Talk:Aaron Swartz/Archive 3

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Hack vs crack

An editor has substituted "crack" for "hack" in the section now called "Attacks and cracks". The edit summaries assert that there's a definitional issue and "crack" is the accurate term. I don't know if that's true, as a matter of accurate usage. But I am pretty sure it's not a definitional difference most readers will understand.

To this particular 50-something year old reader, it obscures more than it explains. Plus, it gives me visions of computer attacks mounted by Jeff Foxworthy or Larry the Cable Guy. Would others please weigh in? David in DC (talk) 10:52, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

It could read "gained access to", as in: "Two days after Swartz’s death, members of Anonymous gained access to ("cracked") two websites on the MIT domain..." Bus stop (talk) 11:03, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

I don't like gained access to because it's synonymous with accessed, which is what anyone who looks at a website normally does. Perhaps "gained" is meant to imply that the level of access was unusually high (such that they could deface the pages) or that they had to go to extraordinary lengths (to access more than usual), but that's not resolving the issue of making things clear to the reader. Perhaps avoid saying members of Anonymous did X altogether, and use passive voice (discouraged as it may be) to say that the sites were defaced and that it was apparently the work of members of Anonymous, or some such. —mjb (talk) 14:22, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

“crack. vb. Slang. … 4. To hack (a computer, network, server, or database) with the intention of causing damage or disruption.”

“hack, vb. To surreptitiously break into the computer, network, servers, or database of another person or organization. Cf. crack. — hacker, n.”

Black’s Law Dictionary (9th ed. 2009).  Reverting slang. --Dervorguilla (talk) 15:43, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Move and Delete the section Does this belong here, or in the wikipedia coverage of Anonymous_(group)? What we have, after all, are various activities, not necessarily related to each other, which someone claims have something to do with the Aaron Swartz. When they first occurred, it seemed like this might be a movement or a meme, but now these seem to be unrelated actions that are connected to Swartz loosely, if they are connected at all, and that might not be connected to each other. MarkBernstein (talk) 16:10, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

• Strong oppose deleting grafs 1–3 or moving to Anonymous_(group).  Hack page said “R.I.P Aaron Swartz; …; Down with Anonymous.”

Agree that none of us has found an RS that says the hacks are connected to each other.  The Aush0k–TibitXimer document says “Down With Anonymous”; that hack at least seems to relate to Anonymous’s hack.  None of us has found any RS that says they might have nothing to do with Swartz.  We have found RSs that say they do. --Dervorguilla (talk) 17:31, 12 March 2013 (UTC) --04:52, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Swartz didn't hack anything. He didn't authorize the hacks. He didn't perform them. He literally had nothing to do with them. They're just marginally notable or non-notable events that happened to use the subject's name to get attention. MarkBernstein (talk) 17:41, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Oppose. Our wording is clear: "Two days after Swartz’s death, members of Anonymous hacked two websites on the MIT domain, replacing them with tributes to Swartz…" There is no implication that Swartz authorized the referred-to activity and I don't think we know that the events "use[d] the subject's name to get attention." Bus stop (talk) 19:26, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

"But what do the events have to do with Swartz? If someone stands athwart the road of history, shouting "Swartz", does that merit inclusion in the article? We don't catalog everything that someone says about Obama on his page, or everything someone says about Madonna on her page. Why does a hoax phone call merit inclusion here? This seems clear recentism and WP:UNDUE. MarkBernstein (talk) 20:08, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Agree that the material about the hoax call does seem to have some elements of WP:UNDUE.

But the passage of interest (graf 4), which now runs to 104 words, could probably be edited down to 50 with no controversy whatsoever.  Should I give it a try? --Dervorguilla (talk) 05:32, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Friends, I think the "Hacks and attacks" subsection is at least as important a part of the "Aftermath" section as all the Congresscrap. And I think the "Aftermath" section is a crucial part of Aaron Swartz's biography. If his life and death have a lasting effect standing athwart world history, it could well be for the activism they inspired and the changes that come to 21st century prosecutory culture because of them. The subsection should stay and all wiki-notable hacks and attacks should be catalogued there.

Moving to Anonymous would be crazy. Half of the incidents cannot be reliably sourced to Anonymous. That's sorta the point. Swartz's activist legacy, and the hacktivism that followed his death extend far beyond Anonymous. That's the whole point of the afterword he wrote to Cary Doctorow's novel.

Trimming is ok, but not much. Each notable incident in the ongoing campaign seems described about as succinctly they can be without inscrutability. WP:CRYSTAL says this issue may need revisiting as/if the incidents continue, but for now I'd counsel against much trimming.

Finally, I'd like to get back to the narrow question I posed at the start: Can we get back to a more colloquially understandable "Hacks" as a better word here than what may be the more hypertechnically correct, but obscurantist "Cracks" appears to have been resolved by Dervorguilla's revision of his original revision to my revision of the original heading. Thanks.

Now, would somebody please acknowledge my Jeff Foxworthy/Larry the Cable Guy joke? I hate it when my jokes get ignored. David in DC (talk) 10:57, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

“Hacks and hoaxes” ... “Attacks and hacks” ... “Attacks, hacks, and hoaxes” ... Great subheads all.  Any preferences?

On Foxworthy/Guy: Anything that requires the reader to click two links & think is just too much work... --Dervorguilla (talk) 01:32, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

Restoring David in DC’s inclusion of the term “Hacks” in the subsection head. --Dervorguilla (talk) 19:21, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Should the whole Hacks and attacks subhed be deleted, trimmed, moved, or allowed to remain, in roughly its current version

New thread for bigger issues raised in prior discussion of Hack v. Crack David in DC (talk) 11:01, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

These are symbolic reactions and they shed light on the significance of Swartz' life, at least from a public point of view, and I don't think they should be trimmed back. Bus stop (talk) 20:30, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Support David in DC’s and Bus stop’s points about keeping the material.  The incident is indeed significant.  I’m revising the text to hopefully make clearer just why it’s significant.  (Revert as needed!) --Dervorguilla (talk) 07:14, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

Here’s the general convention for setting out the relative authoritativeness of the material in the various elements of a newspaper article:  If the story doesn’t support the headline or the caption, the story dominates.

In the particular case of the Kao article, compare the subheadline (“Tip said gunman was after Reif in retaliation for Swartz death”) and photo caption (“The tip said that the gunman was going after L. Rafael Reif in retaliation for Aaron Swartz’s death”) with the actual story (“Police radio traffic suggested … that he [the gunman] was going after MIT President L. Rafael Reif … in retaliation for the death of Aaron Swartz”).

If the tip had indeed said that the gunman was going after Reif, wouldn’t the newswriter most likely have mentioned this rather newsworthy fact?  And the authorities have famously asserted there is “no indication that the hoax was related to Swartz.”

(Alternatively, The Tech’s anonymous headline/caption writer could be the actual tipster himself.  Should I inquire?) --Dervorguilla (talk) 08:58, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

Some fearless – and peerless – editing by David in DC.

The UKDMail and UKDailyMail refs aren’t working, though, so I’m substituting a source (the Herald) that was cited by the AP as the original secondary source, along with the e-mail that was cited by both sources.

I’m also rewording the text (as usual) and adding a pithy quote from the Herald.  Revert as needed! --Dervorguilla (talk) 18:43, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

Prison time in plea negotiations

We've been pretty careful to avoid getting into speculation about how much prison time Swartz was likely to receive, if convicted. We only state, in summary:

• The DOJ publicly said Swartz faced up to 35 years if convicted on all 13 counts.
• Professor Kerr opined that Swartz wasn't likely to get the maximum.
• According to Swartz's attorney, the DOJ offered to recommend 6 months in exchange for a guilty plea on all 13 counts.

This is pretty good, and I hope we can continue to avoid supporting any particular theory of how much prison time he "actually" risked. However, we didn't say what recommendation was on the table if Swartz disputed any of the charges. So today, I added the following, in summary:

• According to Swartz's attorney, the DOJ "threatened" to recommend 7 years if Swartz didn't plead guilty on all 13 counts.
• Swartz's attorney complained to the DOJ's Office of Professional Responsibility that the difference between 6 months and 7 years far exceeds the difference encouraged by the Federal Sentencing Guidelines.

I hope it's OK. —mjb (talk) 16:39, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

I'd suggest also noting that if he pled, he'd suffer the fairly onerous penalties that stem from of having a felony criminal record, likely for the rest of his life. This is mentioned in some of the longer articles, so it's not original research. -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 11:28, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

e.g. from the New Yorker article -

“ He wanted to make the world better from inside the system, and they don't let felons work in the White House," Quinn Norton says. "He said those exact words to me. My dad didn't last very long with his felony conviction. It's like being a fucking leper, and for somebody who wanted to move in the circles of American political power it was the end of all those dreams. ... ”

-- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 12:33, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

I saw that, and I think it and other statements in the New Yorker and Slate pieces might be useful, but mainly just because they could help balance our portrayal of Aaron as mainly a "hacktivist", when in fact his views on how to effect change were both evolving and multifaceted, if not conflicted.

As for what he was facing, in the lead, we do already say what kinds of things, aside from incarceration, would follow a conviction. Quoting the DOJ press release: "...a fine of more than $1 million, asset forfeiture, restitution and supervised release," each term linked appropriately.

It's my opinion, based partly on how Kevin Mitnick was treated post-release—10 years of supervision, at first—that the conditions of supervised release would be far more onerous than whatever restrictions Aaron would run in to later in life as a felon. During supervised release, it's likely he would've been forbidden from using network technology in all but the most passive of ways; the court certainly wouldn't have tolerated any more activism, disruption, or anything that garners notoriety but was not pre-approved... which may well have spelled the end of any tech industry entrepreneurial aspirations as well. There certainly wouldn't be any book or movie deals during that time. And he'd have to second-guess every public statement, no matter how benign, even technical posts to developer forums. Might as well chop off a pianist's hands.

However, even if we can find some "reliable sources" to cite, and no matter how plausible our predictions may be, I don't know if this Wikipedia article is the best place to speculate in this regard. Life as a felon would entail some restrictions...therefore what? Some people think maybe that's why he killed himself? Some people think maybe the government was out to destroy him? It's plausible, perhaps true, but not really necessary support for anything we are saying in the article. So I don't think we can justify using Quinn Norton's quote in that way. —mjb (talk) 03:46, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

I'd say the encyclopedia issue is presenting a reasonable description of what he was facing. Actually, I believe "therefore ... people think maybe that's why he killed himself" is in a way exactly the point. That is, I've seen an extensive misapprehension about the case in terms of people not understanding the ramifications of the plea deal. They mistakenly seem to think that if he pled and got even six months (which would not be hard time), then afterwards, everything would be over, and he could put it all behind him. Then, having assumed he turned down the six months for what appears to them unjustified reasons, they use that as the basis for deeming him unreasonable, and proceed to categorize his suicide as further proof of that unreasonableness. However, they are wrong, since the key assumption in that chain of reasoning about six months is mistaken. It's potential six months in prison, and then a life-long felony record, which can be quite destructive (and plus release conditions as you point out). Thus the downside wasn't "trial/x sentence" vs "plea/6 months", but "trial/x sentence" vs "plea/6 months prison/release limits/lifetime felony burden". That's a very tough choice, and the article should make it clear. Again, this isn't original research, as it's mentioned in some of the various longer magazine pieces about the case. -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 04:46, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Seth Finkelstein. The overwhelming evidence is that the subject faced grave legal consequences that could very possibly have ended his already-distinguished career in software and as a political activist. This is clearly the position of the subject's lawyers, and doubtless reflects the advice they gave the subject. Nearly every journalist and scholar concurs that the risk was very substantial. Quinn Norton's quote is germane.MarkBernstein (talk) 18:05, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

I accept that the risk was real and substantial, or at least the fact that Aaron (as reported by Quinn) and other sources agree on that point. But it is still broaching WP:NOTCRYSTALBALL; we can't just say "as a felon, he would've had a hard life ahead of him." We might say that various sources feel this way, and Aaron himself is said to have believed it. But why do we need to say it? It can't just be to counter external commentary by unsympathetic disbelievers. They'll just be tempted to "balance" it by adding or giving greater weight to their favorite pundits' analyses that risk was minimal.

