The Battle For Free Knowledge

The battle for free knowledge The issue regarding free access to academic journals and content is growing increasingly contentious, with founders of sites that enable this facing the might of the law. But should knowledge be exclusive?

- Lloyd Gedye

In his Guerilla Open Access Manifesto published in 2008, political organiser and internet activist Aaron Swartz wrote that the world’s entire scientific heritage is increasingly being digitised and locked up by a handful of private corporations. As a developer Swartz had been involved in the development of the web feed format RSS, the organisation Creative Commons and the social news site Reddit.

“The Open Access Movement has fought valiantly to ensure that scientists do not sign their copyrights away, but instead ensure their work is published on the internet, under terms that allow anyone to access it,” wrote Swartz.

Swartz advocated for securing copies of all academic articles and publishing them online for open access.

In late 2010 and early 2011 Swartz rigged a laptop up to academic journal article retailer JSTOR, via the MIT network and set it to continue downloading.

On the night of January 6, 2011, he was arrested. By July he had been indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of wire fraud, computer fraud, unlawfully obtaining information from a protected computer, and recklessly damaging a protected computer.

By September the next year, Swartz was facing an additional nine charges, increasing his potential sentence to 50 years in jail.

By January 2013 Swartz was dead. He had committed suicide.