The Case Against Aaron Swartz Was Complete Garbage
from the whether-or-not-it-had-an-impact dept
As I stated in my initial post about Aaron Swartz's death, I don't think it's fair to "blame" the DOJ or others on Aaron's suicide -- just as I don't think it's fair to blame anyone's suicide on a third party, no matter how horrible their actions. That said, the DOJ's actions in this case were quite clearly horrible, and since the case will now never go forward, it seems imperative to highlight just how badly the DOJ acted in this case.Larry Lessig's post made some clear points suggesting that the feds and MIT were out of line in pursuing this case, which seems like an understatement:
Here is where we need a better sense of justice, and shame. For the outrageousness in this story is not just Aaron. It is also the absurdity of the prosecutor’s behavior. From the beginning, the government worked as hard as it could to characterize what Aaron did in the most extreme and absurd way. The “property” Aaron had “stolen,” we were told, was worth “millions of dollars” — with the hint, and then the suggestion, that his aim must have been to profit from his crime. But anyone who says that there is money to be made in a stash of ACADEMIC ARTICLES is either an idiot or a liar. It was clear what this was not, yet our government continued to push as if it had caught the 9/11 terrorists red-handed.Lessig made it clear that the feds sought to get Aaron to agree to a plea deal, in which he'd plead guilty to some aspect of the charges against him, in exchange for letting him off on the more serious charges. Aaron did an amazing thing and refused, believing that he had not done anything wrong:
Aaron had literally done nothing in his life “to make money.” He was fortunate Reddit turned out as it did, but from his work building the RSS standard, to his work architecting Creative Commons, to his work liberating public records, to his work building a free public library, to his work supporting Change Congress/FixCongressFirst/Rootstrikers, and then Demand Progress, Aaron was always and only working for (at least his conception of) the public good. He was brilliant, and funny. A kid genius. A soul, a conscience, the source of a question I have asked myself a million times: What would Aaron think? That person is gone today, driven to the edge by what a decent society would only call bullying. I get wrong. But I also get proportionality. And if you don’t get both, you don’t deserve to have the power of the United States government behind you.
In that world, the question this government needs to answer is why it was so necessary that Aaron Swartz be labeled a “felon.” For in the 18 months of negotiations, that was what he was not willing to accept, and so that was the reason he was facing a million dollar trial in April — his wealth bled dry, yet unable to appeal openly to us for the financial help he needed to fund his defense, at least without risking the ire of a district court judge. And so as wrong and misguided and fucking sad as this is, I get how the prospect of this fight, defenseless, made it make sense to this brilliant but troubled boy to end it.And, for those who don't think that pushing back against the feds is an amazing thing, you have no clue how much pressure the federal government can put on you when it wants you to plead guilty. Two years ago I wrote about a documentary called Better This World, which is about an entirely different subject, but really opened my eyes to the way the feds handle some of these cases. It's not about what's right. It is entirely about them winning, getting the press coverage and "making examples" of people. And they'll go to amazing lengths, and create pressure that you and I can only have nightmares about, to get people to accept bogus "plea" deals, just so they can notch up another "win." It's scary, scary stuff. Fighting back may have been the right thing to do, but must have created a level of stress unimaginable to most people.
The WSJ has provided more details about the hard line that federal prosecutors had taken with Aaron, including last week's demand that he plead guilty to all counts and spend time in jail:
Mr. Swartz's lawyer, Elliot Peters, first discussed a possible plea bargain with Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Heymann last fall. In an interview Sunday, he said he was told at the time that Mr. Swartz would need to plead guilty to every count, and the government would insist on prison time.In exchange for pleading guilty across the board, Heymann apparently promised that they would ask for a shorter sentence, though that's never a guarantee:
Mr. Peters said he spoke to Mr. Heymann again last Wednesday in another attempt to find a compromise. The prosecutor, he said, didn't budge
The government indicated it might only seek seven years at trial, and was willing to bargain that down to six to eight months in exchange for a guilty plea, a person familiar with the matter said. But Mr. Swartz didn't want to do jail time.The report also notes that his girlfriend was unaware of any depressive episodes until right after Wednesday's decision by Heymann to refuse to budge on jailtime and a guilty plea on all counts.
"I think Aaron was frightened and bewildered that they'd taken this incredibly hard line against him," said Mr. Peters, his lawyer. "He didn't want to go to jail. He didn't want to be a felon."
As for the details of the case itself, they were absurd -- and it is no wonder that Swartz refused to plead guilty. Back in September, we delved into the ridiculous details of the final indictment -- which upped the felony count, all of which was based on the idea that he had done some sort of massive computer hacking for the sake of some criminal conspiracy. And yet... that was clearly never the case. As Tim Lee detailed, at worst, it appeared that Swartz might possibly be guilty of trespassing. Yes, he went into a computer closet at MIT, but he got access to a network which was open for all, and he downloaded documents that were made available freely to all on that network.
