Tag Archives: Harvard

Jew of the Week: Aaron Swartz

The son of a software company owner, Aaron Swartz (1986-2013) grew up immersed in computer programming. At 13, he won the ArtsDigita Prize, awarded to websites deemed most useful and educational. At just 14, he was part of the team that developed RSS, the now-ubiquitous web syndication tool. Shortly after, he worked for W3C, the World Wide Web Consortium, where he authored RFC 3870, a program for web resource management that is part of the complex framework of the web that very few understand (and less appreciate). After trying Stanford University for a year, Swartz left to start the wiki-site called Infogami. It later merged with Reddit, and Swartz elevated Reddit to one of the world’s most popular social news sites, with millions of visitors every month. Reddit has also become well-known for being a platform to quickly raise awareness (and funds) for important causes around the world.

Swartz was angered by the steady destruction of online freedoms, and focused his attention on fighting back. His work made him a champion of online freedom. He helped defeat the SOPA bill, and through his online hacks and activities, became the face of the “open access” movement. However, this activity got him into hot water. After downloading articles from JSTOR to the point of crashing their servers, Swartz was arrested and put on trial. The allegations were silly, The New York Times reporting “A respected Harvard researcher who also is an Internet folk hero has been arrested in Boston on charges related to computer hacking, which are based on allegations that he downloaded articles that he was entitled to get free.” The prosecutors wanted to make Swartz an example, and pushed unjustly harsh penalties including up to 35 years in prison and $1 million in fines. Tragically, unable to cope with the legal onslaught, Swartz took his own life last week; found dead in his Brooklyn apartment at the young age of 26.

Words of the Week

A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves.
– Edward R. Murrow

Jew of the Week: Louis Brandeis

Robin Hood of the Law

Louis Brandeis

Louis Dembitz Brandeis (1856-1941) was born in Kentucky to Jewish immigrants from Prague. Despite his own family’s secularism, Brandeis’ role model and inspiration growing up was his uncle Naphtali Dembitz, a religious Jew, and in his honour Brandeis changed his middle name to Dembitz. A graduate of Harvard Law School, he achieved the highest grade point average in the school’s history – a record that stood for 80 years. This distinction, among others, led to his acceptance to the Massachussets bar without even taking the exam! Working at a Boston law firm, Brandeis quickly became famous as the “People’s Lawyer”, always defending the little guy, focusing on the public good, and refusing to take cases where he believed the defendant was guilty. Brandeis fought successfully against corruption, corporate power and consumerism, monopolies and banks; he fought for healthy workplace hours and wages, better living conditions for the poor and a host of other public causes. More amazingly, he stopped accepting payment for this work. In 1916, Brandeis was nominated to the Supreme Court, one of the most controversial events in U.S. political history. It caused such a great furor that for the first time ever a public hearing was held. Brandeis was termed “dangerous”, not only because he was a Jew, but as was later said, “because of his brilliance, his arithmetic, his courage. He was dangerous because he was incorruptible…” Brandeis’ confirmation to the Supreme Court came a month later, in a process that normally took a single day. He would serve as supreme court justice for 23 years. Meanwhile, Brandeis was also a lifelong Zionist, and served as president of the Provisional Executive Committee for Zionist Affairs. In his later years he donated generously to Israel. Nicknamed ‘Robin Hood of the Law’, he is most remembered for upholding free speech and individual privacy, crusading for the public, and revolutionizing many aspects of American law. Brandeis passed away on the eve of Sukkot.

Words of the Week

He who learns but does not think is lost. He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.
– Confucius

 

Jews of the Week: Leo Kahn and Thomas Stemberg

Possibly Everything On Your Desk (Including the Desk)

Staples Founders Thomas Stemberg and Leo Kahn

Leo Kahn (1916-2011) was born to Jewish-Lithuanian immigrants who owned a whole foods store in Massachusetts. After getting degrees from Harvard and Columbia, Kahn served across the globe for the US Air Force during World War II. Following this, Kahn took his parents store to a new level, opening up a chain of supermarkets which today go by many different brand names, the largest being Whole Foods. His greatest competitor was Thomas Stemberg, owner of First National Supermarkets. After battling each other in price wars, the two came together (as all Jews should do!) and realized there was a serious lack in the office supply industry. Thus was born Staples. This chain now has over 2280 stores in 26 countries, with a revenue of nearly $30 billion and over 90,000 employees. The EPA ranks Staples as one of the top 25 environmentally-friendly corporations, and the company is well-known for their philanthropic work. Leo Kahn passed away last May at age 94.

Words of the Week

Whoever destroys a soul, it is considered as if he destroyed an entire world. And whoever saves a life, it is considered as if he saved an entire world.
– Talmud, Sanhedrin 37a