
The four lamest excuses in MIT’s report on Aaron Swartz - bcn
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2013/07/30/the-four-lamest-excuses-in-mits-report-on-aaron-swartz/
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dmix
MIT dropped the ball here but the prosecutor sounds absolutely evil by
comparison and seems to have heavily influenced MIT's position of neutrality.

~~~
chaostheory
It doesn't sound like MIT was really neutral.

[http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/01/15/humanity-
deficit...](http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/01/15/humanity-
deficit/bj8oThPDwzgxBSHQt3tyKI/story.html)

 _" Marty Weinberg, who took the case over from Good, said he nearly
negotiated a plea bargain in which Swartz would not serve any time. He said
JSTOR signed off on it, but MIT would not.

'There were subsets of the MIT community who were profoundly in support of
Aaron,' Weinberg said. That support did not override institutional
interests."_

~~~
mitmatt
From [http://swartz-report.mit.edu/docs/report-to-the-
president.pd...](http://swartz-report.mit.edu/docs/report-to-the-
president.pdf), Appendix 14, Question 35:

> 35\. What influence, if any, did MIT exercise or could it have exercised in
> the plea negotiations? Did MIT really scuttle a plea bargain with no prison
> time?

> Answer: MIT played no role in any plea negotiations related to the Aaron
> Swartz case. For a description of these negotiations, please see the Report,
> section II.B.2 The federal prosecution. For a description of MIT’s position
> regarding the government’s prosecution, please see Part III MIT’s Response
> to the Prosecution. It is unclear whether MIT could have exercised influence
> on the plea bargain. Please see in particular section III.A.2 MIT is
> informed about the prosecution; and section III.C.3 MIT’s outside counsel
> speaks with the lead prosecutor.

What would it mean for MIT to "sign off" on a plea bargain? The prosecutor
alone was pressing criminal charges; MIT was not pressing any civil charges
and it was not involved in the proceedings.

~~~
D_Alex
Thanks for stepping up to argue MITs case. I understand you personally hold
the view that MIT is not to blame for very much at all.

IANAL... I just notice that other people said that MIT _could_ have put an
immediate stop to the proceedings:

"Here are the facts: This report claims that MIT was “neutral” — but MIT’s
lawyers gave prosecutors total access to witnesses and evidence, while
refusing access to Aaron’s lawyers to the exact same witnesses and evidence.
That’s not neutral. The fact is that all MIT had to do was say publicly, “We
don’t want this prosecution to go forward” – and Steve Heymann and Carmen
Ortiz would have had no case. We have an institution to contrast MIT with –
JSTOR, who came out immediately and publicly against the prosecution. Aaron
would be alive today if MIT had acted as JSTOR did. MIT had a moral imperative
to do so."

(from [http://tarensk.tumblr.com/post/56881327662/mit-report-is-
a-w...](http://tarensk.tumblr.com/post/56881327662/mit-report-is-a-whitewash-
my-statement-in-response))

~~~
mitmatt
What have I said that suggests "MIT is not to blame for very much at all"? My
comments have dealt with factual issues; I don't see where I advanced any
opinions on MIT's deserved level of blame.

The MIT report lays out facts (and not conclusions or judgements) for the
express purpose of informing the debate. Many here would probably be
interested in its contents if they weren't so busy expressing opinions about
it.

It's not clear to me what Ms. Stinebrickner-Kauffman meant by her comment,
since prosecution was entirely at the discretion of the DA (as with all
criminal charges) and MIT (like JSTOR) had no involvement in the criminal
charges. The report explains as much in careful detail and my poor
paraphrasing is no substitute.

(Judging by tweet timestamps, Ms. Stinebrickner-Kauffman's statement may have
been made about 18 minutes after the release of the report (8:31am @TarenSK vs
8:13am @MIT), so it's possible that the statement was not based on the
entirety of the report's content. That is not based on precise knowledge of
the report's actual time of release.)

Here is a personal opinion: Hal Abelson, founding director of both the Free
Software Foundation (with RMS, GJS, and others) and Creative Commons (with
Lawrence Lessig and others) and lead author of the MIT report, produced a
thoughtful and thorough document and it should not be ignored.

~~~
D_Alex
> What have I said that suggests "MIT is not to blame for very much at all"?
> My comments have dealt with factual issues; I don't see where I advanced any
> opinions on MIT's deserved level of blame.

My comment should have been a question, let me put it explicitly: What is your
personal opinion on MIT's deserved level of blame?

~~~
D_Alex
OK I have now read the entire report, up to and including the first appendix.
My now informed opinion is that with the issue of this, umm, mild report, MIT
have missed an opportunity to address the "one issue for reflection"
identified in the report itself:

In closing, our review can suggest this lesson: MIT is respected for world-
class work in information technology, for promoting open access to online
information, and for dealing wisely with the risks of computer abuse. The
world looks to MIT to be at the forefront of these areas. Looking back on the
Aaron Swartz case, the world didn’t see leadership. As one person involved in
the decisions put it: “MIT didn’t do anything wrong; but we didn’t do
ourselves proud.”

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zck
This article really needs more evidence supporting its views. Just restating
the claims of the report isn't enough. For example, the third claim is that
MIT claims no one cared until aaronsw's suicide. Citing protests by students,
open letters by faculty, or articles by alumni would sufficiently refute the
report, which is DH5^1. As it stands, this article is just contradicting,
which is DH3, and much less convincing.

[1][http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html)

~~~
aidenn0
I don't think they are even doing a DH3; they aren't claiming that MIT is
lying. I think it is rather: "Here are excuses offered up by MIT for its
behavior, even assuming they are true, it's lame"

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Qantourisc
Moral of the story DO NOT SUE YOUR STUDENTS. For crying out lout TALK with
them first.

The other lesson is we can all trust the USA to not kill a person (indirectly
and unwillingly but still dead non the less) when people commit minor crimes,
and don't even cause significant financial losses.

~~~
pyre
That's a curious lesson to learn seeing as Aaron Swartz was not a student at
MIT.

~~~
cpks
And MIT didn't sue him...

