Skip to content

Comment on How M.I.T. Ensnared a Hacker, Bucking a Freewheeling Cultureparent

Comments

Brewster Kahle was at MIT in 1982. I get the impression that MIT was gradually locked down. For example, prof Jerry Lettvin said, "Up to about 1950's there was a kind of freedom in the scientific world — certainly at MIT — that allowed you to play games of all sorts. As two or three decades went by MIT was taken over by managers." (http://www.tengerresearch.com/learn/interviews/jeromelettvin...)

And as the internet became important to business interests, it's not that surprising that these crimes became more harshly punished. (Though there's the argument that these punishments should be relaxed in some cases because elite CEOs and technologists have been guilty of them as part of their educations. Like Steve Jobs, Tufte, etc. Not unlike presidents getting away with drug use. And there's a conflict between businesses about intellectual property; Google probably would be happy if they could open up books.)

AboutSource Built by g1lg1l

Hackerly is an independent reader for Hacker News, built on the public HN API. Not affiliated with Y Combinator.