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Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

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Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#231

Post by mikeash »

citricsquid wrote: post #174
woah wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He certainly seemed to support the outrageous, overreaching prosecution that Aaron was facing. "Aaron should man up, take responsibility for his actions, and pay his own bills." This sounds a lot like "screw you, what you did is wrong, and you should quit whining about it." "man up" clearly implies that Ed Weissman feels that going up against the massive US justice system to allow people without university affiliatio…

Aaron did something wrong [/edit: wrong in the eyes of the law: illegal, poor word choice/], something that he knew was wrong and that is an accepted fact, correct? If he did something he knew was wrong then what edw519 said is right, he should "man up" and accept the consequences, as everyone should do when they do something wrong. The problem is what has come to light since that post was made, it has come to light…

Aaron (supposedly) did something illegal. Whether his actions were wrong is an entirely different question, and one that is highly subjective.

Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#232

Post by django34211 »

RegEx wrote: post #168
django34211 wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Aaron should man up, take responsibility for his actions, and pay his own bills." ~Ed Sounds like Ed was a bit harsh on someone who was going through allot of trouble. The comment was excessively cruel. Not to mention it was the top comment, which must of added large dosage of salt on an already wounded soul. So he(Ed) rightfully deserves any criticism thrown at him. It's such a tool bag comment, Ed should apologize…

And you sound like a drama queen. The severity was not conveyed. According to HN users in this thread, it couldn't be for whatever reasons. We didn't know the extent of the trouble. Sure, he was rude, and I don't like it when people are rude, but some people in this thread are making it sound like he pulled the fucking trigger. Give it a rest.

Why don't you "man up" and acknowledge, the comment was not only very distasteful, but extremely vitriolic and damaging for someone who was asking for help.

He was asking for help, is this the type of rude comment you make when someone ask for it.

Severity wasn't conveyed, what does everything have to be explicitly spelled out for you in order to understand.

Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#233

Post by waterlesscloud »

martinoma wrote: post #219
Pr0 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually tried to submit it before "martinoma" but was told that I was submitting too often. It's hard to say if TC really did submit its own story - throwaway accounts are quite common nowadays.

I'm not affiliated with TC. Admittedly, I did decide to submit quickly so that I (might) reap the upvotes--HN has been transfixed by Aaron Swartz, and reasonably so, and I thought that people might like a reminder of how the community reacted a few months ago.

I wonder if it might not be better to not award karma for submissions which are upvoted. It's possible/probable that most stories of value would get submitted anyway, and it would discourage the mad rush to submit.

Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#234

Post by jacquesm »

graue wrote: post #185
jacquesm wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What bugs me a lot more than the meanness in either of those two historical threads is some of the stuff that happened in the last 3 days. That's the part I can not get my head wrapped around. It really bugs me.

You mean his death? To say that it bugs me would be an extreme understatement. Like many, I immediately felt devastated, even though I'd never met him. If you are referring to other stuff: What else happened in the last 3 days that bugs you?

Some of the stuff people have been writing in these threads is so unbelievably callous and insensitive that I really wonder what drives us all to do these things.

Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#235

Post by thaumaturgy »

citricsquid wrote: post #207
thaumaturgy wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See, here's the problem. In one sentence you're arguing that he should "accept the consequences", and in literally the very next sentence, you're describing how bad the consequences ended up being. That is what is wrong with saying, "just accept the consequences", when you have no damn idea what the consequences are.

A story and the reality are always different. The story as presented to people at the time was Aaron had done something (legally) wrong and was in trouble for doing it, some people believed what he did was for a just cause (education material should be free) and others didn't. If the people reading the story at the time were expected to act on the situation by donating, why is it wrong for them to act in the form of…

First, just to be really clear about this: Ed is pretty much the very last example of bad behavior that I would ever look to on HN. He's a heck of a nice guy, and I wish he wasn't the one being discussed here.

That said, surely you can acknowledge that there's a difference between donating and posting a comment?

Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#236

Post by justsee »

[deleted] wrote: post #104

[deleted]

EDIT: updated as tptacek appears to have deleted all his contributions to this thread.

Agreed (with tptacek's deleted comment that people should lay off Weissman). Imagine if we all entered discussions assuming the other party was in an extremely fragile state. No skepticism, speculation, conjecture, kid gloves, boring.

