail, but he didn't want to plead guilty at all. He had options.
Re: MIT President on Aaron Swartz
#44Very well written. Reif understands that there is nothing to be gained by outright pointing fingers. He knows that MIT played some part and basically admits it. What he doesn't want to do is go into details until he readily understands what role MIT played.
Well objectively MIT did play a role, but whether the role was ethically right or wrong is a separate question. So the letter by itself does not admit anything, and we'll have to wait for the results of the investigation.
Re: MIT President on Aaron Swartz
#45Aaron Swartz was mentally ill and committed suicide as a direct result of his mental illness. He comtemplated suicide in 2007 long before any of this DOJ stuff happened. http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/dying Furthermore the "glorification" of his suicide is doing nothing more but encouraging other suicidal "hackers" to go over the edge so they have their "story" and inconsequential blog posts plastered all of Hacker Ne…
Woww this is strong.
As many this week-end I have thought about it a lot. I don't know what factor his problems with the DOJ weighed in his decision to commit suicide. But I know few things, when he committed his actions he was very young, moreover what he did is certainly not criminal. The system must be fair must be proportional and balanced. This is a remainder that there is a difference between a citizen taking an action and a system, you can not compare both. The system has an history, has some experience and knows that the decisions it take may affect life of human beings. This is life and deaths decisions. When you represent the justice you can not decide on your own that you want to make an example or that you will seek the harshest penalties possible, you must be fair you must think about the consequences of your decisions, your are responsible, you have duties. I think the persons in charge of this case failed in this regard.
Re: MIT President on Aaron Swartz
#46Aaron Swartz was mentally ill and committed suicide as a direct result of his mental illness. He comtemplated suicide in 2007 long before any of this DOJ stuff happened. http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/dying Furthermore the "glorification" of his suicide is doing nothing more but encouraging other suicidal "hackers" to go over the edge so they have their "story" and inconsequential blog posts plastered all of Hacker Ne…
The witch hunt angle has been bothering me a lot, and should be ample evidence that the people of Hacker News are no better than the reactionaries of Reddit or even 4chan. No sooner had the man's death hit the news that people started foaming at the mouth, writing long manifestos and diatribes, and calling for the head of everyone and anyone related to the prosecution. We are better than this. Actually, evidently, no…
The sanest comment I've read regarding HN's reaction to this tragic story.
Re: MIT President on Aaron Swartz
#47Aaron Swartz was mentally ill and committed suicide as a direct result of his mental illness. He comtemplated suicide in 2007 long before any of this DOJ stuff happened. http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/dying Furthermore the "glorification" of his suicide is doing nothing more but encouraging other suicidal "hackers" to go over the edge so they have their "story" and inconsequential blog posts plastered all of Hacker Ne…
The witch hunt angle has been bothering me a lot, and should be ample evidence that the people of Hacker News are no better than the reactionaries of Reddit or even 4chan. No sooner had the man's death hit the news that people started foaming at the mouth, writing long manifestos and diatribes, and calling for the head of everyone and anyone related to the prosecution. We are better than this. Actually, evidently, no…
Anger is one stage many will go through in the process of coping with such an immense loss.
It may be irrational, but it's only human. Humans aren't logical all the time.
Furthermore, on HN at least, your "we" seems to actually be "a vocal minority of us", and by no means represents the pervasive sentiment. I think overall, we're angry at the machine, not the cogs in it. Certainly I am.
In time those of us who mourn Aaron's passing will hopefully channel that anger into productive change. But until then, judging a community's reasonableness in the wake of a tragedy like this is setting a really, really high bar. Emotions. We've all got 'em, even hackers.
Re: MIT President on Aaron Swartz
#48"Whoopsy. Also: throwing Prof. Abelson under the bus."
I don't see how. Hal Abelson is on the boards of Creative Commons and the Free Software Foundation (and as such is hardly a standard bearer for restrictive copyright), and he's being asked to independently review how MIT handled the entire series of events leading up to this. How is he being thrown under the bus?
As a diversionary tactic.
Re: MIT President on Aaron Swartz
#49Aaron Swartz was mentally ill and committed suicide as a direct result of his mental illness. He comtemplated suicide in 2007 long before any of this DOJ stuff happened. http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/dying Furthermore the "glorification" of his suicide is doing nothing more but encouraging other suicidal "hackers" to go over the edge so they have their "story" and inconsequential blog posts plastered all of Hacker Ne…
The witch hunt angle has been bothering me a lot, and should be ample evidence that the people of Hacker News are no better than the reactionaries of Reddit or even 4chan. No sooner had the man's death hit the news that people started foaming at the mouth, writing long manifestos and diatribes, and calling for the head of everyone and anyone related to the prosecution. We are better than this. Actually, evidently, no…
Thanks for saying that.
Re: MIT President on Aaron Swartz
#50Very well written. Reif understands that there is nothing to be gained by outright pointing fingers. He knows that MIT played some part and basically admits it. What he doesn't want to do is go into details until he readily understands what role MIT played.
Well objectively MIT did play a role, but whether the role was ethically right or wrong is a separate question. So the letter by itself does not admit anything, and we'll have to wait for the results of the investigation.
Threatening someone's life (30+ years in prison) for civilian expropriation of data is certainly a case of bad form, a tenet of ethics. We can argue MIT's significance in this mechanism, but that they aided a bad process is undeniable.