Many people have reasonably pointed to a blog post from Alex Stamos, the CTO of Artemis Internet, who had been brought on as an expert witness on Aaron's behalf. After demonstrating that his reports have been used on behalf of prosecutors in attacks, and pointing out that he's no friend of hackers, Stamos highlights in detail just how completely bogus the charges against Swartz were:
That's from someone who clearly had detailed knowledge about the situation. Other legal experts had come to similar conclusions after the original indictment came out. Way back when, we had pointed to an article by Max Kennerly in which he looked closely at the indictment and was left confused as to how it got as far as it did. Kennerly has since updated his post (both after the new indictment and again over the weekend, in which he notes that Stamos' post suggest that his own original analysis didn't even go far enough after discovering the details). Kennerly looked at how the case really revolved around whether or not Swartz's activities violated the terms of service, but given the details of the case, combined with Stamos' comments and the fact that (since Swartz was charged) multiple courts have ruled that a mere terms of service violation is not a violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), this case seemed to have absolutely nothing legitimate.I know a criminal hack when I see it, and Aaron’s downloading of journal articles from an unlocked closet is not an offense worth 35 years in jail.
The facts:
- MIT operates an extraordinarily open network. Very few campus networks offer you a routable public IP address via unauthenticated DHCP and then lack even basic controls to prevent abuse. Very few captured portals on wired networks allow registration by any vistor, nor can they be easily bypassed by just assigning yourself an IP address. In fact, in my 12 years of professional security work I have never seen a network this open.
- In the spirit of the MIT ethos, the Institute runs this open, unmonitored and unrestricted network on purpose. Their head of network security admitted as much in an interview Aaron’s attorneys and I conducted in December. MIT is aware of the controls they could put in place to prevent what they consider abuse, such as downloading too many PDFs from one website or utilizing too much bandwidth, but they choose not to.
- MIT also chooses not to prompt users of their wireless network with terms of use or a definition of abusive practices.
- At the time of Aaron’s actions, the JSTOR website allowed an unlimited number of downloads by anybody on MIT’s 18.x Class-A network. The JSTOR application lacked even the most basic controls to prevent what they might consider abusive behavior, such as CAPTCHAs triggered on multiple downloads, requiring accounts for bulk downloads, or even the ability to pop a box and warn a repeat downloader.
- Aaron did not “hack” the JSTOR website for all reasonable definitions of “hack”. Aaron wrote a handful of basic python scripts that first discovered the URLs of journal articles and then used curl to request them. Aaron did not use parameter tampering, break a CAPTCHA, or do anything more complicated than call a basic command line tool that downloads a file in the same manner as right-clicking and choosing “Save As” from your favorite browser.
- Aaron did nothing to cover his tracks or hide his activity, as evidenced by his very verbose .bash_history, his uncleared browser history and lack of any encryption of the laptop he used to download these files. Changing one’s MAC address (which the government inaccurately identified as equivalent to a car’s VIN number) or putting a mailinator email address into a captured portal are not crimes. If they were, you could arrest half of the people who have ever used airport wifi.
- The government provided no evidence that these downloads caused a negative effect on JSTOR or MIT, except due to silly overreactions such as turning off all of MIT’s JSTOR access due to downloads from a pretty easily identified user agent.
- I cannot speak as to the criminal implications of accessing an unlocked closet on an open campus, one which was also used to store personal effects by a homeless man. I would note that trespassing charges were dropped against Aaron and were not part of the Federal case.
In short, Aaron Swartz was not the super hacker breathlessly described in the Government’s indictment and forensic reports, and his actions did not pose a real danger to JSTOR, MIT or the public. He was an intelligent young man who found a loophole that would allow him to download a lot of documents quickly. This loophole was created intentionally by MIT and JSTOR, and was codified contractually in the piles of paperwork turned over during discovery.
Given the disclosures by Swartz's expert, Alex Stamos, which are linked at the beginning of this post, it seems that Swartz had a strong argument that he did indeed have "authorization." As Stamos says, at the time of Swartz's downloads, "the JSTOR website allowed an unlimited number of downloads by anybody on MIT’s 18.x Class-A network" and "Aaron did not use parameter tampering, break a CAPTCHA, or do anything more complicated than call a basic command line tool that downloads a file in the same manner as right-clicking and choosing 'Save As' from your favorite browser."Separately, it has been pointed out numerous times that the only real party who had any reasonable claim to "harm" was JSTOR, and it had said from early on that it had settled its issue with Swartz when he agreed to turn over his hard drive with everything he'd downloaded. Now, a bit more has come out, as apparently JSTOR itself asked federal prosecutors to drop the case:
Thus, all Swartz did was write a script to find and download the files. As a factual matter, that may have been "authorization," rendering it lawful everywhere. Even if the script was "exceeding authorization," if the First Circuit had adopted the same rule as the Fourth Circuit and the Ninth Circuit, then Swartz would likely have been not guilty as a matter of law. All of which further shows why this prosecution should not have been brought in the first place; the prosecutor is supposed to exercise their judgment to do justice.