Rather than invite such a shit-storm, I feel it's more productive to use Quinn's quote, etc., in the context of balancing the implicit portrayal of Aaron as being primarily or exclusively a "hacktivist". We'd say the same things, really. It just wouldn't be expressed in support of a declaration of a probable outcome of a conviction in the MIT/JSTOR case. Rather, it'd be in support of a declaration along the lines of [people close to Aaron say] "he also wanted to effect change from within the system." We can say he lamented the difficulties that he and others believed a felony conviction would impose, but we wouldn't be saying that his hopelessness around this one topic was the reason he killed himself, and we wouldn't be saying that it was a certainty that life as a felon would have hindered him. —mjb (talk) 21:50, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Is there any more substantiation to the claim that MIT intervened to prevent a plea deal excluding prison time, as indicated in '‘Marty Weinberg, who took the case over from Good, said he nearly negotiated a plea bargain in which Swartz would not serve any time. “JSTOR signed off on it,” he said, “but MIT would not.”[84]’'? The source is very weak, containing nothing more than that one line verbatim, which is purported to be a claim made by one interested party's lawyer. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:470:8B2D:7E0:6C7B:6601:85EE:C84E (talk) 00:51, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

• Addendum: I was able to speak with some people with close knowledge of the situation and it sounds like the claim is indeed a gross distortion, although it may be true that the person Marty Weinberg made such a claim. Don't know what the proper Wikipedian way is to approach such a quoted dubious claim. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:470:8B2D:7E0:6C7B:6601:85EE:C84E (talk) 03:06, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Mass Lawyers Weekly is a pretty good source. Talking to your pal in the prosecutor's office is Original Research. If the claim is contradicted in the abelson report, then we'll have something to discuss. Oh -- and hi again Carth, I presume?! MarkBernstein (talk) 10:42, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Who the hell is Carth and what does MLW have to do with is? The source cited is a Boston Globe column, which has this as a random one-liner. Do you have another source for the quote with more background information? In any case, if party X is quoted in some source Y as making a claim A, that's not necessarily evidence of A. It's evidence that X claimed A. Selective use of quotations like that makes for unbalanced POV and general lack of rigor. In this case, indeed, I happen to know out of band that the claim is basically wrong. I'm suggesting someone who understands Wikipedia better might know the right way to handle what amounts to selective hearsay. (My guess would be that the quote simply shouldn't be included, unless topical quotations from other sides of the dispute can be found so that they can be contrasted. I am neither a journalist nor a wikipedian so I was hoping to catch the interest of someone who had a better clue and could make the appropriate argument.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:470:8B2D:7E0:EDA9:6AEB:B8C6:B9E9 (talk) 02:12, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

The Silvergate quote is from MLW, with additional followup at ?CNET. Your line of argument and claim to secret sources in the prosecutors offices is reminiscent of a former Wikipedian, for whom you might have been mistaken. But the source for the Silvergate quote is appropriate; your friend might think he was mistaken, but your friend wasn't the subject's attorney and Silvergate's source was. Your friend may be your friend, but MLW is a reliable published source. (We've also been discussing a Quinn Norton quotation, but presumably that's not what you're discussing.) MarkBernstein (talk) 02:21, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

Hm, it sounds like we're talking about completely different things, then! I was referring only to the one-line Marty Weinberg quote from the Kevin Cullen column in the Boston Globe. Perhaps I shouldn'tve tacked on my comment to the bottom of an existing section? I thought it was an appropriate place topically, but I don't really understand how these discussions work, so maybe that was dumb! Anyway, summarized to one line, I think my objection is, claims (or implications) of fact should not be supported solely on the basis of quotations from one side's lawyer, without contrasting statements from the other parties or outside corroboration -- in reference to the one-line MW quote. I happen to know more detail, but that obviously cannot be used in the argument because it's not yet published anywhere (to my knowledge). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:470:8B2D:7E0:EDA9:6AEB:B8C6:B9E9 (talk) 02:51, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

Primary sources and WP:NOR

User:David in DC recently restored a secondary source (the Daily Mail), noting (The link works fine. The Ruiz press relese is a primary source. Primary sources should only be used to back up a secondary source. Cannot be sole source for a fact. WP:NOR. Also, "18 minutes" and "Sprint Internet Relay service" are from Daily Mail.).

I would be advise some caution here. WP:NOR is very misleadingly written in my opinion (I do not claim WP:IGNORE; just that it's sloppy). But it should not be the case that we prefer to use a secondary source to a primary source to establish a fact that is clear in the primary source. WP:NOR's prohibition is based on a concern of misinterpreting a primary source and erroneously synthesizing information from it. It is also written in the context where a primary source and a secondary source can be seperated in time by years (or even decades or centuries), with the clear benefit of hindsight and actual scholarship. Those are not situations we have here. Instead our secondary sources are quickly written news articles (often on short deadlines from reporters highly disconnected in place and reputation), and they lack the imprimatur of the kinds of secondary sources that WP:NOR presumes. In fact, in many cases the secondary sources may represent less scholarship, work, and care than the primary sources.

What WP:NOR actually says is this:

Secondary or tertiary sources are needed to establish the topic's notability and to avoid novel interpretations of primary sources, though primary sources are permitted if used carefully. Material based purely on primary sources should be avoided. All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than to the original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors. (underline is my emphasis).

A quotation from an email regarding a developing recent article (which the whole Swartz affair is) is a good example of where the primary source is best. The secondary source only adds the possibility of error and the certainty of less faith in the chain of evidence and custody.

In this particular case, I'm not so sure the MIT News Office press release really qualifies as a primary source, anyhow. It is essentially a news article quoting the entirety of Ruiz's email (without headers), just as the Daily Mail might be. Except that the Daily Mail is unlikely to have received the email directly (I assert this as informed speculation); they probably got their quote from one of the many other sources who quoted the email in entirety, possibly including the press release, or this [blog post from The MIT Tech], or some copies that appeared on pastebin.com at the time, etc., etc. (They offer no information on the chain-of-custody, implicit or explicit. Neither do the MIT sources, but they have implicit chain-of-custody.)

So anyhow, I would disagree. Yes, the Ruiz press release can definitely be the "sole source for a fact."

Also, tangentially, I suspect it is a mistake to characterize the communication as an "18-minute message." We know that it was a "running message"; assuming 18 minutes is the correct length (is it?), it's probably better characterized as an "18-minute conversation" or communication; otherwise it implies the hoax source was talking/typing for 18 minutes straight. With respect to the Sprint sourcing, citing the Daily Mail citing the Boston Herald is just silly. Again, a tertiary source does not give us a benefit over a secondary source for a raw fact (a fact n+1 -times removed from the source is not better than n times removed. Lowering n is desirable). In point of fact there are fairly few "primary" sources for that fact here: direct interviews with the Cambridge Police (they didn't give many), the Cambridge Police's press conference that Saturday (they did not disclose the Sprint source, and declined to comment when asked), the Cambridge Police's press release the following Tuesday 2/26 (which did cite Sprint), and communications between the police officers during the event (often with fog of war problems). I would suggest their press release is the best source here. Though, unlike the news media -based secondary sources, it is probably not a URL that can be expected to be stable for more than a few years, so that is a strike against it. jhawkinson (talk) 05:38, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

I ought to mention that I did ask David in DC to “fearlessly” revert any of the edits I made.  I’m seeing this as like an expository writing assignment, where you can often get better results if you go back and forth a few times. --Dervorguilla (talk) 09:23, 15 March 2013 (UTC))

Concur re expository writing assignment simile.

Content to see my latest edits fearlessly revised per Jhawkinson and Dervorguilla above.

Consensus achieved? David in DC (talk) 11:25, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

While I don't think I'm technically in violation, I think its best for appearances if I don't actually make edits to this article that relate to portions that might be derived from information sourced from me elsewhere. So I'll let others do that, if they agree. Consider the above "getting it off my chest" perhaps in advance of a long comment on Wikipedia_talk:No_original_research, perhaps. jhawkinson (talk) 17:34, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

Correct on consensus; and A for alliteration.  I’m inspired to restore part of David in DC’s wording in the subsection head:  Attacks and hacks -> Hacks and hoaxes.  (See esp. today’s news about March 20 report of an e-mail hoax.) --Dervorguilla (talk) 19:30, 20 March 2013 (UTC) 02:05, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Today's news / discovery motion

Well, the world is full of irony. The day after the above rant about primary sources, there are additional developments in the Swartz case that appear to be only covered by primary sources right now :). Specifically, Swartz's attorneys filed this afternoon (US/Eastern) a motion to modify the protective order, http://www.archive.org/download/gov.uscourts.mad.137971/gov.uscourts.mad.137971.109.0.pdf. That is, it would permit disclosure of much of the materials that the Government has provided to the defense as part of the discovery process. It also has several attachments, linked from the RECAP docket page.

In summary (hello, synthesis), the defense would like to disclose the documents provided during discovery, and the Government quibbles with the defense on several particular points, regarding redaction of some kinds of information.

And, in more inside baseball terms, docket #110 is an appearance filed by Jack Pirozzola, the First Assistant United States Attorney, who is Carmen Ortiz's number 2 person. It appears that Pirozzola has been handling the details of the case personally in the negotiation over lifting the protective order covering discovery. Have at it, folks! jhawkinson (talk) 01:42, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

Honestly, while this is relevant for reporters and similar ilk, mention of it can wait a few days until the deadline-pressured click-seekers, err, I mean, Reliable Sources, produce a garbled mishmash that's acceptable to cite according to Wikipedia's rules. -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 03:28, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

Hatnote fix

Correcting hatnote & compressing...

For the English actor, see Aaron Swartz (actor). For the American actor, see Aaron Schwartz. For the Canadian actor, see Aaron Schwartz (Canadian actor).  –>

For other people with similar names, see Aaron Swartz (actor), Aaron Schwartz, or Aaron Schwartz (actor-lawyer).

136 characters –> 87 characters.

WP:HN says:  “The hatnote should not overload the user with extraneous information and the content should be imparted quickly….  ‘Less is more.’”  --Dervorguilla (talk) 05:36, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Prosecutory rationale and response: Wu quote

The passage in question (ellipses added):

… Law Professor Tim Wu wrote, “The prosecutors forgot that … their job is … to use the awesome power of criminal law to protect the public from actual harm.”

Reason for keeping:

_ Columbia Law School professor offers expert opinion in The New Yorker; clearly belongs

Some reasons for deleting:

_ Wu, a well-known expert in copyright law, doesn’t claim to be an expert in criminal law.  (“Wu’s academic specialties are copyright and telecommunications policy.”)

_ The opinion was offered in The New Yorker News Desk (a blog), not The New Yorker (a periodical).

_ Wu knew Swartz personally and studied law under the professor who became Swartz’s lawyer.

A better quote?

… Law professor Tim Wu wrote, “Just last year the Ninth Circuit ... threw out a similar prosecution...  [It] refused to read the law in a way that would make a criminal of ‘everyone who uses a computer in violation of computer use restrictions — which may well include everyone who uses a computer.’”

--Dervorguilla (talk) 01:02, 29 March 2013 (UTC) 06:41, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

I strongly disagree. It is likely and desirable for any journalist to know his subject. Dividing the New Yorker’s online and print editions is a pointless errand (and does not reflect well on Wikipedia). Again, we're seeing an effort to water down and obscure what's been written about the subject, replacing it with general commentary about law. MarkBernstein (talk) 15:23, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

“Dividing the New Yorker’s online and print editions is a pointless errand.” — Maybe, but WP doesn’t seem to think that a blog posting in The New Yorker News Desk should be treated as if it were a magazine article in The New Yorker (online edition or print edition or both). WP:CITET --Dervorguilla (talk) 21:47, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

----

Section head:  2.2.4  Prosecutory rationale and response

  Prosecutory.  “Of [or] relating to … prosecution.”

  Prosecutorial.  “Of [or] relating to … a prosecutor or prosecution.”

  Prosecutorial.  “[Of or relating to a] prosecutor.”  Black’s Law Dictionary (9th ed. 2009).

This is a section about the prosecution — not the prosecutor.

You’re an encyclopedia reader seeking information about the response to the prosecutory rationale.  Which response or responses are you likely to find more helpful?

A. “The prosecutors forgot that their job isn’t to try and win at all costs.”

B. “Just last year the Ninth Circuit threw out a similar prosecution.”

C. Both.

D. Neither.

  --Dervorguilla (talk) 00:11, 30 March 2013 (UTC) 02:50, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

both, of course. Simple answers to simple questions. MarkBernstein (talk) 04:05, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

You’re seeking information about the response to the prosecutory rationale — meaning, the response to the prosecution.  The correct answer is B.  C is also correct.  (A and D are not.)

