Overzealous prosecution, outdated computer-hacking laws and MIT accused of turning its back on academic freedom – it sounds like a movie, but it was the life and death of Internet activist Aaron Swartz.
A new documentary, The Internet’s Own Boy, tells the Swartz saga and the string of events that preceded his suicide as his prosecution dragged on:
What this film shows us, in revealing and forceful interviews with his family, friends, lawyers, and fellow Internet pioneers, is that Swartz was always thinking of how to engage the world in a supremely important discussion about the very foundations of our freedom. He was instrumental in defeating SOPA, the Stop [Online] Piracy Act, which would have put an even tighter straitjacket on the free exchange of ideas and information on the web. His goal was citizen empowerment. And it is stirring to think of what he could have accomplished if he had lived.
Aaron Swartz was already a hero at age 26, a citizen anarchist too smart and unpredictable for the power structures of America to contain. When they threatened to send him to prison for 35 years and fine him $1 million, he cracked under the pressure.
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