Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Perhaps Jeff Atwood Should Stick to the Code

supervacuo.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 33 posts

Re: Perhaps Jeff Atwood Should Stick to the Code

#11

Post by supervacuo »

mcherm wrote: post #5
TylerE wrote: post #2

You don't get off to persuasive start when you call everyone who disagrees with you (before even making it clear what you're disagreeing ABOUT) a moron.

You are misreading the first line of the article. The article's author is lumping himself AND Jeff Atwood (not to mention nearly the entire population of Hacker News) into the same bucket here: ALL of them saddened by the passing of Aaron Swartz. He then disagrees with Jeff Atwood about a further point: whether Aaron should have "accepted the penalty" for his activism. Personally, when I first read Jeff Atwood's orig…

> I am neither sure that Aaron Swartz intended to engage in civil disobedience

This is an interesting point: I would develop it to talk about _levels_ of disobedience.

Like Andrew Auernheimer, I think Swartz knew he would get "in trouble", but didn't appreciate the scale -- which is understandable, as I say in my article, because the details of "trouble" are deliberately obscured.

Re: Perhaps Jeff Atwood Should Stick to the Code

#12

Post by Zimahl »

I get what both are saying but from a pragamtic, unemotional side I think Atwood is right. Atwood's simple premise is that if you are going to be an activist, you better realize that those in power are going to throw everything at you so you better be ready to accept the consequences. In even simpler terms, 'don't do the crime if you can't do the time'.

I know this is a bad example, but I watch 'Whale Wars'. Those folks know exactly what they are doing and walking a very, very fine line where they could be guilty of many offenses in multiple countries. But they don't care and a few have served time for what they have done. They don't seem to whine about it because they feel it's worth it.

What Atwood says appears cold and insensitive. But I think he's getting a little tired (like a lot of us) of the constant 'Swartz did nothing wrong'/'prosecution for no reason'/'visionary bullied into suicide' meme (nothing else to call it). He absolutely broke the law in a couple ways. Was the prosecution overzealous? Maybe. We don't know what the outcome would've been so we can't say whether it would've been fair.

Re: Perhaps Jeff Atwood Should Stick to the Code

#13

Post by VikingCoder »

"I say this not as a person who wishes to judge Aaron Swartz. I say it as a fellow gamer who has also considered playing the same move quite recently. To the point that I – like Aaron himself, I am sure – was actively researching it."

Atwood is saying that he's considered suicide - recently, and that he doesn't want to judge Aaron. Most importantly, he's grieving, and different people grieve in different ways.

I think you're being overly harsh in your post. Especially since you have two messages for Jeff: stick to code; alter your message. Which would you prefer? Either way, you're judging his grieving process, which I think is unfair.

I think you should express your own grief (and outrage) in your own way. Pointing fingers at others who are grieving isn't nearly as constructive, I think.

Re: Perhaps Jeff Atwood Should Stick to the Code

#15

Post by supervacuo »

Zimahl wrote: post #12

I get what both are saying but from a pragamtic, unemotional side I think Atwood is right. Atwood's simple premise is that if you are going to be an activist, you better realize that those in power are going to throw everything at you so you better be ready to accept the consequences. In even simpler terms, 'don't do the crime if you can't do the time'. I know this is a bad example, but I watch 'Whale Wars'. Those fo…

"The law" isn't some monolith, though -- it's defined by every institution (every person?) enforcing it, and every decision made in carrying out "justice".

It's a crime under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act to port-scan Google. Are you really saying that you'd be getting tired of people talking about it if someone who'd done just that was facing years in jail (a perfectly _legal_ consequence).

Re: Perhaps Jeff Atwood Should Stick to the Code

#16

Post by raganwald »

ajross wrote: post #8

I don't think this kind of dialog really helps. Jeff's post was, I thought, sincere and understandable. It's not really the same way I saw things, but I can see what he meant. It clearly wasn't intended to be disrespectful, and reading that in and then flaming about it publicly isn't helping anyone. If Jeff was angry at Aaron for "taking the easy way out" (again: not my personal reaction, but one I think I can unders…

If Jeff was angry at Aaron for "taking the easy way out" (again: not my personal reaction, but one I think I can understand), he has the right to express that without being told he should "stick to the code". Dealing with "inconvenient" emotions is part of grief, and that process deserves respect too.

It is extremely common for people to feel anger at the death of a loved one, especially a death so complicated to process as a suicide.

People take years to unravel the knot and come to accept what has happened. I took it as Jeff being human.

Re: Perhaps Jeff Atwood Should Stick to the Code

#18

Post by dfxm12 »

supervacuo wrote: post #11
mcherm wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are misreading the first line of the article. The article's author is lumping himself AND Jeff Atwood (not to mention nearly the entire population of Hacker News) into the same bucket here: ALL of them saddened by the passing of Aaron Swartz. He then disagrees with Jeff Atwood about a further point: whether Aaron should have "accepted the penalty" for his activism. Personally, when I first read Jeff Atwood's orig…

> I am neither sure that Aaron Swartz intended to engage in civil disobedience This is an interesting point: I would develop it to talk about _levels_ of disobedience. Like Andrew Auernheimer, I think Swartz knew he would get "in trouble", but didn't appreciate the scale -- which is understandable, as I say in my article, because the details of "trouble" are deliberately obscured.

From a NYT article on the matter: A respected Harvard researcher who also is an Internet folk hero has been arrested in Boston on charges related to computer hacking, which are based on allegations that he downloaded articles that he was entitled to get free. (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/20/us/20compute.html?_r=0)

It is also reasonable for one to think they wouldn't get in trouble for this. Either way, at the root of civil disobedience and activism is the desire to change.

I think Dr. King's quote is being taken out of context in these discussions. Dr. King doesn't mean to simply "grin and bear it", Dr. King means that fighting for our freedom is hard, and thus activists must, in order to have any chance of producing change, be prepared for the worst, in some form of self sacrifice.

Atwood is saying (I feel erroneously) that Swartz came so close to creating a change, but gave it all away when he "ragequit".

The point is, what happened happened, and I hope we never have to have a "next time", but I'll bet that if there is a next time, it will play out very differently, and for the better, thanks to Swartz.

Re: Perhaps Jeff Atwood Should Stick to the Code

#19

Post by supervacuo »

VikingCoder wrote: post #13

"I say this not as a person who wishes to judge Aaron Swartz. I say it as a fellow gamer who has also considered playing the same move quite recently. To the point that I – like Aaron himself, I am sure – was actively researching it." Atwood is saying that he's considered suicide - recently, and that he doesn't want to judge Aaron. Most importantly, he's grieving, and different people grieve in different ways. I thin…

Sure. But "respecting Atwood's grief" was outweighed by "challenging his dangerous ideology", especially since (as he says in his post) he'd never met Swartz.

Don't think his suicidal thoughts are relevant to his chosen topic of noble activism. If anything, Atwood mentioning it came across a little "I beat suicide... but this guy couldn't".

Post reply on HN