--Dervorguilla (talk) 07:24, 30 March 2013 (UTC) 02:50, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

and why is "Volokh Conspiracy" a dandy source, while the New Yorker Online is a disparaged blog? Other than that one says nice things about the prosecutors, and the other doesn't? (Obviously, the online components of the New Yorker, The Atlantic, etc are reliable published sources and not the target of the WP guideline) MarkBernstein (talk) 13:00, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Strongly support MarkBernstein’s proposition that there’s no reason to believe that The Volokh Conspiracy, a self-published blog, is as reliable a source as The New Yorker, a periodical.  The Volokh Conspiracy site doesn’t even give the publisher’s name (Eugene Volokh).

Support in part MarkBernstein’s point that at least some blogs published on the New Yorker site are more reliable than the blog published on Volokh’s site.

MarkBernstein’s motion to admit Wu’s blog entry is accordingly GRANTED.

User Dervorguilla now moves that User MarkBernstein grant her own request to admit Wu ¶ 6 as an authoritative legal opinion by a federal appeals court implying that the prosecutors in Boston had no case:

Colombia Law School professor Tim Wu wrote, “Just last year the Ninth Circuit ... threw out a similar prosecution...  [It] refused to read the law in a way that would make a criminal of ‘everyone who uses a computer in violation of computer use restrictions — which may well include everyone who uses a computer.’”

--Dervorguilla (talk) 18:40, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

I think it's fine to add this, but not to substitute it for the current quote. MarkBernstein (talk) 21:11, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Improvement?

“The prosecutors forgot that, as public officials, their job isn’t to try and win at all costs but to use the awesome power of criminal law to protect the public from actual harm.” ->

“The prosecutors forgot that … their job [is] … to use the awesome power of criminal law to protect the public from actual harm.”

33 words -> 22

1 logic error -> 0

--Dervorguilla (talk) 23:46, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Removed one of the three quotes from Volokh Conspiracy (all by Kerr), in accord with MarkBernstein’s point above.  -“On January 20, Kerr proposed a revision of the CFAA, including the elimination of penalties for merely exceeding authorized access.”  (If any of Kerr’s language is being incorporated into a bill, the quote ought to be restored, of course.)  --Dervorguilla (talk) 23:28, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

PACER edit (removing 'merciless')

More reasons for the change from: “Was the merciless JSTOR prosecution the revenge of embarrassed bureaucrats?” to: “Was the … JSTOR prosecution the revenge of embarrassed bureaucrats?”

In context, the two sentences are logical identities.  Out of context, the first sentence is ambiguous.  There’s a problem with the prosody.  Some readers may stress the wrong words:

“The merciless JSTOR prosecution” implies that there was a second merciless prosecution (on behalf of some other plaintiff).

“The merciless JSTOR prosecution” implies that JSTOR itself was merciless.

“The merciless JSTOR prosecution implies that there was one prosecution, that it was on behalf of JSTOR, and that the prosecution was merciless.  As we know, this is the way the author meant it to be read.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 04:57, 31 March 2013 (UTC) 05:50, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Now you're improving the prose of the cited authorities? You might not have called the prosecution "merciless." It might embarrass you that it is called merciless here. But the author did choose to call it merciless, and the term should remain. MarkBernstein (talk) 15:34, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

No problem.  I’d thought that I was improving the prose (as well as removing rhetorical language).  Maybe not, though.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 21:45, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

BOLD creation of United States v. Aaron Swartz

This subpage was suggested some time ago when the article was still in great flux. Now that things have settled down, the sub-article seems useful. Please improve it. --HectorMoffet (talk) 07:50, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

One user has suggested that the young United States v. Aaron Swartz article be move moved out of article space until it's more complete. Does anyone else have opinions one way or the other on that? I'm willing to do whatever the group of editors here think is the best way for WP to cover all this. --HectorMoffet (talk) 06:11, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Well now we have two giant bodies of overlapping content. If we're going to have a separate article about the case, and we're going to use the {{main|United States v. Aaron Swartz}} template in this article, then all of this article's content (in that section) should be moved to the new page. All we should be left with here is a terse, 1- or 2- paragraph summary that is phrased in such a way that it isn't going to be changed or expanded every week. —mjb (talk) 23:20, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

I oppose that. I think the split-away article will be good, one day. But I think it needs a whole lotta work and should be userfied somewhere where we can build it up collaboaratively. David in DC (talk) 02:16, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Accord.  The case was filed but never argued.  No trial, no decision, no judicial opinion.  If no one ever cites the case, it has no legal relevance and [the article] will need much work to become independently useful. --Dervorguilla (talk) 03:57, 12 April 2013 (UTC)  04:24, 12 April 2013 (UTC)  04:35, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Meanwhile we could start ‘stealing’ the most pertinent data from the United States v. Swartz article and copying it to Aaron Swartz.  As related material in Aaron Swartz becomes less pertinent, we could likewise move it to the (temporarily) userfied United States v. Swartz.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 04:24, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

(Addressing mjb’s analysis)  These grafs contain material that’s directly about Aaron Swartz, Swartz’s estate, Swartz’s immediate family members, or Commw. v. Swartz:  JSTOR ¶¶ 1–2; Arrest and state charges ¶¶ 1–2; Federal indictment and prosecution ¶¶ 2–3, 5; Plea negotiations ¶¶ 2, 4, 7; Family response and criticism ¶¶ 1–3; Legal proceedings ¶¶ 1, 4.   These grafs contain no material directly about Aaron Swartz, Swartz’s estate, Swartz’s immediate family members, or Commw. v. Swartz, but some material directly about U.S. v. Swartz:  Federal indictment and prosecution ¶¶ 1–2, 4, 6–7; Plea negotiations ¶¶ 1, 3–6; Prosecutory rationale and response ¶¶ 1–5; Legal proceedings ¶¶ 2–3, 5–6.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 03:52, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Quinn Norton on the investigation

Another source worth a read:

• Quinn Norton (3 March 2013). "Life Inside the Aaron Swartz Investigation". The Atlantic.

Andy Dingley (talk) 11:52, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

As long as we're noting sources, while Quinn Norton's article is certainly important and contains a lot of first-hand information that cannot be available elsewhere, I think by far the best summary of the whole situation is Larissa MacFarquhar's New Yorker article from next week (which coincidently came out online the day after Norton's article): American Chronicles: Requiem for a Dream; Aaron Swartz was brilliant and beloved. But the people who knew him best saw a darker side. By Larissa MacFarquhar. jhawkinson (talk) 06:59, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

Best investigative reporting, at least.  Six pages of exclusive interviews with family and friends. --Dervorguilla (talk) 10:39, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

History of suicidal ideation

Swartz's history of suicidal ideation was discussed at length in the New Yorker article by MacFarquhar (and other sources). The article should also discuss his past diagnoses and events like the calling of authorities during a past suicide threat? Kiefer.Wolfowitz 10:35, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Be very careful here - in Wikipedia jargon, there's a huge WP:UNDUE issue in how to handle it. It would be very easy to give a false impression even when citing true facts. For example you write of "a suiicde threat", but that was just some people's characterization of a blog post. He himself denied it was a suicide threat - paraphrasing, that he was just venting via fiction how miserable he felt then. The New Yorker article further says "A Reddit co-founder called the Cambridge police, who tracked him down to Au Bon Pain in Harvard Square, where he was writing his blog.". Which hardly sounds like he was about to kill himself. -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 11:42, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Silverglate, sec. I

Revision history
02:17, 16 April 2013‎ MarkBernstein . . (Undid revision 550576964 by Dervorguilla previously discussed; silvergate's reporting remains the best account.)
02:13, 16 April 2013‎ Dervorguilla‎ . . (… MOS:QUOTE (Also, Swartz’s lawyers say Ortiz’s office took over before the arrest, not after.))

Issues

1. MOS:QUOTE; WP:QUOTE
Original wording. “The wording of the quoted text should be faithfully reproduced.”  Quotations. “Verbatim text … usually an unedited, exact reproduction of the original source….”

• When has the Original wording or Quotations issue been discussed?

2. WP:QUOTE General guidelines
“Never quote a false statement without immediately saying the statement is false.…  There is no difference between quoting a falsehood without saying it’s false and inserting falsehoods into articles.”

Compare Silverglate with Letter from Elliot Peters & Daniel Purcell to Robin Ashton, USDOJ (Jan. 28, 2013):

“Tragedy intervened … when [U.S. Attorney Carmen] Ortiz’s office took over the case to send a message.”

“The email confirmed what we had previously suspected: that AUSA Heymann and Agent Pickett directed and controlled the investigation of Mr. Swartz from the time of Mr. Swartz’s arrest on January 6, 2011.”

• When has the WP:QUOTE Guidelines issue been discussed?  --Dervorguilla (talk) 04:47, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

3. WP:IMPARTIAL in WP:NPOV
“Try not to quote directly from participants engaged in a heated dispute….”

• Silverglate’s firm was engaged to represent Swartz in a legal dispute.  He implies that his unnamed sources were too.  He’s engaging himself in a angry dispute about when Ortiz took over.

4. WP:BLPGOSSIP
“Be wary of sources … that attribute material to anonymous sources.”

• Silverglate attributes the material to unnamed sources.

WP:BDP
“For people who have recently died … the [BLP] policy can extend for … six months [to] two years at the outside.  Such extensions would apply particularly to contentious … material … that has implications for their living relatives … such as in the case of a possible suicide….”

• Swartz committed suicide less than five months ago.  His family is involved in determining Ortiz’s role as compared to MIT’s role.

WP:BLPDEL
“When material about living persons has been deleted on good-faith BLP objections, … if it is to be restored without significant change, consensus must be obtained first….”  --Dervorguilla (talk) 06:46, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Disruptive meddling with code

Somebody’s meddled with the code on this page.  “Something must be wrong with the code on this particular page... Looks like the counter was set incorrectly plus the page size might have been set to too large of a size.”

It’s been wrong for some time, too.  Thank Shearonink for discovering and reporting.

“The posts are out of order.…  I'll see if I can fix [the code].”  Shearonink at User talk:Dervorguilla 06:54, 16 April 2013 (UTC).  Meanwhile the Silverglate posts have to get republished so people can read for themselves, in order.  I’m working on it.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 04:38, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure that anyone has actually changed or meddled with the code...I think the archiving was perhaps not set up completely correctly from the beginning and the error wasn't apparent until the pages filled up and the bot then stopped working. I would leave Archive 1, Archive 2 and Archive 3 alone for the moment and see if the Bot kicks in within the next few days and if my 'fix' worked. The most important thing is "is the archive searchable?" yes it is and yes it always was. Trying to adjust everything at this point so the posts/threads are in perfect order is really not necessary for us to find past threads and discussions. Shearonink (talk) 05:45, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Interesting that AaronSw didn’t spot the error.  Also, the first three months of Talk appear (repeat appear) to be missing.

I’m going to be republishing the Silverglate threads on a single page (maybe my sandbox?) after deleting the personal remarks, to keep the material from disrupting.

== Page creation ==

…  As I noted on the talk page, I didn't create the article. Someone I'd never heard of before (or since) did and emailed me to let me know. I checked the page, made a couple small corrections, and have otherwise left it alone except to revert vandalism and things. If you like, I can introduce you to the person who created the page and you can verify he's not me, but I don't see why it matters. AaronSw 19:55, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

--Dervorguilla (talk) 07:08, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

The archiving wasn't set up until after Mr Swartz passed away. As for the first three months somehow being missing? No, not true...those edits were not posts, they were code/talkpage header stuff. The archiving looks like its initial setup was correct, not sure why it seems to have been splitting posts between Archive 1 & 2 in February 2013 and I have NO idea what was going on with the ARCHIVE FULL stuff...I have never seen any archive have these issues before.

And I'm sorry, Dervorguilla, but what are you trying to do with the creation of this standalone single page? I am having problems following your logic here...you're saying that the Silverglate threads are out of order? Anyone can do a search of the Archives to see any posts/threads that are about the Silverglate issue, I'm not sure what putting them all in one place would accomplish. Are you talking about actually *moving* the posts to a different page or just copy/paste'ing them? Please help me understand.

