Huh? Rosa Parks didn't set out to harm the Montgomery Bus Line. She just took the "wrong" seat.
It's funny that people can play the Anti-Godwin without even really knowing who Rosa Parks was; at least you can assume the people who invoke Hitler actually know why Hitler was evil.
>"Rosa Parks didn't set out to harm the Montgomery Bus Line. She just took the "wrong" seat."
And Swartz didn't set out to harm JSTOR commercially. That's only the view of prosecutors, which is completely expected.
Are you being deliberately obtuse? The point of bringing up Rosa Parks is that you make claims like, "We are a nation ruled by laws, not people. It is not up to Aaron Swartz". Substitute Aaron Swartz for Rosa Parks/Gandhi/whatever other examples people have brought up, and you should see what a ridiculous statement that is.
>"It's funny that people can play the Anti-Godwin without even really knowing who Rosa Parks was"
What's really funny is that, between calling opposing ideas "dumb" and "retarded", you've managed to conceal from most of the HN community the fact that you're really an arrogant blow-hard.
Funny, because I see him repeating, over and over, that the purpose is to set academic research free. It's called the "Open Access Manifesto" for crying out loud, not "Let's bankrupt JSTOR!"
And it's that idea that myself and other "retards" here are able to get behind, despite the fact that he broke the law to try to accomplish it, and will likely suffer consequences.
Only on a message board are these two dots hard to connect. Because after JSTOR's whole database is made public, people will continue to pay JSTOR because they're nice guys.
>"Because after JSTOR's whole database is made public, people will continue to pay JSTOR because they're nice guys."
Because Universities and research facilities are going to download the JSTOR torrent as opposed to purchasing access, just because it's available, right?
That sounds a lot like the argument the record labels and MPAA make. I can't remember, do people still pay for music and movies?
> Huh? Rosa Parks didn't set out to harm the Montgomery Bus Line. She just took the "wrong" seat.
Ah, the intellectual inconsistency of conservatism, where condemnation or condonation is so dependent upon the arrow of time. Urging caution to slow down the rate of societal change is valid; fallacious arguments to further that goal are not.
At the time, the same cryptofascist arguments were bandied about for dear Rosa - she's upsetting the system of segregation between seats, she's destroying the value of the bus lines because white people won't want to ride them, she's delaying the bus and inconveniencing others, she's destroying the value of all businesses that rely on serving white customers, etc etc etc.
But since Rosa Parks is in the past, we embrace Rosa Parks and claim her as part of our American Heritage, responsible for helping usher in an era of freedom and equality. She was guilty of breaking the law, but consciously and respectfully submitted to the immutable system. But the system was wrong back then, so we no longer consider her a criminal.
But Aaron Swartz? He's guilty of stealing (hold pinky to mouth) millions of dollars. For a straightforward downloading of too many articles combined with an upsetting mens rea. Use the vague modern-witch hunting laws to lock him in the clink and throw away the key!
I agree that Aaron Swartz is guilty - of breaking into a closet. If MIT wishes, he should be prosecuted by the Middlesex DA and given the same punishment any non-poor white kid would receive - restitution and probation.
Oh boy.. I had wondered if you were going to say this. Sorry to break it to you, but you are conservative. (at least as far as your HN comments go)
Just go back and reread any thread of yours regarding TLS versus designing new protocols. The liberal cryptographers will design dozens of protocol implementations with starry-eyed visions of new unformalized properties that don't actually exist. Most will be used in places where TLS would have sufficed and most of them will be broken. But eventually something new will come out this mess, provide enough advantages to gain traction, and become hardened canon over the years. Conservative philosophy will never design a crypto protocol, but it will prevent a lot of damage from the redundant badly-designed protocols. Both philosophies are needed.
One could be both liberal and conservative in different areas, but your non-technical comments read the same way. Or perhaps you're just a bit confused about what conservatism actually is. Totally reasonable given the shifty name calling that masquerades as political "debate". This is quite long, but got me started on seeing where the continuum underlying the political spectrum actually comes from. http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2009/01/gentle-... . Eventually, despite that series's mischaracterizations and slightly wrong decomposition, I realized I am liberal (sorry MM) (also, this does not imply that I support politicians who use that label).
Harm? No, certainly not. But to make sure it's totally clear, she knew exactly what she was doing and had been trained in non-violent protest and civil disobedience at the Highlander Folk School.
During that era, having Rosa Parks (and potentially many other men and women of color) in "the wrong seat" could have potentially diminished the attractiveness of taking that Bus line for the patrons, thus damaging the Bus Line's profitability.
A more modern example of the presence of something "unwanted" bringing upon "damages", is Walmart moving into a high end town (which from what I understand, leads to a decrease in property values).
I am playing devil's advocate here, but Rosa Parks certainly could harm the Montgomery Bus Line with her inaccurate seat occupation.
It's funny that people can play the Anti-Godwin without even really knowing who Rosa Parks was; at least you can assume the people who invoke Hitler actually know why Hitler was evil.