| From the little I know, my bet is it's Swartz's _methods_ that have gotten him in trouble, not so much what he's trying to do. Although there's something to do with streaming he was involved with and I don't know much about that. What's the story behind that? PACER I do know about, first hand. It is a low cost _public service_ that has historically operated at a surplus. I'm sure the goverment _wants_ the public to have better access to this information. This information is going to be free; it's inevitable. It just might take some time. But I read that Swartz went into a _federal court_ library and installed some stealth software; maybe it was just a simple script, doesn't matter. If that's true, that is just a really DUMB thing to do, no matter how noble the objective. Is that really the only place he could do the downloads? And as for this MIT incident, the facts speak for themselves. Most people have no idea what Python is. They have no idea how fast an http server can respond to requests. They don't understand the difference between open and closed data formats, or data that's easy to access versus data they have to click 25 times to get to. All they see is a kid sneaking around. Whether the charges he's facing are commensurate with the damage he's caused is another question. But he does need to show more respect for existing systems no matter how slow to change they may be (even if he has to pretend). He's definitely pushed the issue alright. I just hope for his sake and everyone else who knows their way around computers he hasn't pushed a little too far, too soon. If his methods are deliberately extreme, if he meant to do things this way, then he's either got some huge cajonas and unparalleled advisors behind him, or he's just young and stupid. Though I don't agree with the methods, I hope it's the former. |
Right, because our government has been so good about pursuing openness and transparency in other areas.