Do we understand yet? A bit more.

Larissa McFarquhar's  largely sympathetic New Yorker  article (3/11/'13, p.48+)  on Aaron Swartz's suicide is worth reading; it helps solve some of the many puzzles about how Swartz thought about his life, the world, the future of the internet, and personal relationships. The article includes copious quotes from his father and many friends, posts from his blog -"Stealing is wrong.  But downloading isn't stealing." (p.56), and additional backstory - he had previously hacked Westlaw and PACER databases without consequences - and  "At M.I.T. hacking was a tradition ... rarely punished." (p.51). 

Your Brain on the Internet

Am impressed by Cathy N. Davidson's  thoughts in Now You See It (Viking, 2011) which is about learning, teaching and the Internet.

Some relevant quotes: College is a place to learn how to educate oneself rather than a place in which to be educated (p.116).  "We need to test students on how critically they think about issues of the digital age -- privacy, security or credibility (127)." On  crowdsource grading: Democratizing of who can pass judgement is digital thinking (110). "  New modes and methods are needed for "a generation of kids who, from preschool on, have been transfixed by digital media (62)."

Quotes by themselves do not do justice to her thinking about 21st century education, all the while many others are wringing their hands or floundering,