Elliot Peters, Swartz's California-based defense attorney and a former federal prosecutor in Manhattan, told The Associated Press on Sunday that the case "was horribly overblown" because Swartz had "the right" to download from JSTOR, a subscription service used by MIT that offers digitized copies of articles from more than 1,000 academic journals.So even the supposedly "harmed" party didn't want the case to go forward. And yet, Stephen Heymann kept pushing.
Peters said even the company took the stand that the computer crimes section of the U.S. Attorney's Office in Boston had overreached in seeking prison time for Swartz and insisting , two days before his suicide , that he plead guilty to all 13 felony counts. Peters said JSTOR's attorney, Mary Jo White , the former top federal prosecutor in Manhattan , had called Stephen Heymann, the lead Boston prosecutor in the case.
"She asked that they not pursue the case," Peters said.
The case is now gone, so we'll never see how a judge rules on it. We can hope that, given everything above, a judge would have clearly seen what a joke the case was, and dismissed it. But, you never know how judges will rule, and especially when they're not very technically savvy, they'll give a ridiculous amount of deference to federal prosecutors, merely because of their position. But the ridiculousness of the case should be pointed out over and over again to remind everyone of the problems we get when the federal government gets too powerful, and knows that it can use that power against someone it doesn't like.
Whether or not the impending trial contributed to Swartz's death, one thing is undeniable: the case itself was a complete farce, and that should not be forgotten. One hopes that, among other things, one of the legacies of Swartz's death may be to fix broken laws that allowed this prosecution to move forward, and to figure out a way to dial back the aggressiveness with which federal prosecutors take on cases these days.
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Filed Under: aaron swartz, cfaa, copyright, doj, hacking, legal issues, pressure, stephen heymann, us attorneys
Reader Comments
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- Threatening
- Abuse of power/coercion
- Abuse of the judiciary
- Defamation
I'm fairly sure there will be punishment for that, no?
Shall we sit while we wait for justice to be done?
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The War on Terrorism takes an expected turn on itself.
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I think you mean War on Freedom.
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What about criminal misuse of government resources?
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- Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar
It is the foreign element that commits our crimes. There is no native criminal class except Congress.
- More Maxims of Mark, Johnson, 1927
http://www.twainquotes.com/Congress.html
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It would have been more of a compromise to ask for a pinky finger than ask to accept being a felon.
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In the US, we have 2.2 million people considered feelings thanks mainly to our drug war.
You have no access to public education, public funding, public housing, our anything else for ten years. You pay your jailor when you're out on parole and your options for jobs are slim and none when you get out. Communities are torn up to make you an outcast. And to add insult to injury, you can be caucased outside of your place of residency so that when you vote, you have less of a voice in politics than you could imagine.
Felonies are a big deal and we have states and corporations that are empowered to use their powers topunish instead of their own common sense to what's right.
That is never good for democracy in the long run.
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People's feelings should always be considered... ;)
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Of course, I'm sure it won't happen for Life of DOJ + 70...
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It's a nice idea, but sadly hopelessly naive, and something that the government would never allow to come to pass.
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States don't have the authority to make laws governing how the federal government works.
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The first prohibits someone from suing the government, or a governmental agency, while the second can be used to squelch any evidence that could be used to prove wrongdoings, leaving a case gutted.
So yes, the government would very much have to agree for such an idea to work.
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I think you have it backwards. A state court would not be able to force the federal government to do anything.
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Or to put it another way, it doesn't matter how public the information is, if it's not allowed to be presented in a court case.
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What we need is...
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You want to take in the federal government with the DOJ, FBI, CIA, drones, National Guard and an army (who have tanks btw) with your gun?
Have fun with that. Also, how comfortable are you in killing American soldiers who may just be following orders?
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Finally, with regards to what Jay said: "Also, how comfortable are you in killing American soldiers who may just be following orders?" The Nazis also were "just following orders." Following orders doesn't justify actions, particularly ones which bring harm upon Americans. If certain soldiers were to turn their gun against her own countrymen, what does that make them? Traitors.
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A militia came up to protect Washington, which was regulated by each state. It's quite clear that the Founding Fathers didn't want a standing army because they knew that would be a form of imperialism. It's why the army WA to be regulated every two years and the power of war given to Congress, which represents the people.
It's not there so you can amass a small fortune while tragedy happens in a misguided effort to "follow the Constitution"
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You're joking right?
The key issue about militias was that they were used to protect the "property" of slave owners. That's right. It was used so that militias could be formed to fight against slaves being free.
The ones without guns were blacks. The ones with guns were the chemists looking to protect their form of cheap labor.
This gave rise to the electoral college over popular vote which didn't like to think of slaves as anything other than 3/5ths of a person.
No. The reason that our second amendment reads as it does is to promote slavery.
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Americans being ordered to shoot other "americans" and all that.
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How about one that doesn't involve murder?
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the US government and US law enforcement in particular, refuse to accept that they are often very wrong (more often than not on so many occasions nowadays!) and are also supposedly governed by the same law as ordinary people, not above it!
