Free Culture and the Internet Activist: Two Books about Aaron Swartz : The Booklist Reader

abernard102@gmail.com 2016-01-13

Summary:

" ... The Boy Who Could Change the World is a remarkably substantial collection of writings given the terrible brevity of Swartz’s intellectually daring life, from his geeky ardor for code to his collaborative, web-driven dreams of saving the world. Swartz’s mentor and friend, Lawrence Lessig, a professor of law at Harvard and U.S. presidential candidate, introduces the collection, in which Swartz reveals himself to be ardently inquisitive, self-deprecating, funny, brilliant, radical, and quixotic. The book organizes his writings according to his primary fascinations: computers, politics, and free culture, the last a concept rooted in the belief that access to knowledge and the ability to use it constitute the way to empowerment and justice. Swartz’s multifaceted activism included orchestrating massive online petitions protesting copyright and antipiracy bills. Swartz also wrote passionately about books (Kafka and David Foster Wallace were particular favorites), magazines, movies, music, and education. Each section is preceded by an illuminating essay by Swartz’s associates, including science fiction writer Cory Doctorow, Slate columnist David Auerbach, and David Segal, with whom Swartz cofounded the activism organization, Demand Progress ... Journalist Peters tells Swartz’s story in full in The Idealist: Aaron Swartz and the Rise of Free Culture on the Internet. In this impressively nimble and engrossing big-picture biography, Peters places hacktivist Swartz within a pantheon of intellectual property trailblazers and presents a colorful history of American publishing, public libraries, censorship, and copyright law ..."

Link:

http://www.booklistreader.com/2016/01/11/books-and-authors/free-culture-and-the-internet-activist-two-books-about-aaron-swartz/

From feeds:

Open Access Tracking Project (OATP) » abernard102@gmail.com

Tags:

oa.new oa.comment oa.copyright oa.licensing oa.advocacy oa.guerrilla oa.book_review oa.libre

Date tagged:

01/13/2016, 09:23

Date published:

01/13/2016, 04:23