Quotes from Aaron Swartz

Normally, I just sit in my quiet little room and do the small things that bring me pleasures. I read my books, I answer email, I write a little bit.

Writing an encyclopedia is hard. To do anywhere near a decent job, you have to know a great deal of information about an incredibly wide variety of subjects. Writing so much text is difficult, but doing all the background research seems impossible.

Large corporations, of course, are blinded by greed. The laws under which they operate require it - their shareholders would revolt at anything less.

Even among those who I would not count as 'friends,' I have met many people online who have simply commented on my work or are interested by what I do.

I was around computers from birth; we had one of the first Macs, which came out shortly before I was born, and my dad ran a company that wrote computer operating systems. I don't think I have any particular technical skills; I just got a really large head start.

Say yes to everything.

Information is power. But like all power, there are those who want to keep it for themselves.

Senator Wyden continues to be the Senate's truest champion of an open Internet.

Real education is about genuine understanding and the ability to figure things out on your own; not about making sure every 7th grader has memorized all the facts some bureaucrats have put in the 7th grade curriculum.

We need to download scientific journals and upload them to file-sharing networks.

Assume nobody else has any idea what they're doing, either.

Now, as far as I know, nobody has ever put up the U.S.'s nuclear missiles on the Internet. I mean, it's not something I've heard about.

What is the most important thing you could be working on in the world right now? ... And if you're not working on that, why aren't you?

Big stories need human stakes.

There's all sorts of stuff people want to publish anonymously.