Btw, the bot kicked in and is now again creating archive pages...it seems that no further manual archiving might be necessary, see this edit. I am going to try to find someone who knows more about archiving than I do, to take a look at the page and make sure it is set up correctly and will *work* correctly from now on. Shearonink (talk) 16:55, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I took a look at the archiving template code, and it looks fine now. The "bad" code had |counter = %(counter)d set, and that probably screwed up the bot. Legoktm (talk) 17:10, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

The pertinent posts have been pasted, to Dervorguilla/sandbox.  Best of all, the personal comments are (mostly) gone.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 21:53, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

does this mean you've filleted the files and sanitized the records, or something else? MarkBernstein (talk) 04:51, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

The pertinent records have been compiled but not sanitized.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 06:23, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

WP's treatment of quotations

WP:QUOTE (emphasis added)

2 General guidelines

The quotation should be representative of the whole source document….

Where a quotation presents rhetorical language in place of the more neutral, dispassionate tone preferred for encyclopedias, it … should be avoided.

Never quote a false statement without immediately saying the statement is false.

4 Overusing quotations, WP:QUOTEFARM

Long quotations … remove attention from other information.…  A summary or paraphrase … is often better where the original wording could be improved.

Consider minimizing the length of a quotation by paraphrasing or by working smaller portions … into the article text.

4.1 Examples of overuse of quotations, WP:LONGQUOTE

_ Using too many quotes is incompatible with the encyclopedic writing style….

_ Quoteboxes should generally be avoided; … they draw special attention to the opinion of one source….

_ Longer quotations may … be hidden in the reference as a [ref quote] to facilitate verification … without sacrificing readability.

5 Copyrighted material and fair use

The quotation must … aid understanding of the subject [of the article].

---

Replying to MarkBernstein’s request (Undid numerous deletions… Too entangled to resolve one by one. Discuss individually and less boldly on talk page. please):

   Short reasons for each individual major deletion are found in each summary.  In many cases, an authoritative reason is found above.  If not, please restore the individual deletion.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 20:57, 31 March 2013 (UTC) 21:49, 31 March 2013 (UTC) 03:56, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

More on unexplained deletions:

   Rephrasing of a short text.  “ft followed by … the new version of what was changed … fully informs about the edit.” (WP:Edit summary legend).  A rephrasing doesn’t need to be explained.

   When a deletion is unexplained, it could be a signal that the editor is going to be rephrasing or reorganizing sometime later.

--Dervorguilla (talk) 23:39, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

... Luckily, any prospective edit war can be avoided here just by permitting other editors to make individual restores of any individual edit (or individual subset of entangled edits) that they don’t agree with.  I myself don’t intend to do any more reverting or restoring for a while.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 22:15, 31 March 2013 (UTC) 00:06, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Support restore by MarkBernstein of Salon item about mural added by HectorMoffet (In the press).  --Dervorguilla (talk) 03:50, 1 April 2013 (UTC)  Strongly support MarkBernstein’s awesome removal of longstanding but dilutive 19-word passage in lede (-‘and later worked … was also a contributing editor….’) --22:42, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

In light of the 40 or 50 edits here, please define the meaning of "a while" in the following half-sentence: "I myself don’t intend to do any more reverting or restoring for a while." David in DC (talk) 19:33, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Three days plus...  While. 1.d. A relatively short period of time; a brief time.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 21:55, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Is the irony inherent in linking to a definition in a dictionary whose content lies behind a paywall intentional? David in DC (talk) 18:54, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Meow...  (Implying that $29.95/yr is mere pocket change for some of us...)  --Dervorguilla (talk) 04:50, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps my point was too obscure. Given the subject this particular talk page is attached to, even so minimal a paywall as $29.95/year inevitably prompts this question: WWAD? David in DC (talk) 15:12, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

No point is too obscure for Dervorguilla!!  But WTF does “WWAD” mean?  Can′t find it in Webster′s.  Help!  --Dervorguilla (talk) 15:03, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Replace "A" with "J" and regoogle. David in DC (talk) 17:01, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

One presumes He would use the Learner′s Dictionary, which is free... --Dervorguilla (talk) 01:51, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

WP:MOSQUOTE

The second heading in WP:MOSQUOTE, about typographic conformitysiderations, is being routinely ignored on this page. It indicates, in its very first "bullet point" that brackets should be used within direct quotations to avoid having capital letters in the middle of sentences. Please read the Manual of Style and please do not "correct" the series of MOS edits I'm about to make. I understand that this aspect of the Wikipedia Manual of Style may not be in accord with a couple of other style guides. But guess what: on Wikipedia, where our Manual of Style conflicts with Turabian, or the AP, or MLA, or Strunk & White, or Little, Brown, or Stan Lee's Guide to the Marvel Way, we take the unusual step of following our own style and usage rules. David in DC (talk) 15:16, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

That heading about typographical conformity is indeed being routinely ignored−by one editor only.  Review the most pertinent illustrations at WP:MOS...
     Arthur said, "The situation is deplorable and unacceptable."
     Bob said, "Did Jim say 'I ate the apple' after he left?"
     Eve said, "He ate the apple."
     Eve said "He ate the apple."
     She said "Yes!"
Also, purely typographical alterations shouldn’t be bracketed.
     A penny saved is a penny earned.
     … the oft-repeated maxim "a penny saved is a penny earned" …
not
     … the oft-repeated maxim "[a] penny saved is a penny earned" …
And cf. MOSR:Curly or straight: Currently there is no consensus regarding which quotation glyphs to use.
The erroneous serial editing (and the WP:MOSQUOTE misquotation) are unacceptable.  In most cases, attention-seeking edits should be reverted without comment.  I believe however that in this case the responsible editor is thoughtful enough to revert his own edits and strikethrough his remarks.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 05:38, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Dervorguilla has just made her own attention-seeking (minor) edit — to the hidden comment in the lede about ‘hanged’ vs. ‘hung’ — and reverted.  Restore if you think it improves on the original (and is mildly humorous).  (“Both men AND women are ‘hanged’.”)  Thx!  --Dervorguilla (talk) 07:43, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

(1) I deny "attention-seeking". I'm just trying to get it right. (2) I'm wrong about needing brackets when I change a capital in the middle of a sentence. The rules says just do it without brackets. Some examples say don't do it. I'm going with the text rather than the examples. (3) While the MOS language does say there's a lack of consensus over "straight v. curly", they also say consistence is most impotant, and straight is prefered over curly. I'm leaving those. (4) Both are correct and yours is funnier. I'll reinsert. David in DC (talk) 12:03, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks!  (What’s also amusing is that some of the examples at WP:MOS directly contradict its guidelines, as David in DC discovered.)  --Dervorguilla (talk) 18:25, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Silverglate, sec. II

This statement could be left out too:

“According to attorney Harvey Silverglate, lawyers familiar with the original case told him they had expected it to be dismissed after a ‘continuance without a finding’.”

1’. WP:BLPGOSSIP
“Ask yourself … whether the material [that] is being presented as true … is relevant to a disinterested article about the subject.”

• Are the erroneous (or erroneously quoted) opinions of unnamed interested lawyers relevant to an article about a person?

2’. WP:WELLKNOWN
“In the case of public figures, there will be a multitude of reliable published sources….  If you cannot find multiple reliable third-party sources documenting the allegation … leave it out.”

• Silverglate is considered a reliable published source.  Can others be found?  --Dervorguilla (talk) 09:32, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

No, no, and no This has been discussed thoroughly before; I'd refer you to the archives, but I believe you were a participant in some of those discussions as well. (a) This is not gossip. It is the core assertion of a news report that appeared in the leading professional news source for the Massachusetts Bar. (b) What evidence can you provide that the quotation is inaccurate? *Two* news organizations separately reported it. The reporter has a strong reputation, as does the editor of Mass Lawyers Weekly. No reliable news organization has reported that this quotation is erroneous. (c) Many, many significant facts are sourced to specific interviews. Nearly every off-the-record and background quotation in your daily paper has precisely this sourcing. The quotation is entirely appropriate, and the constant efforts by one or two people to remove it do bring to mind the grinding of a WP:AXE.MarkBernstein (talk) 17:30, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I share MarkBerstein's frustration. These issues have been discussed in great depth and detail. Dervorguilla was deeply involved in the discussions. The archive is full of them. Replowing the same ground, over and over again, is tendentious editing. There is not a thing in these two new Silverglate talk sections that has not already been resolved, in a manner that is evidently not to Dervorguilla's liking. Well, she's out of luck. Just because I haven't been vocal recently does not mean I have forgotten the days of tedious discussion refuting the points now being regurgitated, perhaps in the hope that other editors have been worn down, or have tired of trying to edit collaboratively with editors who haven't the commitment to collegiality and consensus this project requires. Dervorguilla, CarthCaresen and CarthCarsen's IP alter ego have been the worst offenders here, although there have been a few others, plus some suspicious IP editors with few edits but encyclopedic (if skewed) knowledge of wikipedia's policies and guidelines.

Dervorguilla, please knock it off. You've entreated others, off-wiki, to intercede on your behalf, to assure editors that your motives ought not be suspect. The result of one such off-wiki plea can be found on my talk page. I stand now where I stood then. I can barely divine my own motives, sometimes. I'm not going to try to divine yours. But your behavior, that I can draw conclusions about. And your editing behavior is slipping into old, unwelcome patterns. It is becoming disruptive. Please take some time off, take a step back, and return with a willingness to concede a point, now and again, when you know the enormous weight of discussion, most of it archived, stands against propositions you now seek to "re-litigate" with absolutely no new facts or insights.

I've come to doubt that you're being intentionally destructive to the project. I've come to believe you're simply misguided, if on a collossal scale. Please do a kindness for everyone who holds this collaborative encyclopedia-writing project dear. Stop editing pages you have such an emotional attachment to. Spend a month or two editing pages you know nothing about. Get some perspective. You have the makings of a good editor. You also have the makings of a train wreck. Choose wisely, please. David in DC (talk) 20:25, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Summary for newcomers: Mass Lawyer’s Weekly is a trade newspaper widely read by attorneys in the state and region. In an article about the Swartz case, attorney Harvey Silverglate reported that state prosecutors had intended to dismiss the subject with a stern warning, a quotes them to the effect that it was the federal involvement that led to a very different outcome. This narrative of events had been widely assumed in early reports of Swartz’s death, but Silverglate was able to provide verified background sourcing. Other news agencies followed, depending on the same off-the-record sources.

Since the day of publication, one or two editors have repeatedly sought to remove reference to this article, adducing various arguments. First, it was argued that wikipedia cannot use background-sourced quotations. Then it was argued that Silverglate was in some way an interested party. Then it was argued that the opinion expressed in the quotation is in some way unreliable. I believe that the common thread among these arguments, none of which has won much support and none of which has much in common with the others save that they all argue to exclude the quotation, is a desire to exclude a quotation that might seem to embarrass the US Attorney or her assistants. MarkBernstein (talk) 20:27, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

“It is the core assertion of a news report that appeared in the leading professional news source for the Massachusetts Bar.” — MarkBernstein.

On this point Silverglate agrees with Dervorguilla (me), not with MarkBernstein.

MarkBernstein says he made the assertion in a news report; Silverglate says he made it in an op-ed.

Harvey Silverglate, The Swartz Suicide and the Sick Culture of the DOJ, The SilvergLatest (Jan. 23, 2013) (emphasis added):

“I was asked to do an op-ed for the Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly.”

Silverglate doesn’t say he wrote a news report or a news article or was asked to write one.  MarkBernstein’s dispute is with Silverglate, not with other WP eds.  (It could best be discussed with Silverglate, not here.)  The point has been made before:

== Does Silverglate’s op-ed cite only anonymous partisan sources…? ==

--Dervorguilla (talk) 03:49, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

It appeared in Mass Lawyers' Weekly. That newspaper stands behind it, and stands behind the reporting that underlies it. MarkBernstein (talk) 14:47, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

We agree, then, that the Silverglate piece is an op-ed.  Featured on the op-ed page.  Meant to reflect an individual point of view.  Only. 
“op–ed page. The page usually opposite the editorial page of a newspaper that features by-lined articles reflecting individual points of view.”  --Dervorguilla (talk) 21:41, 20 April 2013 (UTC)  00:36, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

This is not gossip. It is the core assertion of a news report that appeared in the leading professional news source for the Massachusetts Bar. — MarkBernstein

“gossip. 4. Rumor, report, … or behind-the-scenes information….” — Webster’s Third.

“Be wary of sources … that attribute material to anonymous sources.” — WP:BLPGOSSIP

“anonymous. 1. Having or giving no name; of a name or with the name unknown or unrevealed; nameless <an anonymous author>.” — Webster’s Third.

