San Diego GOP Chairman Alleged To Be a Fairlight Co-Founder

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.

Comments

WTF? Is it just me?

[zappepcs]

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. Is it just me that remembers some of the OTHER criminals the GOP has working for them, never mind running for office?

WOW

Re:Republican Motto:

[OutSourcingIsTreason]

Well, as long as he didn't get a BJ

and was careful to delete his old e-mail messages.

Re:Duh

[MrHanky]

Libertarians are the kind of people who think comments like the above are "insightful", which means they are not.

Re:I downloaded once in college

[spun]

You see, back in those days, drugs... I mean warez were different. Nowadays you can catch all kinds of viruses from warez, and the money all goes into the pockets of terrorists and pedophiles. But back in the day they were just cool, and fun, and no one got hurt. Just say no to warez!

Re:Republican Motto:

[spun]

Cry more, n00b.

Re:Republican Motto:

[spun]

You're new so I will point out that there is an old tradition here at Slashdot that few even mention anymore. It's called Troll Tuesday. Welcome to Slashdot!

Re:select * from subjects where content = 'witty'

[stephanruby]

I see the picture you're trying to paint, but it has the wrong focus. Tony Kvaric was not just some impressionable young member, he is the co-founder of Fairlight. To correctly expand your analogy about the "drug scene," it would be as if Pablo Escobar of the Medellin Cartel had come to the USA and become a Democratic Party leader.

Your comparison is exaggerated. Pablo Escobar is a mass murderer, not just some high-profile smuggler.

Fairlight and its founders haven't tried to kill anybody (as far as I know). If you want to compare anybody to Pablo Escobar, compare high ranking members of the Republican party. Henry Kissinger, Oliver North, Caspar Weinberger, (possibly) Ronald Reagan, etc. Those Republican leaders weren't just mass murderers in South America, making tens of thousands of people disappear, they also used drug trafficking in the Americas as a way to finance their covert black ops throughout the rest of the World.

You're wrong

[hassanchop]

Gay marriage does not have any affect whatsoever on straight couples.

This is demonstrably wrong.

Married couples pay different taxes than unmarried couples. With a large increase in the number of married couples (as a result of gays who could not previously marry) the tax burden of married straight couples will be affected.

Whether that will be a positive affect or not is irrelevant, you said "Gay marriage does not have any affect whatsoever on straight couples" which is, as I have shown, wrong.

This is not the only example of why you're wrong, just an obvious one.

That calls into question the accuracy and validity of your opinions on the subject, as anyone with an opinion worth considering wouldn't make an easily refuted, demonstrably wrong claim like you did.