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RMS, Aaron Swartz Among 2013 Internet Hall of Fame Inductees

Posted by Soulskill on from the barry-bonds-given-the-cold-shoulder-again dept.

gnujoshua writes "The Internet Hall of Fame inducted 32 new members, today. This years class had a number of 'policy innovators' and activists including Aaron Swartz (posthumous), John Perry Barlow, Jimmy Wales, and Richard M. Stallman. Stallman had this to say upon his induction: 'Now that we have made the Internet work, the next task is to stop it from being a platform for massive surveillance, and make it work in a way that respects human rights, including privacy.'"

7 of 118 comments (clear)

  1. RMS named by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I think the world is actually finally reaching a more dire version of the 2010 panel of this xkcd: https://xkcd.com/743/

    1. Re:RMS named by kthreadd · · Score: 4, Insightful

      How to you know that Microsoft Word doesn't spy on you? Do you have the source code?

  2. RMS is a hero in my eyes (again) by hojo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In my idealistic youth, I thought of him as a programming God.

    As I grew older, I began regarding him as more of a cranky old, "get off my lawn", impractical hard liner.

    Now, with the whole NSA/Snowden revelations, I realize I was wrong to be complacent. He has reverted to deity status for me.

  3. Why Aaron Swartz? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I hate to do this, but I have to question the inclusion of Aaron Swartz.

    Yes, what happened to the young man is a tragedy. But a 'Hall of Fame' should be for people with actual accomplishments. All Swartz did was get himself into trouble, and instead of enduring his legal difficulties he decided to commit suicide. That's a symbol of cowardice, not heroism.

    Should naive activists who are cowardly in the face of oppression be considered for any Hall of Fame?

    1. Re:Why Aaron Swartz? by UltraZelda64 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      1. The guy had depression. You don't fuck with depression. The government did, until he could finally take no more. If you knew fucking *anything* about depression, then you might have even the slightest clue of how he must have felt. Hint: It's not a happy feeling.
      2. Yes, he got into trouble with a ridiculous federal law, and was made an example of by people in power who were had more greed than anything, wanting to utterly destroy his life just for a bit of fame and fortune on their end. In the end, their plan backfired--and deservedly so.
      3. Enduring his legal difficulties? I'm pretty sure just before his suicide *ALL* hope for a reduced prison sentence was thrown out the window in Ortiz's infinite wisdom, meaning "enduring his legal difficulties" would be "stuck behind bars for 35 years or so." He hung in there for a couple years until the U.S. removed all hope.
      4. The whole treatment the government gave him opened the eyes of a lot of people on the corrupt joke of the U.S. "justice" system, and in the end he has done the world a service on that alone. Changes are still likely to come, thanks to him.

  4. Re:RMS and unintended outcomes by LordLimecat · · Score: 3, Insightful

    and our privacy would be safe if we used anything more complex than ROT13)

    I like the naieve implication that the NSA is somehow incompetent. Recall that the original AES spec was amended with a recommendation from the NSA which was determined, around 10 years later, to have substantially strengthened it against just-now-being-discovered cryptographic attacks. Recall that the NSA is largely responsible for SELinux.

    Im sure there are other examples of their competence which escape it, but needless to say they arent exactly bumbling; theres every indication that some of the best security folks in the industry work @ the NSA.

  5. Some things never change, Slashdot by petrus4 · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I've got mod points today, and I figured that a good use of them would be beating the Stallmanite trolls into submission, who I knew would be infesting this thread. Unfortunately, there are far too many of them to be stopped by a measly five points.

    The vitriol directed towards Aaron Swartz, additionally, is nothing short of disgusting. Until someone is able to offer me concrete proof to the contrary, I am going to continue to believe that Swartz was the victim of assassination by the American government. If you want to convince me that I am wrong in believing that, then as I said, you had better have an extremely compelling argument.

    Jimmy Wales does not deserve induction into the Hall of Fame, either. Wikipedia has long since degenerated into a cess pit of pro-establishment pseudoskeptics, who ruthlessly delete anything which is not entirely in line with their agenda. Wales has also done absolutely nothing to try and restrain said people.