Silverglate attributes the behind-the-scenes information to unnamed sources.  Lawyers call this kind of material ‘legal gossip’.

--Dervorguilla (talk) 00:53, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

... and for those who haven’t been reading both Aaron Swartz and Carmen Ortiz:

Compare Aaron Swartz as edited by David in DC at 03:05, 8 February 2013:

According to attorney Harvey Silverglate, who is of counsel to the first firm to represent Swartz on the federal charges, lawyers familiar with the case told him the Middlesex County District Attorney had planned to resolve Swartz’s case with a "stern warning" and "continuance without a finding." As he explained to c|net's Declan McCullagh

Under such a disposition, the charge is held in abeyance ("continued") without any verdict ("without a finding"). The defendant is on probation for a period of a few months up to maybe a couple of years at the most; if the defendant does not get into further legal trouble, the charge is dismissed, and the defendant has no criminal record. This is what the lawyers expected to happen when Swartz was arrested....

"Tragedy intervened," Silverglate wrote in Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly, "when Ortiz's office took over the case to send 'a message.'"

with Carmen Ortiz as edited by David in DC at 17:24, 5 February 2013:

According to attorney Harvey Slivergate, who is affiliated with the firm that first represented Swartz on the federal charges, the Middlesex County District Attorney had planned to resolve Swartz's case in state court with a "stern warning" and a "continuance without a finding". As he explained to c|net

Under such a disposition, the charge is held in abeyance ("continued") without any verdict ("without a finding"). The defendant is on probation for a period of a few months up to maybe a couple of years at the most; if the defendant does not get into further legal trouble, the charge is dismissed, and the defendant has no criminal record. This is what the lawyers expected to happen when Swartz was arrested for "trespassing at MIT." But then the feds took over....

"Tragedy intervened," Slivergate wrote in Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly, "when Ortiz's office took over the case to send 'a message.'

See also Talk:Carmen Ortiz: Slivergate analysis and reporting:

[…] Please do not revert negative information just because it's negative.[…] David in DC (talk) 17:37, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

and Carmen Ortiz: Revision history:

• 14:10, 5 February 2013‎ Collect (talk) . . (rm sentence which is pure opinion and not a clear fact from a BLP -)

--Dervorguilla (talk) 07:56, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

An interesting selection to cite, that Ortiz reversion. Because it did not stand. Consensus was that the quote was kosher, it was reinserted, and more than two months later, it stands. As I've already noted once, this decision to re-argue extensively discussed and resolved consensus decisions, months later, with absolutely no new insight, is part of a disturbing, disruptive pattern of editing behavior that ill-becomes its author. David in DC (talk) 10:40, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Here is the consensus David in DC mentions above.  See Slivergate analysis and reporting at Carmen Ortiz.

…Please do not revert. Please discuss, here. David in DC (talk) 17:37, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

The new edit seems less problematic than some earlier versions were.… Collect (talk) 19:31, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Here is a new insight (one of several).

08:27, 16 April 2013 Dervorguilla . . (→Arrest and state charges: +'On November 17, Swartz was indicted by a Middlesex Superior Court grand jury on state charges of breaking and entering with intent, larceny of electronic data, and unauthorized access to a computer network.’)

Collect was right.  Other edits by David in DC have been more problematic.  But given our new insight, does any of the old material have to be kept?  If so, which part? --Dervorguilla (talk) 23:18, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

(One of David in DC’s allegedly ‘problematic’ edits at Carmen Ortiz can be attributed to me.)  --Dervorguilla (talk) 01:33, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

I've thoroughly rewritten the Ortiz grafs to remedy the paralels between the prose on that page and this. I don't think it was necessary, but it ain't hard to use the same sources and wrote the prose two different ways, so what the hell.

But this business of suggesting that that an op-ed piece cannot contain reporting, as well as opinion, is poppycock. Silverglate is reporting facts when he indicates what the sources have told him. (And I've said this before, but it seems as likely that his unnamed sources include peeved Middlesex County ADA's as outraged Swartz attorneys. Give his article a close reading. He's not just giving voice to defense outrage. He's also giving props to state prosecutors vis-a-vis the feds.)

He then opines about the facts, but the best newspaper opinion columns include reportage that provides a foundation for the opinions it expresses. Please read the topic paragraph of this Wall Street Journal article written after the death of Robert Novak. I was no great fan of The Prince of Darkness' politics, but I read his column religiously, precisely because he reported his op-eds every bit as much as he opined in them. Silverglate's piece reminded me very much of a Novak op-ed, chock full of factual reporting AND fearless opinion-slinging. And that, folks, may be the only time you ever read a paragraph arguing that Novak and Silverglate ever had anything in common, about anything. David in DC (talk) 02:22, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

In any case, *any* article in a news journal must, when it asserts facts, adhere to that journal's rules. At the very least, Mass Lawyers Weekly stands by the assertion that the sources are accurately represented and that they should be expected to know, or can be shown to know, what they're saying. One editor here apparently thinks something in these uncontroversial remarks is unbearably embarrassing to someone, and has been grasping at straws since the date of publication for some rationale to exclude it. I really don't understand why this is such a focus of their attention, or why Wikipedia is the appropriate venue for the fight. Why not write to the editor of Mass Lawyers Weekly if the editor thinks the Silverglate piece was intolerable? Why not take the case to The Boston Globe or the Herald? Wikipedia is not the best or only place to defend one's son-in-law or second cousin. MarkBernstein (talk) 17:17, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Dervorguilla denies MarkBernstein’s malicious accusation by innuendo that a member of her immediate family has an affiliation with USAMA.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 17:09, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

Harmonizing sources

I'd like to suggest that federal control of the investigation from the outset does not necessarily contradict Silverglate's reporting nor CNET's additional reporting about the initial state charges and prosecution. (And CNET really isn't just an echo - the Silverglate quote in the CNET report helps move us forward.)

It seems irefutable that the feds were in on this from the beginning. It's the only way having a Secret Service agent on hand at the arrest makes sense. And Heymann is a notable expert in cybercrime. But none of that means the feds were going to prosecute the case, under the CFAA, at first. Investigation and prosecution are different things.

Something changed while the state charges were pending. There's no reason to doubt Silverglate's reporting about what the D.A. intended to do and what all the lawyers expected. (And again, I'll note that his sources likely include outraged Swartz attorneys AND peeved Middlesex ADA's. Defense attorneys don't much like federal prosecutors, on principal. But, generally, state prosecutors don't like being big-footed by the feds either. It's even worse in law enforcement, where state cops routinely call FBI agents "the feebs," a play on words making use of truncation of the word "feeble.")

We've got a report about what changed everything. Quinn Norton writes that she'd assumed the feds knew about the Manifesto. She mentioned it in answer to questions from Heymann, never dreaming he'd never heard of it. She's now concuded, she wrote, that this ill-advised mention is what made Heymann (and Ortiz) decide to, quite literally, "make a federal case of it."

Connecting these dots, in the article, violates WP:SYNTH. Our job is to put all the dots out there, as coherently and in as neutral a way as possible. How to connect them is the reader's job.

Dervorguilla, your efforts on this page and on the Ortiz page are being slapped back, by totally unconnected editors, because you're trying to make the "the feds controlled the case all along" trope guide the story. That's not wiki-editing. It might make a good op-ed piece in a newspaper. As I've written earlier, the best op-ed writing is based on a foundation of reportage. What makes it opinion is the conclusions the author draws from the facts.

But here, on wikipedia, we're Joe Friday. Just the facts, ma'am.

So please, I beg of thee, stop treating "the feds controlled the case all along" as if it, of necessity, contradicts Silverglate. Whether it does or not is up to the reader. Your editing behavior on this is counter-productive and it's disruptive to the project. If it continues, unabated, it's archetypal edit-warring. We all know where that's led you once. Please consider making new mistakes. Making mistakes is an inevitable feature of the human condition. But making the same mistake over and over is not. That's entirely optional. And unwise. David in DC (talk) 21:05, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Just popping in for a moment - "the feds" isn't a unitary entity. The Secret Service, indeed involved at the start due to the nature of the investigation, isn't the same department as the Federal prosecutor for the Massachusetts district. Also, while I'm sure mentioning the Manifesto didn't help matters, I have a hard time seeing it as making all the difference between prosecution and not prosecuting. It would indeed help establish motive, but there's still all the complicated legal issues pertaining to "access", which don't depend on motive. Norton might sadly be experiencing some survivor's guilt. Regarding CNET, I'm not passionate about excluding it, and personally wouldn't put much effort into arguing to leave it out. From my point of view, quoting general journalism to explain legal concepts is bad practice (though not inaccurate in this specific instance, but that's more akin to accident than design). -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 00:55, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

Removing excessive quotes

Pertinent thread at Reliable sources noticeboard:  Can an op-ed by an eminent lawyer be used to support a contentious statement in a BDP (Aaron Swartz) or BLP (Carmen Ortiz)?  What if the lawyer attributes his information to anonymous sources who were engaged in a legal dispute with the LP?  --Dervorguilla (talk) 12:02, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

'“[The local D.A. was planning for Swartz’s state case to be] continued without a finding, with Swartz duly admonished and then returned to civil society to continue his pioneering electronic work in a less legally questionable manner.  Tragedy intervened when Ortiz’s office took over the case to send ‘a message’.”

The amount of quotes in the Swartz article is excessive; … a shorter article would have far greater effectiveness.  I note the example quote given above is “first year law” and thus of little value – and ESP as to what someone “would have done”; [this] is speculation in any event, which must be sourced to the specific person asserting such knowledge.  [comment by Collect (talk) at Reliable sources noticeboard 13:56, 30 April 2013 (UTC)]

--Dervorguilla (talk) 03:27, 1 May 2013 (UTC)  17:49, 1 May 2013 (UTC)


Removing dispensable 155-word quote, as recommended by Collect at WP:RSN (April 30) (“amount of quotes … is excessive....  The quote is ‘first year law’ and thus of little value”).

According to attorney Harvey Silverglate, lawyers familiar with the case told him the Middlesex County District Attorney's plan had been to resolve Swartz’s case by having it “...continued without a finding, with Swartz duly admonished and then returned to civil society to continue his pioneering electronic work in a less legally questionable manner.”  As he explained to CNET’s Declan McCullagh:  “Under such a disposition, the charge is held in abeyance (‘continued’) without any verdict (‘without a finding’).  The defendant is on probation for a period of a few months up to maybe a couple of years at the most; if the defendant does not get into further legal trouble, the charge is dismissed, and the defendant has no criminal record.  This is what the lawyers expected to happen when Swartz was arrested.”  “Tragedy intervened,” Silverglate wrote in Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly, “when [United States Attorney Carmen] Ortiz’s office took over the case to ‘send a message’.”

Removing CNET ref at Arrest and state charges, as suggested by SethFinkelstein at Harmonizing sources (May 1, 2013) (“quoting general journalism to explain legal concepts is bad practice”).

Removing dispensable 64-word quote, in accord with Collect at WP:RSN (April 30) (“amount of quotes … is excessive”).

Malamud went on to link PACER to Swartz′s subsequent prosecution in the JSTOR case.  “Was the overly aggressive posture of the Department of Justice prosecutors and law enforcement officials revenge because they were embarrassed that – in their view at least – we somehow got away with something in the PACER incident?  Was the merciless JSTOR prosecution the revenge of embarrassed bureaucrats because they looked stupid in the New York Times, because the U.S. Senate called them on the carpet?”

Removing dispensable 50-word quote, in accord with Collect at WP:RSN (“amount of quotes … is excessive”).  Content is one author’s opinion (“Voices”) only.  Not an organizational opinion.  Published in MSNBC, not in flagship NBCNews.  Because the author isn’t a recognized expert on Swartz or on law, his opinion isn’t significant.
Cf. WP:NEWSORG in WP:RS (“Editorial commentary [and] analysis ... are rarely reliable for statements of fact.…  The opinions of specialists and recognized experts are more likely to be reliable and to reflect a significant viewpoint.”

MSNBC contributor Chris Hayes criticized the prosecutors, saying “at the time of his death Aaron was being prosecuted by the federal government and threatened with up to 35 years in prison and $1 million in fines for the crime of – and I’m not exaggerating here – downloading too many free articles from the online database of scholarly work JSTOR.”

Removing dispensable 48-word quote from 100-word LONGQUOTE, in accord with Collect at WP:RSN (“amount of quotes … is excessive”).

