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Aaron Swartz Ebook's DRM Has Been Cracked (hackaday.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the cracking-open-a-good-book dept.

Slashdot reader jenningsthecat writes: From Hackaday comes news that the collected writings of Aaron Swartz, released as a watermarked eBook by publishing company Verso Books, has had its watermarking scheme cracked by The Institute for Biblio-Immunology, who also published a guide for removing the BooXtream watermarks.

The writings of Aaron Swartz, with DRM applied? Oh, the irony. Still, at least the DRM employed doesn't restrict a user from reading the book on any and all capable devices, so it's not a very intrusive form of DRM. But I somehow doubt that Mr. Swartz would take any comfort from that...

6 of 63 comments (clear)

  1. Why are we still talking about this guy? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Yes, the files should have been pubicly available, but it doesn't mean he gets to break into server rooms to get that content.

    1. Re:Why are we still talking about this guy? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      We are talking about him because his case in an example of prosecutorial misconduct and the forced application of intense sentences due to legislation that takes the discretion on sentence length away from the judge

      It is about filling our prisons with people who are simply warehoused with no plan on how they are going to be brought back into society, and nobody really noticed until rich white people started getting railroaded by it.

      It is a really big deal, and the more the people can be made aware of it and fix the problem, the better it will be for all of us

    2. Re:Why are we still talking about this guy? by DragonTHC · · Score: 2, Insightful

      we're still talking about this guy because he fought to release the collective human knowledge which was locked away by by academic bureaucracy and held for ransom to keep a system alive which rewarded those with money and stifled human innovation through exclusivity of said knowledge. His story will go down in the history books, not as a thief who broke into restricted areas and released restricted content, but as the crusader for freedom of human knowledge that he was.

      --
      They're using their grammar skills there.
    3. Re:Why are we still talking about this guy? by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 4, Insightful

      We're still talking about Swartz not because he was in any way heroic, but because the prosecution was so purely evil. The wronged party, JSTOR, quickly lost interest in pressing charges, but the federosairus persisted in being douches anyway, because that's how they are trained to behave.

      States' rights are the American equivalent of Brexit.

    4. Re:Why are we still talking about this guy? by hackwrench · · Score: 4, Insightful

      So in your first sentence you're telling us you're just like Aaron Swartz. You want to do what you see as a good thing without wanting to deal with the possible negative outcomes.

      No, it did not cause his death, but to claim it was not a factor is not dealing with reality. Other people have it far worse should pretty much be only an argument for other people have survived under worse, you can survive too sorts of things. Other people having it worse is not a justification for lesser bad behavior. Your sentence about it has no place in this discussion and just muddys the waters.

      Which means that the poor treatment of Aaron Swartz does not justify his poor behavior leading up to his treatment. Yes, that's what he should have done. However, the way they treated him was improper and partially at fault for his death. His response to their treatment of him by killing himself is improper. The way his parents raised him to be so bothered by the way he was treated is partially at fault, too. We should be looking for more precursors to the situation, not less.

      I don't buy for a minute that the fault for the change of policy at MIT can be all laid at the feet of Aaron Swartz. JSTOR had probably been pushing for tighter restrictions on the documents they offered before the Aaron Swartz incident. Was it additional leverage? Yes. But there have been any number of other things involved in the decision. Again we should be looking for more precursors.

      But this time instead of saying that something isn't at fault, you are committing the mistake of saying something is the only thing to blame, and not even the people with agency involved. Why are you so quick to blame only Aaron when it comes to his death, but so quick to absolve MIT of everything when it made a decision?

      That's what situations like the one surrounding Aaron Swartz is for me. Not about making him a hero, or vilifying him but speaking out against people like you who basically want the same things as Aaron Swartz, but don't realize that's what they are doing, people like you who want to make things all or nothing, and people like you who want to blame the person with agency when it is convenient for their worldview and absolve people when it is convenient to do that too. I don't view hypocrisy to necessarily be a problem, but I do find these behaviors that just happen to be hypocritical to be a problem. If you are going to be hypocritical, at least do it right.

    5. Re:Why are we still talking about this guy? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      lol....or...if Swartz hadn't done the act to begin with the problem wouldn't have happened and maybe he'd be alive....

      Please don't discount his own responsibility in it all.