'a judge would have clearly seen what a joke the case was'
just as in the cases of Mega, of dajaz1 and others, but like the articles says, the main thing for the government is not applying the law but winning the case, putting someone in jail and ruining (in this case taking) as many lives, needlessly, as possible!! Heymann needs to be sacked and never employed again, at least in any sort of legal position. i bet, however, the opposite happens and he gets a massive bonus and promotion!! and as for any feeling of guilt? it ain't gonna happen!!!
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Why a felon
The government, the banks, and the corporate interests behind this are attempting to prevent the breakdown of a system that allows them a lot of control over information while not technically violating any free speech rights.
Banks and their corporate clients control information through the use of the monetary system. Information is distributed through a handful of corporations who are able to dominate the industry because of their credit. Large corporations do not have to earn the money they spend. They have great credit, which allows them to get the bulk of new money created in any given economy through the partial reserve lending system. No matter how much you can raise online, they can simply borrow a hundred times that amount and bury you.
That is the way the system is designed. It is designed that way from the ground up specifically for that purpose.
This is not an accident, nor is it a conspiracy theory to merely relate how the system works, or why it is necessary to squelch the objections of Aaron Swartz and those of us who agree with his philosophy of open access to information.
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Re: Why a felon
Banks love to lend money at interest to sure things. They are not quite as keen to lend to innovate.
This, in turn, is why innovation is far more expensive than it truly needs to be. Large corporations spend the money specifically for their own profit. Banks lend the bulk of this money. More and more dollars then chase after a very limited pool of innovators, thus swelling the cost, thus increasing the need for corporations to tighten IP further in order to ensure profits in order to pay off their loans.
It's similar in its own way to the housing bubble. We already had one tech related bubble. We could easily have more.
We do not have a free market. That, ultimately, is the problem. Those in control of it are not keen on letting it go.
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"When 22-year-old programmer Aaron Swartz decided last fall to help an open-government activist amass a public and free copy of millions of federal court records . . . the U.S. court system told the feds he’d pilfered approximately 18 million pages of documents worth $1.5 million dollars . . . the Government Printing Office abruptly shut down the free trial and reported to the FBI that PACER was “compromised,” the FBI file reveals . . . The investigation was closed on April 20."
Copying legal documents are illegal? Copying scientific articles are illegal? Next you'll be telling copying television shows is illegal too!
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Oh, wait...
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Wrong word...
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One is from Orin Kerr (Professor of Law, George Washington Uni) via The Volokh Conspiracy with a very good, consise, and unbiased analysis of the actual law that your DoJ charged Aaron with. Orin plans to do a post on the discretion and judgement of whether what the DoJ did was correct or not soon. I look forward to reading that one, especially from someone who lives and breathes the weirdness that is the USA Computer Fraud and other cybercrime statutes.
The other one is from Scott H. Greenfield at Simple Justice who in a long post states why it's not just Aaron that received this harsh, overreaching myopic and daunting treatment from the government but hundred, ney thousands of poor individuals who still are too. Scott ends it with a call out to all: Exactly.. what now?
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Wow! That's a nice start and tribute to Aaron's philosophy of allowing Publicly owned and payed for research to be free and accessible by all.
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While much of Kerr's post is good, I have a few problems with it, including his claim that Swartz planned to release the documents. That's conjecture and was never proven at all. Swartz also did a ton of research on large data sets, and it is entirely possible he planned to use the information for his research, rather than to release it.
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I am going to wait until the 2nd post (that hopefully is soon) before I pass judgement on Kerr's conjecture though since he has only pulled what was really on the indictment with media reports of events at the time and applied them to the post. Knowing Kerr it will be highly illuminating, most likely add in what Stamos found in his forensic examination (that's an eye opening report that normally would never reach the light of day except for the fact that the whole case now is moot).
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It was in direct protest at Aaron's indictment, and the papers were all in the public domain which basically made JSTOR re-evaluate it's whole system of charging for papers that the public own already - no matter the CYA press release that JSTOR gave (There was NO sweat of the brow in JSTOR's actions of holding the papers that were PD and they had no intention of ever releasing them before the Maxwell incident).
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On wire fraud, for example, Kerr completely ignores the hardest part: proving intent to defraud. As the Department of Justice’s own Attorney Manual notes, most courts interpret “defraud” as meaning “a scheme to defraud another out of money.” That doesn't even arguably cover what Swartz did.
On computer fraud, he argues unauthorized access is established because "this is a case of circumventing code-based restrictions by circumventing identification restrictions." The same is true every single time you say your birthday is "January 1, 1900" to get into a newspaper's website, or enter "asdf" as your name on a public WiFi.
Tellingly, Kerr doesn't even mention the huge circuit split developing over the meaning of "authorization" — he just brushes it all aside. Perhaps he should have read my post.
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Though that was the whole point as I see it with the post to show the law 'as read' was correctly applied to the charges brought against Aaron. Whether the charges were warranted or would of withstood scrutiny in court is now sadly something for only the media and academia to ponder.
