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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

#361
This is dumb...

A person can disagree with an individual's actions and still be sad when that person passes away.

There was no need for this by techchrunch. In fact this article is useless, and complete bullshit.

This article does nothing productive, it adds no value to anything, but only takes away from the whole situation.

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

#362
post #164
post #104

[deleted]

I've been incredibly vocal about my stance on depression here on HN in the past, specifically that saying things like "man up" is absurd. Depression, like every other disease on the planet, is not something you "man up" through. It's a disease that happens to manifest itself in the same places that personality does. To a casual, uninformed observer, depression is a choice of behavior. It isn't. You don't get depressi…

"That said, Ed Weissman made an inappropriate comment."

Could you detail which part of it was inappropriate and why you feel that's the case? (Serious question is it all - or on a point or two?)

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

#363
post #104

[deleted]

I find it odd that everyone here is pointing fingers at edw519 for his 1 comment on that thread, when there were several comments from tptacek that I think did far more to sway public opinion at the time. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4529706 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4529716 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4529781 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4529799 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=452…

:quote: In the abstract he had very valid points, but in the context of that specific thread I think he did a pretty effective job at convincing people that

* Aaron did something wrong * JSTOR backing out doesn't really mean anything * the prosecution is justified in trying to make an example of him * Aaron probably won't serve serious time, this is just a scare tactic :/quote:

All but one of those are correct though. Why is this a bad thing? Even the one that isn't (point 3) is close to an accurate recital of one of the goals of the U.S. justice system (to deter crime by making the perceived risk of conviction unacceptably high).

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

#364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Completely agreed. And as someone who strongly supported what Aaron did at the time (and thus disagreed with you, Ed, et al), this techcrunch "article" is still disgusting. This public singling out of one of us for ad impressions should be taken personally by every commenter here. I know it's the 3072nd time someone has said this, but techcrunch.com should just really be added to the spam blacklist. Unfortunately, fl…

I too disagree with a posted link, and therefore earnestly believe that it should be censored so nobody can see it. Sincerely, the church of scientology

The introspective point raised is quite valid (and has already spawned discussion); the public shaming of an individual citizen of this community is unacceptable. It's not about censorship of ideas - it's about cutting off the funding (and in this case motive) for yet another case of a non-hacker outsider attacking one of us for personal gain.

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

#365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He gave his honest appraisal of what was happening in a current events story on a message board, based on the facts available to us at the time, which included none of the outrageous details that have come to light in the last few days. So, so true. I mean, it's not like people could have simply, y'know, avoided speculating publicly on another person's case when they didn't have all the facts. No, don't go trying t…

Do we know Ed doesn't suffer from depression? The hypocrisy of the TC article is disgusting. They're recklessly throwing stones at people who may be in delicate positions themselves. As far as I can tell the TC article was designed to elicit an emotional reaction without any consideration given to human cost. TC needs to do the naval gazing here.

"Do we know Ed doesn't suffer from depression?"

This in fact happens on HN from my observation frequently.

It goes like this.

Someone says something and if people don't agree they downvote and sometimes say something nasty in return.

Someone write a "Please Help" plea on HN and all the sudden everybody is nice and considerate and rolls out the red carpet (at least time times this happens that the plea gets voted up).

People of course don't know if the person they are being nasty to is suffering from depression, having a bad day, just got fired etc. Unless of course they specifically announce that fact in the "Subject" of what they write (or in a blog post etc.)

No need to ask why that happens (why people are nice when someone lays on their belly asking for help) because it's obvious. The question is why are people so quick to be a "dick" if someone doesn't reveal any weakness.

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

#366
post #260
post #104

[deleted]

I may or may not have something to say about this, but not here, and not now. Can we please just let the family grieve? We are the family.

How about saying your sorry.

Someone was asking for help and mr. edw519, just spit in his face with such absurd comments.

Lets take a step back. Would you spit in the face of someone asking for help. What type of patronizing comments did edw519 make?

He still hasn't said sorry and that tells me all I need to know about him and his ego.

Shame on the members that supported edw519

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

#367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude, stop acting and shut the fuck up. What you said amounts to cyber bullying and it's idiots like you who are setting the spiteful tone in HN comments. So much hate. No matter what other comments here say, you are in a way responsible for his death.

Utter and complete nonsense. Someone offers a thoughtful and considered opinion, and that's "cyberbullying"? Disagreeing with an opinion you hold, no matter how intelligently and reasonably, is "cyberbullying"? Your post could have just stopped at "shut the fuck up". Because that's the essential gist of everything that followed.

edw519 comment 119 days ago on TC, does not present an argument for why it is better if Arron pays his own bills vs society helping pay his bills.

>Aaron should man up, take responsibility for his actions, and pay his own bills.

This comes across as edw519 saying "Aaron should" do what I think is right. Edw519 may have a deep and well reasons argument for why society would be better if it followed his opinion in the comment, but that argument is not in that comment. It would have be more valuable comment in my opinion if had included such a argument

Stating your opinion with out giving a well reasoned argument is by no means cyberbullying, but they do share some signals and indicators.

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

#368
post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I may or may not have something to say about this, but not here, and not now. Can we please just let the family grieve? We are the family.

I am surprised people have taken issue with the words man up. It's only connotation was that Aaron should pay for his own defense, a reasonable statement. I am more taken aback by the overall tone implying that Aaron had some golden-ticket-chance-of-a-lifetime...In hindsight, I don't think anyone would have wanted to shoulder his burdens. I don't think anyone would still say he had a golden ticket. Probably the great…

I am taken back by how much people are defending Ed. The man has ego issues, clearly.

Who berates a person for asking for help any person. It is beyond rude.

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

#369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Not a bad idea. Or maybe simply bifurcate the karma. One value for stories and one for comment quality.

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

#370

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…

(1) hindsight is 20-20 (2) the facts as we know then today were not readily apparent back then (even to those that were actively seeking those facts) (3) Ed has a longstanding history of compassion and care (4) mistakes were made, but there is nobody to apologise to. Can we please stop the mobbing? Thanks.

Exactly we should not mobbing on to Ed. We all make harsh comments sometimes at one point or another. We should only try to keep all this as a remainder that sometimes it's better not to make a comment than a comment too negative when it's made on a person and that it may affect him personally.
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