Aaron Swartz: Is it time for an Internet Bill of Rights? + The Best Way to Honor Aaron Swartz

Image by Elizabeth Brossa via Flickr

Dandelion Salad

To honor Aaron Swartz’s memory, we must continue his work.

RTAmerica·Jul 3, 2012

In the US, the Bill of Rights maps out the fundamental privileges each citizen has in the country, but is it time to draft an Internet Bill of Rights? Congress has attempted to implement legislation that could stop online freedoms, but a group of online advocates are pushing lawmakers to sign the Internet Bill of Rights to allow the freedom of expression, access, openness, innovation and privacy. Aaron Swartz, founder and executive director for Demand Progress, joins us with his take.

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Aaron Swartz Death: The Best Way to Honor the Reddit Co-Founder is to Keep the Internet Free

by Dan Johnson
Founder of PANDA
http://www.policymic.com
Jan. 13, 2013

As I was browsing the internet, I came across an article announcing Aaron Swartz’s passing. The mainstream news labels him as merely the co-founder of Reddit. What they forget is that he was a fiery young man spearheading the internet freedom movement.

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Without the internet Aaron tried to protect, political activism would be severely crippled. Without a free and open internet, you wouldn’t be reading this. Without a free internet, the organization that I founded in January wouldn’t exist. If not for Aaron and Demand Progress, SOPA, PIPA and CISPA would have probably killed both it and the internet. I have never personally met him, but that does not diminish the gratitude I have for his work. In maintaining the freedom of the World Wide Web, he helped to preserve, for now, what is possibly the greatest tool for preserving our great Republic.

[…]

via http://www.policymic.com/articles/22790/aaron-swartz-death-the-best-way-to-honor-the-reddit-co-founder-is-to-keep-the-internet-free

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Internet phenomenon Aaron Swartz takes his own life after MIT prosecution

RTAmerica·Jan 14, 2013

On Friday, Aaron Swartz’s body was found in his Brooklyn home where he committed suicide. Swartz, who was a co-developer of RSS and helped establish the online site Reddit, took his life after facing legal issues for his alleged involvement in a hacking case involving the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Swartz was being accused of taking documents from protected computers and was later indicted for stealing information from the MIT and it is believed that the Internet prodigy’s legal troubles and history of depression lead him to take his own life. Marina Portnaya joins us to take a look back on Swartz’s life.

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“An Incredible Soul”: Lawrence Lessig on Aaron Swartz After Leading Cyberactivist’s Suicide

democracynow·Jan 14, 2013

DemocracyNow.org – Today we remember the pioneering computer programmer and cyberactivist Aaron Swartz, who took his own life Friday at the age of 26. As a teenager, Swartz helped develop RSS, revolutionizing how people use the internet, going on to co-own Reddit, now one of the world’s most popular sites. He was also a key architect of Creative Commons and an organizer of the grassroots movement to defeat the controversial House internet censorship bill, The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), and the Senate bill, The PROTECT IP Act (PIPA).

Swartz hanged himself just weeks before the start of a controversial trial. He was facing up to 35 years in prison sneaking into the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and downloading millions of articles provided by the subscription-based academic research service JSTOR. We hear Swartz in his own words and speak to Harvard Law School Professor Lawrence Lessig, a longtime mentor and friend. “There are a thousand things we could have done, and we have to do because Aaron Swartz is now an icon, an ideal,” Lessig says. “He’s what we will be fighting for, all of us, for the rest of our lives.” Lessig also echoes the claims of Swartz’s parents that decisions made by prosecutors and MIT contributed to his death, saying: “This was somebody who was pushed to the edge by what I think of as kind of a bullying by our government.”

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Freedom to Connect: Aaron Swartz (1986-2013) on Victory To Save Open Internet, Fight Online Censors

democracynow·Jan 14, 2013

DemocracyNow.org – Cyberactivist and computer programmer Aaron Swartz took his life on Friday at the age of 26. We air an address of Swartz’s from last May where he speaks about the battle to defeat The Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA — a campaign he helped lead. “[SOPA] will have yet another name, and maybe a different excuse, and probably do its damage in a different way, but make no mistake, the enemies of the freedom to connect have not disappeared,” Swartz said. “… Next time, they might just win. Let’s not let that happen.”

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Updated: Jan. 15, 2013

Inside Story Americas – What was Aaron Swartz fighting for?

AlJazeeraEnglish·Jan 15, 2013

Computer programmer and internet freedom activist Aaron Swartz takes his own life. But what was really at stake in his work to ensure internet freedoms and free access to public information? Guests: Lawrence Lessig, Tim Lee, Maria Bustillos.

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Note: replaced video

Aaron Swartz – a Fighter Against the Privatization of Knowledge

TheRealNews·Jan 15, 2013

Two colleagues and friends of Aaron Swartz talk about his activism and vision of technology in the service of a more democratic and just society.

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Petitions:

Posthumously pardon Aaron Swartz

Remove United States District Attorney Carmen Ortiz from office for overreach in the case of Aaron Swartz

see

Reddit Co-founder, Aaron Swartz, 26, Found Dead

Videos: Internet, Net Neutrality, Privacy

from the archives:

TrapWire: American cities under total surveillance?

New CISPA in the Senate ready for a vote + Action Alert: Support Privacy Amendments To Cyber-Security Bill

Obama Accelerated Cyberwar With Iran