I agree with you about defraud being pecuniary only (in the majority of cases) and most definitely agree with the problematic and ambiguous wording of the CA though again in the context of what Kerr was trying to put across in this first post that's irrelevant though highly likely it will be in the second post. Especially when you consider Kerr has been a highly vocal critic of them both.
As for the authorisation split I wasn't aware of that myself, though your circuits and their different jurisdictions in the same country to myself, a foreigner, are a strange entity at the best of times.
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Don't blame the prosecutors
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moderate
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Please sign this
I don't expect anything to happen to the bastard, but at least they'll have to respond if it gets enough votes.
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I finally realized this morning while listening to the radio and the DJ's told the story of the petition to build a death star and how many ppl signed it that we are totally fucked in any aspect that requires citizens to be diligent in protecting their freedoms.
F'in petition to build a death star and it got the required signatures. Really Amerika?
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Violation of rights under color of authority
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Entertainment Industry
In the meantime, the actual "victims" had no public interest in pressing the issue.
Why do you imagine it happened then?
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Look!!!! Black helicopters!!!! Being flown by Elvis!!!
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The fact that the charges are very trumped I can say yes the DOJ is to blame.
Even if he was going to win it should be illegal to stack up a bullshit case that has the potential to ruin someones life completely.
I would say otherwise if their case was actually legit. In that case I would have said it was Aaron Swartz that brought it on himself. That is not the case though now is it.
Do you think he would have killed himself if he was facing 1 to 3 with a possibility of being out in little as 6 months? Or even better with a time of 1 to 3 it's very possible he would have had a plea deal of probation.
My crimes dealt 2 to 5 and I was let off on probation. What I did was worse I was a junkie and played doctor one too many times.
Aaron Swartz on the other hand was leeching information THAT SHOULD HAVE FUCKING BEEN OPEN TO EVERYONE IN THE FIRST PLACE...
He was not hacking the government.
He was not hacking banks and stealing money.
He was not hacking companies stealing trade secrets.
He was not hacking personal computers of anyone.
The information was there but it was not open in the sense you could go find it on Google.
If he did not take it by automation I doubt we would be in this mess right now.
His crime was wanting efficiency and do you blame him? How in the fuck can we ever evolve if we start locking all our information up ffs..
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His crime was wanting efficiency and do you blame him?
Good point. If he had gotten a hundred people to use their web browsers to do this, there would have been no issue at all. But using a script to do exactly the same thing means 35 years in prison? Holy hell.
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Ummm, he was actually looking at six months or less in Club Fed. Not exactly a reason to kill yourself and inflict such terrible sorrow on those who love you.
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An eye for an eye; a tooth for a tooth, 7 years in prison plus some unmentioned amount of money for...
Downloading free stuff.
You don't have the moral high ground. Give it up.
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The charges added up to over 50 years.
The *plea bargain* that the feds refused to budge from included asking the judge for 7 years in jail.
Six months is you making stuff up.
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Six Months
http://betabeat.com/2013/01/tom-dolan-defends-carmen-ortiz-aaron-swartz-twitter/
Neverth eless, it apparently was on the table at some point. Not that it much lessens the wrongdoing to me.
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Re: Re: Six Months
It is not, however, difficult to distinguish between violating a terms of service agreement and hacking into a network. Six months or six centuries, the government is lying and in the process of harassing a law abiding citizen has cost us the life of a brilliant young computer scientists and human rights activist.
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Re: Six Months
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The charges added up to over 50 years.
The *plea bargain* that the feds refused to budge from included asking the judge for 7 years in jail.
Six months is you making stuff up.
You are such a shameless liar Masnick. His own attorney has said he was offered six months:
http://boston.com/metrodesk/2013/01/14/mit-hacking-case-lawyer-says-aaron-swartz-was-offe red-plea-deal-six-months-behind-bars/hQt8sQI64tnV6FAd7CLcTJ/story.html
http://www.nextlevelofnews .com/2013/01/prosecutors-husband-tomjdolan-aaron-swartz-was-offered-a-6-month-deal-by-buzzfeed.html
Now go run away since you have again revealed to be a liar.
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You are correct. I misread the statements from earlier. His lawyer does indicate that they were offered 6 months. I apologize for misreading.
That said, if you don't think you've done anything wrong -- six months in federal prison PLUS multiple felonies on your record is hardly appealing.
Besides, the details out there suggest that since he refused to plead guilty to the felony charges, they had indicated to him that they would push for many years in prison -- thus, once he had made the decision not to accept a felony plea bargain, he was indeed facing years in prison.
You may not think that's stressful, but you'd be wrong.
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Well this seems to prove that Theresa May got it right - for once
So the British goverment had already recognised that the pressure generated by the US justice system creates a significant suicide risk.
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Re: Well this seems to prove that Theresa May got it right - for once
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Re: Re: Well this seems to prove that Theresa May got it right - for once
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Re: Well this seems to prove that Theresa May got it right - for once
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Why would a judge prevent him for asking for help?
