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Airw0lf writes with a claim that appears too implausible to credit, at first glance: "If anyone remembers 'Fairlight' — one of the great groups on the warez scene, you may be interested to know that one of their leaders, Tony Krvaric, is now the chairman of the San Diego Republican Party." A similar report (on which the TorrentFreak story above draws heavily, and which is cited for the same claim about Krvaric made in the above-linked Wikipedia entry) showed up last week in The Raw Story. According to these reports, Krvaric is the same person known as "strider" in the Warez scene. I called Krvaric seeking comment; though he was unavailable, I hope he chooses to comment by email to help inform any followup coverage. A telephone receptionist at the office of the San Diego Republican Party acknowledged that she knew of the claims, but refused further comment, citing workplace rules. While she would not directly acknowledge or deny the truth of the allegations, she asked me to "remember, these are things that happened more than 20 years ago." Since some people have been penalized quite harshly (and some have been jailed) for the sort of large-scale software piracy that Fairlight enabled, it's interesting that Krvaric has enjoyed instead a meteoric rise in conservative politics.

Mark of THE CITY writes "Mark of THE CITY writes "Since helping to found the San Diego Supercomputer Center in the 1980s, Sid Karin has distinguished himself as a national expert on digital technology and its possibilities for scientific research. Go here for the full interview."