“Heymann engaged in serious prosecutorial misconduct on multiple occasions.”…  Of Holder, she wrote, “The Department of Justice is not interested in admitting their errors, even when an out of control US Attorney’s office has cost this country one of our best and brightest.  The DOJ is only interested in covering their asses.”

Removing dispensable 40-word quote, in accord with Collect at WP:RSN (“amount of quotes … is excessive”).

Slate technology columnist Farhad Manjoo said, “If MIT truly wants to atone for joining the federal case against Swartz ... it should pledge to spend its money, prestige, and moral authority to launch a multiuniversity campaign to free every scholarly article from behind paywall archives like JSTOR.”

Dervorguilla again denies MarkBernstein’s accusation that “You … have special super-secret knowledge”.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 05:55, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

MarkBernstein may be “involved” in the article.  Cf. comment at Dervorguilla:Talk.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 18:14, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

I disagree, as argued above. But I'm busy as conference chair at ACM Web Science. Could someone else please cope with Dervorguilla' this time? Thanks in advance. MarkBernstein (talk) 07:56, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Administrators’ noticeboard/Edit warring, reported by Dervorguilla (talk) 01:40, 3 May 2013 (UTC)  --Dervorguilla (talk) 21:55, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Library of Congress Bibliographic records citation

The article cites a quote in The Economist -- "he obtained—though he would not say how—the complete bibliographic data for books held by the Library of Congress" -- for this section, but Archive.org identifies this as the source of the LoC bibliographic records: http://archive.org/details/marc_records_scriblio_net . — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.247.192.218 (talk) 15:56, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Restoring Silverglate

The previous consensus language was as follows:

Writing in Mass. Lawyers’ Weekly, Harvey Silverglate reported that lawyers familiar with the original case told him they had expected it to be dismissed after a “‘continuance without a finding’.... The charge [would be] held in abeyance ... without any verdict ... for a period of a few months up to maybe a couple of years.” (If the defendant manages to stay out of further legal trouble, the case is typically dismissed.) “Tragedy intervened,” Silverglate said, “when [U.S. Attorney Carmen] Ortiz’s office took over the case to send a message.”

One editor objects to this, and has repeatedly excised the passage. Nothing here seems particularly controversial or duplicative. My opinion is that this information will help readers understand the JSTOR issue, that there is no reason to doubt the authority of either Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly or CNET, and that this straightforward question has now consumed a great deal of time and energy to the detriment of the article and of the project. MarkBernstein (talk) 14:25, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

The original language was

Writing in Mass. Lawyers’ Weekly, Harvey Silverglate reported that lawyers familiar with the original case told him they had expected it to be dismissed after a “‘continuance without a finding’.... The charge [would be] held in abeyance ... without any verdict ... for a period of a few months up to maybe a couple of years.” (If the defendant manages to stay out of further legal trouble, the case is typically dismissed.) “Tragedy intervened,” Silverglate said, “when [U.S. Attorney Carmen] Ortiz’s office took over the case to send a message.”

How might this be rewritten to address Devorgiulia's concerns while retaining all the facts? MarkBernstein (talk) 19:29, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

MarkBernstein asked that I come here from AN3, so here I am. From what I can tell, there's a disagreement over whether or not the Silverglate source is acceptable and if it goes against WP:UNDUE. Is that a fair reading of the situation?

Also, may I remind Dervorguilla that this is strangely reminiscent of her behaviour three months ago, which resulted in a block for edit warring. Further reversions without discussion are not recommended. m.o.p 19:53, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes -- as far as I can tell, these are the grounds of the disagreement. 20:29, 8 May 2013 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by MarkBernstein (talk • contribs)

Dervorguilla gratefully acknowledges the contributions of:

• Sysop Ocaasi at Aaron Swartz (concern about BLPSOURCES)

15:55, 7 February 2013‎ Ocaasi . . (→‎JSTOR: rephrase, a bit more neutrally …)

• Sysop Bbb23 at BLPN:Stephen Heymann (concern about BLPSOURCES)

More input would be appreciated with respect to recent changes [by MarkBernstein] to the article.… --Bbb23 18:56, 17 March 2013

Harvey Silvergate’s essay for Mass Lawyers Weekly is not inappropriate for a biography of a living person.… --MarkBernstein 23:33, 17 March 2013

I don’t care if it was written by a supreme court justice. It’s an opinion piece that attacks Heymann.… --Bbb23 00:27, 18 March 2013

• Rollbacker FreeRangeFrog at Talk:Stephen Heymann (concern about GRAPEVINE)

The Harvey Silvergate report in Mass Lawyers Weekly is entirely appropriate for a biography of a living person.… --MarkBernstein 23:40, 17 March 2013

OK, I’ll give you my humble opinion. Including the essay directly is original research. Basically it means “I think this guy is right”…. --FreeRangeFrog 18:03, 22 March 2013

• Sysop Collect at RSN (concern about BLPSOURCES)

… I note the example quote given above is “first-year law” – and thus of little value, esp as to what someone “would have done”, this being speculation in any event, which must be sourced to the specific person asserting such knowledge. --Collect 13:56, 30 April 2013

• Sysop Collect at AN3 (concern about NOPR)

… My employer’s house magazine, TEKKA, did publish some work by Swartz seven or eight years ago. I’d completely forgotten those discussions about getting teenage Swartz to write a book.… --MarkBernstein 07:49, 3 May 2013

The TEKKA website presents you as more than just an “employee”. I think that your words on it suggest a stronger connection that you seem to imply here to the Swartz article. --Collect 08:04, 3 May 2013

Typographical errors and grammatical slips have been silently corrected. --Dervorguilla (talk) 09:44, 9 May 2013 (UTC) 12:47, 9 May 2013 (UTC)  12:45, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Swartz was quite prolific, especially in circles that often overlap with Wikimedians. You couldn't swing a dead cat around here without hitting someone who has some sort of "six degrees of separation" connection to Swartz. Best to focus on behavior, not identity. --HectorMoffet (talk) 00:14, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Full Disclosure of Financial Interests:  I myself have no kind of connection to Swartz.  Do you have evidence that some other editor on this page does — beside MarkBernstein? --Dervorguilla (talk) 20:32, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Full Disclosure: I have never swung a dead cat. But the dead cat I never swang was named Schroedinger. I understand that they study probability and physics at MIT. David in DC (talk) 17:28, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Note to bystanders: Here's the shopping list of quotes again. Dervorguilla, not having received the support she was looking for at AN3, has now taken this discussion to ANI. And here. And she's started making inconsequential edits at Eastgate Systems, in which she's presumably interested because I work there. At other pages, these inconsequential edits have been the prelude to an edit war. This is getting tiresome.

Substance: is Silverglate WP::UNDUE? Perhaps for Steve Heymann, since we have no idea whether he was or was not involved in the federal takeover and escalation which Silverglate's source discusses. But clearly this is not undue for Swartz, nor for Carmen Ortiz (since it was, ultimately, her decision and her responsibility).

Is Silverglate a reliable source? Silverglate published a background quote in an established professional journal; that's a reliable source. It was picked up by CNET, which also stands behind the statement. Far from retracting the quote, Mass Lawyers Weekly ran a front-page story on reaction to story in the following issue. Silverglate's source might be mistaken, but we have the full credit of the paper that the quote is not invented or misrepresented.

Does User:MarkBernstein have a conflict of interest? This seems to be the thrust of the final quotation here. But it regards a handshake for serial rights for a projected technical monograph, reached years ago with a teenager who never did write the book. Anyone in publishing has "conflicts" like this with half the world. It has no bearing at all on anything we're discussing here. MarkBernstein (talk) 12:21, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Says Silverglate: The op-ed was misinterpreted, Ortiz did not say she was sending “a message”. --Dervorguilla (talk) 13:18, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Also, it’s Eastgate Systems, not EastgateSystems.  Diff not a minor.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 13:39, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Do the two editors in the dispute have an example "diff" between your two proposed languages? --HectorMoffet (talk) 13:32, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Editor Dervorguilla would support wording proposed by more authoritative editors, like Bbb23, Collect, FreeRangeFrog, Ocaasi, RightCowLeftCoast, or Guardian columnist SethFinkelstein.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 14:23, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

HectorMoffet: I'd support the language at the top of this section. As far as I can see, Dervorguilla insists that the passage and reference not appear at all. MarkBernstein (talk) 14:33, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

If that’s how the other editors feel. But Dervorguilla is hoping that MarkBernstein could first give everyone access to that front-page story about the reaction to the op-ed. --Dervorguilla (talk) 16:46, 9 May 2013 (UTC) 12:45, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Greetings. I came her through a notification, as I was mentioned. My understand is that the source from the Mass. Lawyers’ Weekly, as discussed at RSN, was an OpEd piece. As I said there, even if the information in the OpEd is factual, as an OpEd it should only be used to verify the opinions of the OpEd's author. Therefore, the question really is, is the author's opinion significant amount that it should have weight in this article? Who is the author, why is their opinion important to the subject? Is the author a leading authority, etc.?--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 16:58, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

The author is a leading criminal defense attorney in Massachusetts, with special expertise in this sort of prosecution. The refs to his own wikipedia article are a good place to start in assessing his expertise. Not the wiki-article itself, written by hacks like us, but the reliable sources the article is based upon. Massachusetts Lawyers' Weekly's publication of his reportage and opinions in this piece (it has both factual reporting AND opinion) also stands for his reliability. It is, itself, a respected journal in the legal community. CNET's choice to cover his original piece, and further interview him, stand for the reliability and credibility of the original piece. The quotes from CNET, as opposed to Massachusetts Lawyers' Weekly ought to be beyond questioning. We cite to CNET as a reliable source all the time. I'm looking forward to MarkBernstein providing the subsequent front page article from Massachusetts Lawyers' Weekly, buttressing Silverglate's original reporting. It's likely to make all but the most zealous detractor of the consensus language at the top of this section recognize the correctness of the consensus. David in DC (talk) 18:52, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

I don't have the paper copy. Possible leads (behind a paywall) include http://masslawyersweekly.com/2013/02/14/ortiz-under-fire/ , http://masslawyersweekly.com/2013/01/24/a-lesson-in-the-wake-of-the-swartz-tragedy/ , http://masslawyersweekly.com/the-docket-blog/2013/03/12/d-c-hearing-still-unscheduled-on-swartz/ . There's also http://www.wbur.org/2013/02/20/carmen-ortiz-investigation , a report on a joint investigation of WBUR (a Boston-area NPR station) and Mass Lawyers Weekly. Perhaps useful here or for Carmen Ortiz, http://www.wbur.org/2013/01/16/gertner-criticizes-ortiz-swart . MarkBernstein (talk) 19:10, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

In looking at the sources, and the article about Silverglate, I am now more cautious regarding inclusion of a full quote from the individual, per WP:NOTADVOCATE. The organization which Silvergate has cofounded appears to have questionable notability, and if Silverglate's opinion is significant there should be other reliable sources other then the op-ed itself that have repeated/reported the opinion.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:43, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

The question is not Silverglate's notability (though he is notable), nor his opinion (though it is widely shared -- see the article and the sources listed immediately above.) The article reports a background interview with a source "familiar with the original [state] case" which is (so far) uniquely Silverglate's source. This is hardly unusual in reporting -- compare Watergate, for one of innumerable examples -- and such reports are as reliable as the underlying publication. In this case, Mass Lawyer's Weekly and CNET implicitly assure readers that "a source familiar with the original case" did say what he or she is claimed to have said. MarkBernstein (talk) 21:33, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

The three sources in Mass Lawyers Weekly that MarkBernstein is citing to support the statement he’s given us are available at [LINK REDACTED] [Link redacted by David in DC, restored by Dervorguilla, and redacted again ... by Dervorguilla!]  In my opinion, MarkBernstein’s cited sources don’t appear to support his allegation. Details coming up (new section).  --Dervorguilla (talk) 17:23, 10 May 2013 (UTC)  21:28, 10 May 2013 (UTC)  [David in DC replies at 2nd graf below.]