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Just a guess but...
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Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Just a guess but...
Remember, they were trying to charge him with over a dozen felonies, and even had the secret service involved; I don't think it would be that hard to convince a judge that the case was serious enough to ban those involved from discussing it.
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Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Just a guess but...
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Defendant can't mention their case?
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Re: Just a guess but...
I'm glad usually on the other side of the debate. Every time someone on your side gets in deep shit, their so-called friends and supporters don't lift a finger, much less write a check. What tiny amount of respect I may have had for any of you people has evaporated. You didn't do shit for the Ninjavideo crew, nor anyone else. All you do is scream into the echo chamber. Pretty pathetic.
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Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
The way I read the letter, Lessig meant he couldn't openly appeal to the internet to help fund a defense.
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Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
People who disagree with some of the issues with copyright don't usually have that monetary luxury, and he takes pride in it.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
1. the KID had little/no money left 'cause HE DONATED most of it to inertnet causes and actions, you useless human-shaped pile of shit... probably gave away more than you will earn in your greedy, grasping pathetic life...
2. he had more principles, ethics, and bravery in ONE neuron than you have in your whole family...
3. it is not only HIS fault for getting trumped up charges
by the gummint behemoth, but it is then OURS for not ponying up enough cash to bribe the whole system to reverse the injustice ? ? ?
sure, we peons can outbid the korporate overlords to wrest away control of a corrupted system; you are one gullible piece of authoritarian trash, mister...
(yeah, there is NO way a woman wrote that nasty shit)
the eye of sauron gets turned on ANYONE -even bona fide 'heroes' (sic) like petraeus, et al- and you are going to get fucked over NO MATTER guilt or innocence...
but, guess what, the petraeus's of the world only get caught up if internecine warfare among the puppetmasters breaks out, otherwise, it is the TRUE and BRAVE PATRIOTS like swartz, manning, kirakou, AD INFINITUM who get fucked over by the machine of empire on a daily basis...
i'm old and out of shape, but you better hope we never cross paths, because i'm about sick of authoritarian pieces of trash like you pissing on people who contributed more to society in a short life than you could in a million years...
FOAD
art guerrilla
aka ann archy
art guerrilla at windstream dot net
you live in florida ? let's arrange to meet, shithead...
eof
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
1. the KID had little/no money left 'cause HE DONATED most of it to inertnet causes and actions, you useless human-shaped pile of shit... probably gave away more than you will earn in your greedy, grasping pathetic life...
So in this kids hour of need, when he was in such despair he took his own life- the recipients of all of that money did what? They turned their fucking backs, that's what. They took his money, they basked in his reflected glory and then didn't lift a fucking finger or give back a single dime when he was in crisis. Who is the useless piece of shit here?
2. he had more principles, ethics, and bravery in ONE neuron than you have in your whole family...
I don't question the first two, but struggle with the bravery assertion. Personally, I believe suicide to be cowardly. But I think he had mental health issues that may have caused him to surrender. As far as me and my family, you don't know me and I doubt you'd entertain anything I said about this.
3. it is not only HIS fault for getting trumped up charges
by the gummint behemoth, but it is then OURS for not ponying up enough cash to bribe the whole system to reverse the injustice ? ? ?
sure, we peons can outbid the korporate overlords to wrest away control of a corrupted system; you are one gullible piece of authoritarian trash, mister...
Based on the facts (facts) it seems that he broke the law and knew it, as attempting to evade identification by the security camera by hiding his face with his bike helmet indicates. I don't know about the scope of the charges, but that's probably a 35 year max sentence was offered to be reduced to six months. And no, I'm not talking about bribes. Any lucid person knows that doesn't happen on the Federal bench. I'm talking about how his so-called friends and followers didn't step up to mount a first class defense. But all you people do is take. You can't even see your way clear to dig in and contribute to one of your own leaders. Just more talk. Utterly shameful and pathetic.
(yeah, there is NO way a woman wrote that nasty shit)
You are doubtlessly one coarse and unappealing woman.
the eye of sauron gets turned on ANYONE -even bona fide 'heroes' (sic) like petraeus, et al- and you are going to get fucked over NO MATTER guilt or innocence...
Wow, nice transition into a Gorehound-esque rant. Meh, Petraeus should have known better. Arrogant like Swartz, thought he was above it. You can't get fucked unless you assume the position.
i'm old and out of shape, but you better hope we never cross paths, because i'm about sick of authoritarian pieces of trash like you pissing on people who contributed more to society in a short life than you could in a million years...
FOAD
Hahahahaha......An aged hippie, pseudo-anarchist is going to get me.
you live in florida ? let's arrange to meet, shithead...
