Information Privilege & Aaron Swartz
Information today may seem more accessible than ever, but the truth of the matter is that there is an ocean of information, academic journals, research, data, etc. being gripped tightly by corporations charging large subscription fees creating an information gap between the haves and the have-nots. Depending on your own situation, this issue may not be of any great concern to you; most universities, well-funded libraries, and even primary schools maintain subscriptions to these databases and academic journals, but there is a massive population experiencing the effects of this lock-box of information. Less well off individuals, institutions, and even countries are being physically blocked from accessing academic information that carries with it massive benefits for those with access.
With any controversial issue, there comes with it two sides of the argument — and opposing these corporations holding the key to access are Whistleblowers across the world. One of which, made a lasting and dramatic impact that cost him a great deal — even his life. Aaron Swartz found this issue to be a gross social injustice and spent his career as a political whistleblower, software developer, and hacktivist promoting transparency and open access to information. Swartz was an icon in the open access movement, and authored the widely shared, “Guerilla Open Access Manifesto,” in which he states, “With enough of us, around the world, we’ll not just send a strong message opposing the privatization of knowledge — we’ll make it a thing of the past. Will you join us?” Swartz brought this same passion to many projects that helped combat information privilege including the launch of Creative Commons which allowed content creators to pick and choose which rights are allotted to other users. This non-profit organization encourages sharing and collaboration in online content.
Swartz also developed DeadDrop, which is a platform intended to allow other whistleblowers to securely share and collaborate on sensitive documents and materials. In 2010, Swartz took his passion for open access to a new level when he began downloading hundreds of PDFs per minute from the academic journal storage platform, JSTOR, which he intended to share for public use. This resulted in criminal charges, Swartz’ arrest, and a plea deal which Swartz rejected. After two years of a legal battle, Swartz eventually committed suicide in his apartment in Brooklyn. This was a dramatic and public story for the battle for Open Access.
Swartz’ efforts were not in vein, however. The Creative Commons licensing organization is growing in scope every year, DeadDrop is still helping many journalists securely share information under the new name, Secure Drop. Additionally, more open access efforts have developed since Swartz’ began his fight against information privilege including the twitter trend #ICanHazPDF which is a publicly used hashtag to request the sharing of PDFs and academic documents.
Clearly, while Swartz’ efforts to combat this gap in access to information came at a great cost, his efforts are continued by other proponents of open access in the academic world today.