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Worldwide Aaron Swartz Day Memorial Hackathons This Weekend

Posted by Soulskill on from the rest-in-peace dept.

New submitter sterlingcrispin writes: There are hackathons taking place all over the world in memory of Aaron Swartz this weekend, November 8th and 9th. The goal is to "bring together the varied communities that Aaron touched to figure out how the important problems of the world connect, and to share the load of working on those problems." If you are interested in open access, privacy, free speech, transparency, citizen activism, human rights, and information ethics please attend, promote this event, and contribute to its growth.

I'm organizing the Los Angeles meet up and would love to see you there! Here are the other cities hosting one.

6 of 76 comments (clear)

  1. Ideally by rmdingler · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Some group would make public the government's abuse of surveillance

    and the public outcry would break the decibel record set at a college football game.

    Dream big, right?

    --
    Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

    Ernest Hemingway

    1. Re:Ideally by BitZtream · · Score: 2, Insightful

      And that has exactly dick to do with Aarpm Swartz.

      He didn't expose you to some massive cover up. He was a common criminal who couldn't handle the fact that he got caught. Any 'good' he did was by dumb luck and coincidental, not intentional.

      He was not a hero. Stop pretending he was or bullshitting about what he did, you just cheapen the actions of those who have done heroic deeds.

      Do you even know what he did and why he got in trouble? I don't think you do.

      --
      Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
    2. Re:Ideally by SuricouRaven · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The accusation levied is that the prosecutors overdid the intimidation in their efforts to get to to accept a not-very-good plea bargain. It's a standard procedure: Inform someone that they could go to jail for decades, their life effectively owner, unemployable when they do get out, financially ruined, reputation in shreds. Throw in some scary talk about how dangerous prison is to leave them wondering how they'll survive in a place filled with violent criminals. If all goes to plan the subject will be so terrified they'll accept any plea offered. Prosecutor gets a good politically-advantageous outcome and the taxpayer is saved the cost of a drawn-out and expensive trial. There are downsides though - innocent people may be pressured into pleading guilty this way, and occasionally someone just can't take the pressure and has a breakdown, which is what happened here.

  2. Suicide awareness by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    INSERT SNIDE COMMENT HERE

    He is not my hero. He shouldn't be yours either.

    1. Re:Suicide awareness by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      INSERT SNIDE COMMENT HERE

      He is not my hero. He shouldn't be yours either.

      Exactly. It is ridiculous how much press this is getting here and on Reddit. He is no hero just because he took some documents illegally and then killed himself.

  3. Slashdot knows nothing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ... open access, privacy, free speech, transparency, citizen activism, human rights, and information ethics ...

    So far, no-one on this thread is addressing these issues. For those who don't know, which is most of you, Aaron got Google Inc. involved in the "Stop SOPA" campaign. So don't bitch about the one thing he did wrong, we owe him.