Anyone who's cultivated an online persona has dealt with a variety of debating opponents. I can't imagine Aaron would have been moved either way because one HN commentator questioned the rightness of his fundraising effort. The pitchforking of Weissman by anyone angered by the prosecutorial pitchforking of Swartz is rather absurd.

However what I found more interesting in that thread [0] was additional examples of tptacek's strident establishment stance and how it really irks some HN commentators.

I'd already gathered from his vocal opposition to Wikileaks, and lukewarm opposition to SOPA et al that he's not a CCC-type hacker (a more generous characterization would be that he refuses to drink hacker kool-aid). I think part of that irked me in an irrational way, because really, if you're running a security consultancy in the US then adopting any philosophical position similar to Swartz or Assange would be a complete commercial non-starter.[1]

Perhaps some here expect that any notable hackers should all be Swartzs', sharing a similar social and political outlook, which is a little unrealistic to say the least.

[0] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4529484

[1] I'm also not implying you hold contrary public and private positions. Your advocacy of a more government / corporate friendly position goes well beyond devil's advocacy.

Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#237

Post by nostrademons »

derleth wrote: post #220
Mz wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a woman. I go around telling women to "woman up". I try to do so in an empowering way and not be an asshole. Fuck sexism though.

> I am a woman. I go around telling women to "woman up". Well, the difference between "woman up" and "man up" is that, for men, showing emotion is a sign of weakness, so "man up" means "don't show emotion". That's a very dangerous thing to tell people who have serious emotional problems.

It's not, though. There's a perception that showing emotion is a sign of weakness for men. However, think about how you actually react to men who show emotion. How did you react to Lessig's or Doctorow's posts about Aaron, with all their emotion? Did you think them less of a man for it?

I think there is a strong taboo against men appearing out of control of themselves or their situation. But that's not really gendered: when women appear out of control, we label them "crazy bitches".

Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#238

Post by jacquesm »

nostrademons wrote: post #227
citricsquid wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aaron did something wrong [/edit: wrong in the eyes of the law: illegal, poor word choice/], something that he knew was wrong and that is an accepted fact, correct? If he did something he knew was wrong then what edw519 said is right, he should "man up" and accept the consequences, as everyone should do when they do something wrong. The problem is what has come to light since that post was made, it has come to light…

I'm not entirely certain that Aaron knew he was doing something wrong, or, for that matter, whether he was in fact doing something wrong. It seems he made little effort to cover his tracks and pretty much acted out in the open. And from what I've heard from friends who've met him in person - Aaron was brilliant, idealistic, a nice guy, and hopelessly naive about how the world actually works.

I'm pretty sure that he believed strongly that he was doing something right and that he must have been very upset at being persecuted in the way that he was for doing what was right.

Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#239

Post by dyno12345 »

nostrademons wrote: post #227
citricsquid wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aaron did something wrong [/edit: wrong in the eyes of the law: illegal, poor word choice/], something that he knew was wrong and that is an accepted fact, correct? If he did something he knew was wrong then what edw519 said is right, he should "man up" and accept the consequences, as everyone should do when they do something wrong. The problem is what has come to light since that post was made, it has come to light…

I'm not entirely certain that Aaron knew he was doing something wrong, or, for that matter, whether he was in fact doing something wrong. It seems he made little effort to cover his tracks and pretty much acted out in the open. And from what I've heard from friends who've met him in person - Aaron was brilliant, idealistic, a nice guy, and hopelessly naive about how the world actually works.

If he didn't think he was doing anything wrong, why didn't he just ask permission?

Re: Aaron Swartz, Asking For Help, 119 Days Ago

#240

Post by django34211 »

angrycoder wrote: post #183
[deleted] wrote: post #104

[deleted]

An honest appraisal? That is one way of looking at it. Another way is he threw out a giant derogatory 'Meh' to someone asking for help. Does he bear responsibility for what happened to Aaron? No, but it is also not hard to see how the top ranked comment from a respected member didn't carry some weight in how people perceived Aaron and his situation. The big take away here is that words matter and maybe if you don't h…

"The big take away here is that words matter and maybe if you don't have all 'the facts available' you can give someone the benefit of of the doubt. Or the next time you feel like making a 'meh' post, just say nothing at all"

Couldn't have said it better.

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