I made no allegation. I pointed out that Mass Lawyers Weekly had not retracted the quote, and indeed that they had a front-page story in a subsequent issue. Devorgiulla asked for the front-page story. I don't have it. I provided some links that might be pertinent if you really want that story. But that's irrelevant, and has nothing at all to do with anything. Please stop hitting me, yourself, DavidInDC, and everyone else with this dead horse red herring. MarkBernstein (talk) 21:47, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Yikes! D - please take a deep breath and stop. Once is inadvertant, at least assuming good faith. That's hard to extend to TWICE. Please see WP:ELNEVER and please revert the second posting. Honest to goodness, it's not only in the best interest of the project, it's in your best interest as well. David in DC (talk) 21:39, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

EL Nutshell: External links in an article can be helpful to the reader, but [etc.].  (Emphasis added.)  The nutshell suggests that the guideline doesn’t apply to links not in an article.  But In any case there’s nothing in the material has no relevance to Aaron Swartz that supports the questioned statement — so there’s no reason to keep the link! Be it hereby redacted.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 22:53, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm not Dervorguilla's sure if these are the sources to which MarkBerstein is alluding to., or no I'm not. (Or at least I wasn't at the time I first typed this.) But Regardless, there's a much bigger problem here. The link above, which I've hidden, is rife with copyright violations.

One of these is a joint report from WBUR and Mass Lawyers Weekly. Here a version not protected by a paywall, nor needing to be cited to the MIT Crime Club's posting of copyright-protected material from a Nexis/LexisWestlaw search : Boeri, David and David Frank, Ortiz Under Fire: Critics Say Swartz Tragedy Is Evidence Of Troublesome Pattern, 90.9-WBUR website, 20 February 2013. Retrieved 10 May 2013. It doesn't include Silverglate's reporting about what the attorneys close to the case told him they expected the result of the state prosecution to be. But it's a rich source for criticism of the federal prosecution and prosecutors in Swartz's case and in a series of others. Some is from a former federal judge who'd criticized Ortiz's office in prior cases before that judge, and who is at least equally critical of the handling of the Swartz case. Some is from the decisions of other judges in cases brought by the US Attorney for Massachusetts. Some is from academics, and some is from defense counsel with experience on the receiving end of the Office's less-than-universally praised conduct in criminal court.

One is a brief article, about when and whether Ortiz will appear before Issa's committee. Again, it might be useful to add info from this article to the Issa investigation section, but we couldn't link to the copyright-violating document the MIT Crime club has posted. That's OK, there's no requirement that a ref be retrievable on the Internet.

One is a fairly brief article about federal jurisprudence under the CFAA. It's tangentially related to the Swartz case. It might be good for beefing up the CFAA wiki-article. But again, we could not link to the copyright-violating version from the MIT Crime Club's .pdf of a Lexis/Nexis Westlaw search.

Query: should the link Dervorguilla has posted to this talk page be oversighted? I'm guessing her violation of our copyright rules is inadvertant. She's probably just trying to be helpful and has enlisted assistance from the club she used to advise and whose wikipedia page she has tended to over time. But I think the link is problematic, even on a talk page and even if posted in good faith. In an excess of caution, I'm going to hide the link for now. If I'm wrong, would an admin please unhide it? David in DC (talk) 20:44, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Disregard, already restored and then redacted again (by Dervorguilla). --Dervorguilla (talk) 21:36, 10 May 2013 (UTC)  07:28, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

I believe we can both appreciate the marvelous irony of our remarks here, David in DC...  Carrying the discussion to the point of absurdity,
Dervorguilla now asks that you timely:

1. STRIKETHROUGH  ‘LexisNexis’, and SUBSTITUTE  ‘Thomson Reuters’.

2. STRIKE  ‘her violation of our copyright rules’, which begs the question, and 'SUBS ‘her pioneering editorial work done in a legally questionable manner’, as Silverglate might put it.

3. STRIKE  ‘I’m not sure if … or not’, and SUBS  ‘I’m sure …’.

4. STRIKE  ‘is rife with copyright violations’, and SUBS ‘links to a document that arguably could perhaps have some possible copyright violations, although there’s no reason to believe that a club whose jurisdiction includes crime at MIT wouldn’t have licensed the reprinted compilation about a crime at MIT.’

Do take care of item 1, anyway...  Thanks!  --Dervorguilla (talk) 07:28, 11 May 2013 (UTC)  12:45, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

I stand corrected on Lexis/Nexis. The search was conducted with the search tool of its competitor, Westlaw. I've made the correction. (Westlaw is a brand owned by a subsidiary of Thomson Reuters. If I mention Fritos, there's no reason to add information about Pepsico).

Citing nutshells is not such a swell idea. WP:ELNEVER applies to talk pages.

It's not a copyright violation for one (let's call this hypothetical person "Lola") to do the Westlaw search, assuming Lola (a mixed up, muddled up sort) has a Westlaw account, nor for Lola to print it out for her own use. It most assuredly is for her or her compatriots (let's call her hypothetical compatriots "the Davies brothers") to post the search print-out online, for 3rd parties to see and use, without their having to secure a Westlaw account. So Lola is entitled to see, print and use the search results. But neither Lola nor the Davies brothers are entitled to post the results. The whole posted hypothetical .pdf posting IS a violation of copyright law by Lola and the boys. Wikipedia cannot link to their .pdf.

Violating copyright law and the wikipedia rules against original research and copyright violations is not pioneering. A pioneer does something first. One who does something similar is not a pioneer. What he or she does is the opposite of "pioneering". It's mundane. Banal. Tiresome.

I acknowledge, and the corners of my mouth even turned upward involuntarily, at the irony inherent in talking about copyright violations on the Aaron Swartz talk page. Irony notwithstanding, I must note that the metaphor breaks down upon closer inspection. Downloading and making available public domain documents (PACER) or academic research papers already being given away for free (JSTOR) is, in the end, quite different from pirating copyright-protected magazine articles only available behind a paywall (Mass Lawyers), or through a for-profit, commercial, subscription, proprietary search engine (Westlaw).

This last point is exactly why the only link I provided was to the WBUR website, for the joint WBUR-Mass. Lawyers article, while simply summarizing the Mass Lawyers-only pieces about the Issa hearing and CFAA jurisprudence. David in DC (talk) 17:21, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Still more editorial recommendations by Dervorguilla!

5. STRIKETHROUGH  ‘a much bigger’, and SUBSTITUTE  ‘no’.

6. STRIKE  ‘rife with’, and SUBS  ‘devoid of’.

7. STRIKE  ‘copyright-violating’, and SUBS  ‘misquotation-containing’.

8. STRIKE  ‘is inadvertent’, and SUBS  ‘was an inadvertent misperception on my part’.

9. STRIKE  ‘enlisted assistance from’, and SUBS  ‘found it by reading new material posted by’.

10. STRIKE  ‘she used to advise’, and SUBS  ‘whose territorial and subject-matter jurisdiction would, in my opinion, empower it to use MIT funding to (a) investigate the B&E incident and (b) commission (for public display) a made-for-hire compilation from Westlaw to keep the community from being misled by misstatements published on authoritative websites (which it likely monitors)’.

Note. David in DC’s otherwise helpful legal treatise doesn’t apply to works made for hire.

Compilation of Material About Aaron Swartz 24 (copyright page).  “Compiled May 3, 2013, by Westlaw.  © 2013 by Thomson Reuters.  All rights reserved.  Publicly displayed by permission.”

--Dervorguilla (talk) 12:45, 12 May 2013 (UTC) 12:54, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Remain included To my knowledge, it looks like we should include the Silvergate quote (or an equivalent source). Basically, the reader should know that initial arrest on state charges alone would not normally have led to much more than a warning, were it not for the DOJ "making a a Federal Case out of it". That's a useful fact that is essential to understand, and I don't think that's a point in dispute, is it? The current quote explains this fact well, but perhaps other sources explain it better. --HectorMoffet (talk) 00:11, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

HectorMoffet: Do we agree, then, that if the allegation’s more likely false than true, the quote’s not too useful?

• We’ve yet to find found a source that supports Harvey’s allegation.  MarkBernstein’s research suggests we’re not likely to.
• D.A. Leone’s official statement on the matter indicates that he wanted to prosecute Swartz himself, for the publicity.

See Press Release, Middlesex Dist. Attorney, Cambridge Man Indicted on Breaking & Entering Charges, Larceny Charges in Connection with Data Theft (Nov. 17, 2011):

Aaron Swartz was indicted today on [state] charges of Breaking and Entering with Intent to Commit a Felony, [Grand] Larceny, …

“The defendant violated the trust of a not-for-profit organization [JSTOR] by stealing …, going so far as to physically break into a MIT server room in order to continue his theft undisturbed,” Leone said.  “The steps he took to accomplish his thievery were criminal.”

Emphasis added.  --Dervorguilla (talk) 20:10, 10 May 2013 (UTC)  12:45, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

What reliable published source states that the background quotation in the Silverglate passage was not, in fact, provided by a "lawyer familiar with the original case"? I know of no reliable published source that claims this. Dervorguilla apparently believes that Silverglate’s source was lying or misinformed, but of course Silverglate, his source, and Silverglate’s editors know more than we do -- and we're getting so deep into WP:OR at this point that we can barely see the surface. If we have some reason to also cite the Middlesex DA, that's a separate discussion. MarkBernstein (talk) 20:42, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

David in DC:  The “front page article” cited by you and MarkBernstein to support your “consensus language” does not exist.

See MLW (vol. 41, issue 25), Feb. 4, 2013, at p. 1 (print ed.):  Recovering Addict Can Get LTD Benefits; Errors Made by Lender Invalidate Foreclosure; REBA Declare Victory as Closing Co. Goes Belly Up.  Cf. also issues 24, 26 & 27.

You’ll find nothing in Mass Lawyers Weekly that somehow “buttresses Silverglate’s … reporting”.

I believe that you two have been making stuff up. --Dervorguilla (talk) 08:30, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

You believe incorrectly. I have made nothing up. Well, that's not true. For years, when my young son would whine about wanting something he couldn't have, I'd tell him that that the English philosopher Michael Jagger had once said "you can't always get what you want." He was kinda steamed at me the first time he saw the Rolling Stones album featuring the the title of that song. Quite rightly, he felt I'd misled him about the source of the quotation. I'll cop to that.

That bit of misdirection notwithstanding, I have made nothing up that I've typed on this talk page and others, nor anything I've edited into the article.

MB wrote: Far from retracting the quote, Mass Lawyers Weekly ran a front-page story on reaction to story in the following issue.

Assuming MB's good faith I wrote: "I'm looking forward to MarkBernstein providing the subsequent front page article from Massachusetts Lawyers' Weekly, buttressing Silverglate's original reporting. It's likely to make all but the most zealous detractor of the consensus language at the top of this section recognize the correctness of the consensus."

MB replied: "I don't have the paper copy. Possible leads (behind a paywall) include..." and then provided three links.

Someone posted a .pdf of the results of a Westlaw search to the MIT Crime Club's website. You provided a link to that .pdf, arguing that the search results established that MB was wrong about articles in the issue he'd alluded. You indicated that the results of the search established that there was no such article backing Silverglate's reporting.

I wrote: "I'm not sure if these are the sources MarkBerstein is alluding to, or not. But there's a much bigger problem here. The link above [your link to the Crime Club .pdf], which I've hidden, is rife with copyright violations."

You asked me to amend my statement, to say I was now sure they WERE the sources MB was alluding to. I did amend my statement, but not quite as you'd asked. I made it: "I'm not Dervorguilla's sure if these are the sources to which MarkBerstein is alluding to., or no I'm not. (Or at least I wasn't at the time I first typed this.) But Regardless, there's a much bigger problem here. The link above, which I've hidden, is rife with copyright violations."

Please let me know what leads you to accuse me of "making stuff up." I haven't. I said I wasn't certain that the Crime Club .pdf provided the source MB alluded to. I said I would look forward to seeing his source because it would add additional weight to the already-strong policy-based reasons for retaining Silverglate's and C|NET's reporting. The article hasn't materialized. Assuming good faith you now seem to have looked at a hard copy and determined that, whatever source(s) MB is relying on do not appear on the front page of the subsequent issue(s) of MLW and you've determined that MB's characterization of his buttressing source was inaccurate. He still may have made a mistake of fact, rather than making it up. But that's for him to clarify. I do not know. I'll assume good faith.

I've gone on at length about this because I'm mightily peeved at being accused of "making stuff up." I haven't. David in DC (talk) 14:28, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

And mightily peeved you should be. Some time after the Silverglate article appeared, I noticed a the follow-on article while helping sorting mail for our office coop. I borrowed a neighbor's copy, with his permission, to read the article, the gist of which was the MLW-WBUR joint investigation referenced (far, far) above. It was, as I recall, below the fold, with a continuation on an interior two-page spread. Unfortunately, nobody here keeps back issues handy, and the Watertown Public Library doesn't receive Mass Lawyers Weekly. But this detailed and circumstantial account should allow anyone who does keep them to find the article if they really wish to consult it.

