The technology community’s brightest minds are memorializing Aaron Swartz, the 26-year-old programmer and digital rights activist who committed suicide Friday months before his trial over computer fraud was set to begin. A Prodigal Mind: Swartz was nothing short of a prodigy: at the age of 14, he helped develop the Real Simple Syndication (RSS) standard, paving the way to services such as Google Reader. He worked on the Open Library, which has a goal of putting one page online for every book ever published. He founded Infogami, which was eventually incorporated into Reddit before the sale to Conde Nast, a move that gave him the means to detach and take up various causes at his pleasure. “He was brilliant, and funny. A kid genius. A soul, a conscience, the source of a question I have asked myself a million times: What would Aaron think,” wrote Harvard academic, activist and personal friend of Swartz Lawrence Lessig.
About Shelly Palmer
Shelly Palmer is the Professor of Advanced Media in Residence at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications and CEO of The Palmer Group, a consulting practice that helps Fortune 500 companies with technology, media and marketing. Named LinkedIn’s “Top Voice in Technology,” he covers tech and business for Good Day New York, is a regular commentator on CNN and writes a popular daily business blog. He's a bestselling author, and the creator of the popular, free online course, Generative AI for Execs. Follow @shellypalmer or visit shellypalmer.com.