this post was submitted on 09 Feb 2024
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[–] [email protected] 54 points 10 months ago (4 children)

I am unfamiliar with this historical event, care to explain?

[–] [email protected] 100 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Tl; Dr:

  • Savant-genius in our time works on/with and drives a large amount of the early “Web 2.0” era that champions decentralization, openness, and freedom of information
  • This ethos is carried throughout his work in tech, leading him to mass copy databases that are paywalled or closed access to students, that he had permission to use, and dump the info online for free
  • JSTOR and MIT get salty about this, set up a sting at the school servers where he’s doing said mass copying
  • Prosecutor wayyyy overcharges Aaron and seeks to neuter him from using tech, Aaron gets scared and (due in part to a longstanding mental & physical illness) commits suicide

There’s more info and context, but that the broad strokes. Fuck MIT for pushing his prosecution, JSTOR was fine once he stopped uploading their database

[–] UnculturedSwine 1 points 10 months ago

There is actually speculation that he never intended to dump the files online for free. He was working on information research at the time.

[–] nezbyte 59 points 10 months ago (4 children)
[–] [email protected] 35 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Aaron Swartz Didn't Kill Himself

[–] TropicalDingdong 21 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I mean, I think we know he probably did, unfortunately.

He believed he was facing a lifetime in prison.

[–] ignotum 7 points 10 months ago

And the people pushing for that punishment were the ones that caused it, pushing someone into committing suicide is as good murder
his blood is on their hands

[–] [email protected] -5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Sounds like something the D E E P S T A T E would say.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Who is this Deeps Tate guy you're talking about? I thought there were only two dipshits.

[–] Agent641 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Deep State is older brother to Firefly actress Jewel Staite, and belligerent younger brother Islamic State.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Talk about a diamond in the rough. Jewel is a treasure!

[–] BigDiction 18 points 10 months ago (1 children)

He was arrested for bulk downloading PDFs?

[–] [email protected] 31 points 10 months ago (1 children)

he was arrested to make an example.

[–] TropicalDingdong 12 points 10 months ago

In the same way that whistleblowing or "leaking" evidence of a crime is punished far more severely than any crime. It's basically a death sentence.

[–] dzervas 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

that’s very fucked up

i’d say to him to install a small computer or something (raspi?), leave it there and leak the pdfs slowly - would take weeks, maybe months

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Unless you misplaced a decimal point somewhere and we're pretty sure they're gonna notice 80,000 PDFs copied! D:

[–] Z3k3 23 points 10 months ago (1 children)

If I remember correctly it relates to the death of the other reddit founder. The not spithead one.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago
[–] EisFrei 11 points 10 months ago

There is a documentary about him. Be ready to get punched right in the feels.

https://youtu.be/9vz06QO3UkQ