BOSTON (AP) -- A Harvard University fellow studying ethics has been accused of using the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's computer network to steal nearly 5 million academic articles.A federal indictment released Tuesday accused 24-year-old Aaron Swartz of stealing the documents from JSTOR, a subscription service that offers digitized copies of articles from more than 1,000 academic journals. ... Prosecutors say he intended to distribute the articles on file-sharing websites.
Because Lord knows that if he got away with this, the incentive to write academic articles would completely collapse.
Shouldn't the AP put the word "steal" in quotes here? Amazing how the whole "theft" lingo false meme has so causally pervaded discussions of IP. Might I suggest he has been accused of "liberating information without authorization"?
AP copy editors, take note.
This guy faces 35 years in prison.
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