There should be a sanction. In recent days, Dervorguilla has been edit warring a dead horse, took that edit war improperly to the wrong noticeboard with an accusation directed at the wrong person, venue shopped it when it failed at a different noticeboard, tried to trump up a specious argument with copyright violations, and now has called two editors liars. In short, Dervorguilla has been breaking every commandment in the wikipedia canon as it comes to hand, and wasting a lot of everyone's time in the process. Meanwhile, this Talk page (and others on related pages) are defaced by long recitations of "evidence" that leads nowhere, and encyclopedia pages are damaged by a meandering series of pointless and deceptive tiny edits that try to obscure the nature of proposed changes. A previous episode involved adding bad information to the encyclopedia and referencing it in a hatnote in order to argue for the hatnote's deletion. It's getting difficult to assume good faith where that assumption is contrary to fact, and of course civility is tough when improper insinuation shift, as they did this morning, into improper accusation. Let's face it, folks: we have on our hands a partisan, someone whose main activity in life appears to be the MIT Crime Club, who is extremely eager (to say the least) to denigrate the reputation of the subject. MarkBernstein (talk) 15:05, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Three weeks ago I was invited by sysop Ocaasi to review PLAINANDSIMPLECOI. I did, making 26 edits. I now ask that you review WP:THREATEN: “It is unacceptable to threaten another that some form of action that cannot or will not likely be taken will occur.” Also WP:CIV: “Other uncivil behaviors: lying”. Also I see that you’ve been making silent alterations to this page, MarkBernstein. No insertion markup, no timestamp, no edit summary.

You’re confusing editors in a way that makes other editors look bad.

Jhawkinson has also asked that you improve your Talk page habits. --Dervorguilla (talk) 08:56, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

David in DC: About that comment: “I'm looking forward to MarkBernstein providing the subsequent front page article from Massachusetts Lawyers' Weekly…” So why didn’t you try to help him? You could have just googled [ Silverglate site:masslawyersweekly.com/2013/ ].

Or I could have gone straight to the Mass Lawyer's Weekly web page and found out what it cost to get past the pay wall. Which I did. I decided I'd rather spend the money on lottery tickets. Probably a bad decision. The tickets turned out to be defective. I didn't win anything. And the vendor won't give me a refund. He says my definition of defective is overbroad.

I'm genuinely unfamiliar with the format of the google query you've provided. Would it have gotten me past the pay wall or in some other way shown me more than I saw by going straight to the source's web page? David in DC (talk) 11:10, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

[Inserted comment]. No. But the title and the lead graf aren’t paywalled, David in DC. Wouldn’t Mass Law Weekly’s newswriters understand that they have to put the subject’s name in one or the other if they want anyone to buy the the article? --Dervorguilla (talk) 17:31, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Instead, you made up the statement that the article existed and that it supported a (made-up?) consensus.

You've misunderstood. I made nothing up. I assumed good faith. As I now ask you to do. David in DC (talk) 11:10, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Another point: It’s hard to imagine that a lawyer wouldn’t have observed that this document is being silently altered over time. A link changed here, a sentence added there — but no insertion markup, no timestamp, nothing in the edit summary.

I AM a lawyer, 'though non-practicing. But I haven't observed what you've described. I guess you'll have to stretch your imagination a bit.David in DC (talk) 11:10, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Do you want to let the other editors know about this, David? --Dervorguilla (talk) 07:09, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

About something I haven't observed? No. David in DC (talk) 11:10, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Don't be silly. Kettle/pot/black much? Any editor that was confused by my silently correcting my own typos or signing edits I made seconds before ? Sorry about that. And signbot will be along to help you in a few minutes. HINT: try picking up the relevant issue of the paper and look for the article before you assert that everyone is a liar. If you must search, look for Swartz (the subject of the article-- remember him?) not Silverglate. MarkBernstein (talk) 11:14, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

I’ve picked up the relevant issues and looked for the article about Swartz. I wish I didn’t have to say this, MarkBernstein, but the article you’re describing doesn’t exist. (Anywhere.) --Dervorguilla (talk) 17:49, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Who Was/Were the Judge(s) Who Oversaw the Prosecution to Date?

It would be helpful to know who the judge(s) were, as this case progressed. E.g., was it Mark Wolf? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Benefac (talk • contribs) 18:31, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Roanne Sragow, state, mitcrimeclub.org/SwartzFilings-state.pdf; Nathaniel Gorton, federal, ia700504.us.archive.org/29/items/gov.uscourts.mad.137971/gov.uscourts.mad.137971.docket.html.  The federal proceedings were held before a magistrate judge, Judith Dein (who hears pretrial matters only).  --Dervorguilla (talk) 00:58, 8 May 2013 (UTC)  12:02, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

With regard to granting a nolle prosequi motion, the identity of the particular judge who grants it is more-or-less irrelevant. It’s up to the D.A.; if he declares that he will not prosecute the case further, it doesn’t get prosecuted.
nolle prosequi, vb. To have (a case) dismissed by a nolle prosequi <the state nolle prosequied the charges against Johnson>.
nolle prosequi, n. A docket entry showing that … the prosecution has abandoned the action.
Black’s Law Dictionary (9th ed. 2009).

Um, no. For starters, please see Nolle_prosequi#Decision_maker. But more importantly, since one oughtn't cite wikipedia as a source for a fact, please see britannica.com which says, in pertinent part: "In some states the common-law rule that the entry of a nolle prosequi is within the sole discretion of the district attorney still exists; in others his discretion is subject to review by the court" and Commonwealth v. Atkinson, 15 Mass. App. Ct. 200, 204 (1983) which holds that, in Massachusetts, a prosecutor's right to enter a declaration of Nolle Prosequi under Massachusetts Criminal Procedure Rule 16, prior to trial, is generally "without limitation, except possibly in instances of scandalous abuse of his authority."

It is precisely this exception that requires at least cursory review by a judge and, as here, a docket entry signed off on by Judge Sragow in December 2011 and made effective by publication in the criminal court's docketing system in March 2012. David in DC (talk) 01:59, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

OR (last point only). See docket No. 1152-CR-073 (and docket No. 1152-CR-075), available at http://mitcrimeclub.org/SwartzFilings-state.pdf

Offense: B&E Building Daytime for Felony
Disposition date: 12/16/11
Disposition method: Nolle Prosequi

I agree that the filing dates would also have been 12/16/11. But the dockets don’t show it.

They also say nothing about the six superseding charges, but do check that organizational website from time to time. The publisher appears to have been recognized as a source of law-enforcement records relating to MIT criminal cases.

Boston (2009) (“Ordinarily, the MIT Crime Club confines its efforts to … collecting incident data …”); City Council (2011) (“MIT Crime Club members have for six years furnished MIT students with data of value in safeguarding their persons and property; … MIT Crime Club members have faithfully served the MIT and Harvard communities as Police Log Compilers at The Tech and the Cambridge Chronicle”), which suggests that its site is where you’d be most likely to find the documents.

Docket says B&E with intent. Docket says (and implies) nothing about larceny or unauthorized access.

--Dervorguilla (talk) 03:46, 15 May 2013 (UTC) 04:53, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

“A Cambridge man has been indicted on charges of breaking and entering, larceny of electronic data, and unauthorized access to a computer network …” Middlesex DA (Nov. 2011). Article says (and implies) nothing about charges of B&E with intent.

“The charges dropped by Massachusetts were two counts of breaking and entering, one count of larceny over $250, and three counts of unauthorized access to a computer system.” Tech (Feb. 2012). Article says (and implies) nothing about charges of B&E with intent.

Do try not to add false information to the article.--Dervorguilla (talk) 04:23, 15 May 2013 (UTC) 04:53, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

We do not include the truth as Dervorguilla asserts it. We include what's published in reliable sources. Even if Dervorguilla asserts that it's false.

The sources have: (1) a nolle prosequi signed off on by Sragow on December 2011, in a .pdf of the court "jacket" posted to a hobbyist website, and (2) the court's electronic criminal docket, as reported on in a reliable source, indicating that charges were dropped in March 2012.

Dervorguilla's editorial behavior is increasingly disruptive. Please stop treating this article as if it appears on dervorpedia. Please stop editing according to what you "know." We edit here based on what appears in reliable secondary sources.David in DC (talk) 12:27, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

What is this about? Again, we have a controversy where Dervorguilla feels strongly about excluding some details that seem of little consequence. Indeed, it's not clear to me why dropping the state charges is per se worth mentioning in the article, except that Dervorguilla apparently feels so strongly that it should be mentioned in precisely her way and relying on her sources. It notice that her sources are the famous MIT Crime Club, which she praises above; is she defending its authority or trying to increase its traffic or something like that? Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't speculate on another editor's line of reasoning, but we've had a similarly obscure situation here with the Silverglate quote which has gone on for months; I think it's safe to say that nobody understands the source of the fuss there, and I'm not sure why Dervorguilla wants to get into a revert contest over the nolle prosequi either. If someone can explain (e.g. "it matters whether it was Mar __ and not Mar __ because ___"), I know I'd sure be grateful. MarkBernstein (talk) 14:11, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

New consensus version?

A new “consensus version”, draft 1:

Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly columnist Harvey Silverglate, a defense lawyer, said that some of the attorneys familiar with the state case had expected that the district attorney would have the proceedings postponed for a year or two, so that if Swartz got into no further legal trouble, the case could be dismissed "without a finding". According to Silverglate, they had not expected that the federal prosecutor, Carmen Ortiz, would "t[ake] over the case".

Verge reporter Jeff Blagdon said that an e-mail from Ortiz’s office to a Secret Service special agent showed that by the time it was written (January 7, 2011), federal rather than state prosecutors had begun "calling the shots" on the case. He cited a letter from Swartz's law firm to the Department of Justice to that effect. A similar story was published in the Huffington Post.

--Dervorguilla (talk) 09:28, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Tthis POV rewrite paraphrases Silverglate with less clarity than the current language. It appears to tendentiously argue that sources contradict, something it no other editor, it seems, can see. It slyly tries to impeach one source (nasty defense attorney!) while not impeaching another (tech writer for a startup blog). Can we please give this a rest?MarkBernstein (talk) 11:20, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

This proposal is a step backward. The language in the article right now is fine. Like MB, HM, and Shearonink, I see no reason to continue this discussion. I doubt the proposer of this latest proposal agrees, but hope springs eternal. David in DC (talk) 11:35, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Summary of progress on content
1. Some of the points made in the shopping list of quotes don’t appear to have been directly rebutted yet.
2. Silverglate hasn’t retracted his statement about the state prosecutors.
3. Silverglate has no known political reason to retract it.
4. Silverglate’s statement about the state prosecutors has yet to be supported by a second source.
5. A new WP monograph argues that some sources contradict Silverglate.
6. The monograph slyly impeaches Silverglate.
7. A Harvard contributor to WP said Mass. Lawyers Weekly (print edition) published a front-page article that supports WP’s material about the state prosecutors.
8. The relevant MLW issues (print edition) were reviewed; no article was found.
9. New material about the state prosecutors has lately been added to the section.
10. Part of the material appears to be OR.
11. The sources cited by WP to support that part appear to contradict it.
12. That part was removed by an editor who said the sources don’t support it.
13. No other editors have yet said the sources don’t support it.
14. The material was soon restored.
15. The editor who removed the material was asserted to have been edit-warring.
15. A statement by the Harvard contributor supporting the assertion of edit-warring was found to have been doctored.
16. The contributor had been investigated by disinterested editors and found to have a non-insignificant conflict.
Should the material be kept? --Dervorguilla (talk) 09:37, 16 May 2013 (UTC) 05:34, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, the material should be kept.

This latest laundry list is tendentious, to say the least. I'm not sure why you think I'm best described as a "Harvard" editor. You're mistaken about the "disinterested editors" and about the supposed conflict. The former seem to be chiefly yourself and your sock. The latter doesn't exist. On the substance, the question isn't Silverglate's statement, but rather his report of what a lawyer with knowledge of the state case told him. There is no reason to doubt the quote and every reason to believe it accurately represents what the lawyer and his colleagues believed and expected -- which is precisely what the passage explains.

A wp:wikibreak might, as another editor suggested below, be in order.MarkBernstein (talk) 11:12, 16 May 2013 (UTC)