Figures they'd have senior citizen communes down there. I'll pass. I've never been down with the whole bingo and dinner at 4:30 thing. Though I am tempted to see if you are as big a buffoon in person as you are on this board.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
Your "side". pfft Your side doesn't even know that you exist, let along care.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
And then you wonder why so many people are losing faith in your system?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
But at the end of the day, he was offered six months. He'd end up with five if he behaved and probably spend two in a minimum security (unlocked) facility then he'd go to a pre-release center. So he has a felony conviction, BFD? He was an extraordinarily skilled kid with lots of connections. He's an entrepreneur. It's not like he'd have gotten out and had to look for work at WalMart. Seriously, what is the huge stigma? How would his future been limited? Gun ownership? So what, he doesn't look like he'd know what to do with one. Voting? Well, I think after a time that gets reinstated.
I think Swartz was a typical arrogant kid who didn't realize the kind of trouble he could manage to get into. He was high profile and political. It seems that someone older and more experienced should have been in this kids ear about how shit can go bad fast. It didn't happen and that's a fucking shame.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
That you see this as a game is horrendous. This was a human life. Not some game piece.
If you cannot see that, there is a word that describes you. It is sociopath.
Something people ought to consider BEFORE they do shit that can put them in harm's way.
If the charges against him are bullshit, then why would any rational person think doing what he did would put him in harm's way? Either you were lying when you said you thought the charges were bullshit, or you're lying here.
But at the end of the day, he was offered six months.
Six months or 50 years, it doesn't matter when what he did was not wrong.
So he has a felony conviction, BFD?
When what someone has done is not wrong, and the only party with any possible imaginary harm has urged the state to drop the case, taking away any of someone's rights is a big fucking deal. Unless you don't care about someone's rights, which you've made abundantly clear you don't.
Go. Fuck. Yourself.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
Swartz knew what he was doing was illegal. He hid his face from security cameras because he knew his actions were unlawful.
If you don't see the difference between six months and 50 years of incarceration, you are an idiot.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
No, the judicial system is simply a way of resolving disputes. Disputes between a government and its citizens, or between individual parties. While it should be about finding the truth, the best I can hope for is that it remains civil and fair. It is blindingly obvious that it was neither fair nor civil in this case. But it is not a game - and your characterization of it as such shows that you don't understand that it impacts the lives of real people. This is not abstraction.
Swartz knew what he was doing was illegal. He hid his face from security cameras because he knew his actions were unlawful.
Entering the wiring closet at MIT was illegal, yes. It was trespassing. Trespassing was not charged. As has been pointed out by lawyers and computer security experts, nothing else he did was illegal, and was at worst inconsiderate.
Aaron was extremely intelligent and understood technology and the protocols of the internet at a very fundamental level. If he thought his other actions were illegal, why didn't he cover his tracks? Why didn't he encrypt his laptop? Why did he hack into MIT's network via untraceable (or at least difficult to trace) proxies? All of these were well within his skills.
The fact that the only time he tried to hide himself was when he was trespassing into the wiring closet (and let me reiterate again that this was not charged) is very strong evidence that he didn't think his other actions were illegal.
And I never said there was no difference between 6 months and fifty years. I said that the difference didn't matter - taking away someone's rights for actions which were not wrong is wrong no matter the length of time.
Is the government taking away your right to freedom of speech because you're a lying sack of shit wrong if they only do it for a day?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Just a guess but...
There was a defense fund which many people contributed to. Your ignorance of it is your problem.
The issue was not the lack of a defense fund, but rather the fact that Swartz was not in a position to call more attention to it. If you don't recognize that judges sometimes take such requests and turn them against defendants, again, that is a problem of ignorance on your end.
And where was Lessig himself for that matter? He's a law professor at Harvard for Christ' sake. He taught at Stanford and is on the board of Creative Commons (Swartz's organization) and Center for Internet and Society. He was the kid's friend, why wasn't he representing him pro bono?
As he clearly stated in his post (which you apparently didn't even read), Lessig did help him pro bono until issues were raised about conflicts of interest. Also, Lessig is not a criminal law litigator.
Also, I would suggest you do some research and understand who actually managed the defense fund that was being raised (contrary to your assertions that it did not exist).
I'm glad usually on the other side of the debate. Every time someone on your side gets in deep shit, their so-called friends and supporters don't lift a finger, much less write a check.
Your ignorance is disgusting and insulting. Many, many, many people reached out to support and help Aaron.
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Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
Trash, that's what you are indeed.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
And wasn't it Lessig who said that it [a defense fund] couldn't be public and asked-for, yet that is precisely what his wife was doing? WTF?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
I didn't announce it because that's actually NOT the kind of thing we write about on Techdirt. We don't ask people to donate to specific causes. We may ask people to speak out, but donations are a personal decision.
Not sure why you think we should have written about it.
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Re: Re: Just a guess but...
http://betabeat.com/2012/09/early-reddit-employee-wife-of-creative-commons-founder-larry- lessig/
And it was started by Lessig's wife no less so you are completely off base on in claiming that he didn't try to help.
PS. Note that this link is from BEFORE his death not some claim being made after the fact.
