I don't see how basically saying "information doesn't need to be free, it's just the wrong people making money off it, it should go to me" can be constructed as serious activism. Yeah, maybe critical support for tying the copyright bullies up in lawsuits, but he's not Robin Hood, he's robbing the rich so he can live in a castle for himself.
How did his fighting in court have any implication on information not being free?
I only knew him as the Megaupload guy who got very sued, and reading his biography he clearly just happened to be on the cool side we might be able to critically support because of his specific grift.
But I'm not sure what he's fighting against would only be about him making money off stuff. If he somehow won his lawsuit (not happening) then wouldn't that ruling mean torrenting (peer-to-peer sharing, which is actually freeing information) would be protected too? And internet archive would probably be able to archive more stuff?
Yeah he's a guy who made money off a sketchy website that hosts shit behind sketchy ads that should've probably just been on torrent trackers, but that doesn't mean I won't root for him in his lawsuit and just hope he loses all his money at the same time in legal fees and fades to obscurity because of course he's also a nazi (thing that was just pointed to me on this website today because I didn't really follow him so don't want to go to bat for him too much)
Hence the critical support. His actions can definitely have positive effects (although it's very unlikely to succeed). But he's no champion of information freedom, and his posturing as such just rubs me the wrong way. He's fighting for his right to a mansion, not for the rights of internet archive.
I don't see how basically saying "information doesn't need to be free, it's just the wrong people making money off it, it should go to me" can be constructed as serious activism. Yeah, maybe critical support for tying the copyright bullies up in lawsuits, but he's not Robin Hood, he's robbing the rich so he can live in a castle for himself.
How did his fighting in court have any implication on information not being free?
I only knew him as the Megaupload guy who got very sued, and reading his biography he clearly just happened to be on the cool side we might be able to critically support because of his specific grift.
But I'm not sure what he's fighting against would only be about him making money off stuff. If he somehow won his lawsuit (not happening) then wouldn't that ruling mean torrenting (peer-to-peer sharing, which is actually freeing information) would be protected too? And internet archive would probably be able to archive more stuff?
Yeah he's a guy who made money off a sketchy website that hosts shit behind sketchy ads that should've probably just been on torrent trackers, but that doesn't mean I won't root for him in his lawsuit and just hope he loses all his money at the same time in legal fees and fades to obscurity because of course he's also a nazi (thing that was just pointed to me on this website today because I didn't really follow him so don't want to go to bat for him too much)
Hence the critical support. His actions can definitely have positive effects (although it's very unlikely to succeed). But he's no champion of information freedom, and his posturing as such just rubs me the wrong way. He's fighting for his right to a mansion, not for the rights of internet archive.