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Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
Now how about that link where a 6 month deal was offered from before his death?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
I was wrong about the 6 month deal. It was actually 4:
http://www.businessinsider.com/aaron-swartz-plea-deal-2013-1#ixzz2I4KY3gFM
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
From the Daily Beast, which is linked in the citation I provided you earlier:
“They’re very serious and their job is very serious and they’re very serious about it and this is a very serious matter and this is how it is going to be,” Peters says of the prosecution in the Swartz case. “They made their position very clear. They believed they had to seek prison time and multiple felony convictions in this case.”
The best deal the prosecutors would offer was four months in prison with Swartz pleading guilty to 13 felonies. And they warned Peters that his client had better take it while he still could.
“They told me over and over again that the offer had been on the table,” Peters says. “And any future offer would be less attractive.”
Peters is Swartz attorney.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
Try harder.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
http://www.wral.com/swartz-death-fuels-debate-over-computer-crime/11974285/
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Just a guess but...
Your logic is illogical.
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Rage
Ultimately I am slowly turning into one of those people who no longer blames the government. Ultimately, this nation is failing because people do not care.
This is just too obvious. I'm just sick and tired of a handful of people being the only ones.
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Re: Rage
My point exactly. Where were all of you "friends" and admirers when this kid needed help? Specifically Shane, what the fuck did you do? Other than rage bitterly and red faced in virtual silence. More talk, that's all you people do. Which doesn't seem to have helped matters much. You too are one of the people who don't care but have so little self-awareness you're blind to it. Acting concerned is not the equal of actually doing something.
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Re: Re: Rage
What I did was oppose it. What you did was support it. Your apparent glee at the outcome speaks volumes about what is wrong with this nation these days. It's not -just- the government. The general population is grossly unethical and immoral.
You and people like you are the problem that needs addressing. What would you suggest I do about you? Not respond? Let your vindictive and petty notion of how the economy and the legal system should run be published unopposed by any other viewpoint?
You wouldn't be here if you didn't know how important what is going on here is.
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Re: Re: Re: Rage
Couldn't have created or contributed to a defense fund? Couldn't have organized a rally in front of the courthouse or prosecutor? Couldn't have written a letter to the editor or started a goofy White House petition? Let's face it: You didn't care enough to lift a finger.
What I did was oppose it. What you did was support it. Your apparent glee at the outcome speaks volumes about what is wrong with this nation these days. It's not -just- the government. The general population is grossly unethical and immoral.
You opposed it with some cheap talk. That's pretty weak in my book. And I did not support it. I did nothing, just like you. The difference is Swartz is not one of my heroes or allies.
You and people like you are the problem that needs addressing. What would you suggest I do about you? Not respond? Let your vindictive and petty notion of how the economy and the legal system should run be published unopposed by any other viewpoint?
No keep talking. It seems to make you feel better about not actually doing anything.
You wouldn't be here if you didn't know how important what is going on here is.
I'm just here to inject a little reality into the echo chamber.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Rage
Or are you just trying to stir up enough outrage to get someone to say something crazy so you can use it against the movement to destroy your self serving business model?
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The whole point
You're nowhere near as cleverly pragmatic as you try to sound.
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Re: The whole point
Anonymous Coward, Jan 14th, 2013 @ 6:04pm
That one.
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Re: The whole point
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Remember Customer Service
Mass searches and downloads represent an advance in technology that enables researchers to sift through the massive amounts of information we now have available.
Swartz did them a favor, and they drove him to suicide for it. That is very typical of the modern financial/informational complex.
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Re: Remember Customer Service
Mass searches and downloads represent an advance in technology that enables researchers to sift through the massive amounts of information we now have available.
Swartz did them a favor, and they drove him to suicide for it. That is very typical of the modern financial/informational complex.
So it was JSTOR that drove him to suicide. I thought you said it was the US Attorney.... no wait, the content industry. Shit. Let me know when you re-decide again.
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Re: Re: Remember Customer Service
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Re: Re: Re: Remember Customer Service
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Remember Customer Service
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Re: Re: Remember Customer Service
"And" rather than "or".
It's not a difficult concept.
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heads must roll
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Re: heads must roll
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White House Petitions
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2262137/Aaron-Swartz-Reddit-founder-request-plea- deal-turned-Massachusetts-prosecutor.html
Lawyer says he warned prosecutors that Reddit co-founder Aaron Swartz was suicidal
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2262518/Lawyer-says-warned-prosecutors-Reddit-fo under-Aaron-Swartz-suicidal.html
White House petition to fire US Attprney Carmen Ortiz for her misconduct in this case
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/remove-united-states-district-attorney-carmen-orti z-office-overreach-case-aaron-swartz/RQNrG1Ck
The petition to fire US Attorney Carmen Ortiz has already exceeded the 25,000 signatures needed to get a response from the White House.
Here's a new petition to fire Assistant US Attorney Steve Heymann:
http://wh.gov/Ex1n
White House petition to limit copyrights to a maximum of 10 years
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/shorten-excessive-copyright-terms/XMc72zjc
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Re: White House Petitions
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oh boy
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