About 300 people packed their seats in the Internet Archive auditorium on Friday to witness Pablo Peniche, head of development at startup AquaVoice, unveil a marble bust of late programmer, activist and open access hero Aaron Swartz.
Swartz is one of the co-founders of Reddit, helped develop RSS, and played an important role in the creation of Creative Commons. He is a representative figure of the Internet freedom movement.In 2013, Swartz committed suicide after being federally indicted for downloading millions of academic papers from JSTOR through the MIT network.

"The Internet's Own Boy" is engraved below the bust, the San Francisco Standard reported, adding that the 312-pound marble statue "was made using a mix of artificial intelligence-driven robotic milling and traditional hand carving."

The statue was unveiled at the Internet Archive Auditorium on Friday, with about 300 people in attendance. "Aaron's legacy is about bringing people together to make change," said Cindy Cohn, executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. "His hometown is now undergoing a renaissance." said Lisa Rein, co-founder of Creative Commons, a nonprofit dedicated to expanding public access to information. She founded "Aaron Swartz Day" in 2013, which hosts a hackathon and tribute event every year on Swartz's birthday. Now, Brazil has an Aaron Swartz Institute, a documentary, multiple books and podcasts, and even an Aaron Swartz commemorative coin (which she warns "don't buy").

"It's good that people idolize him, as long as they tell the story clearly: He was not a martyr," said Laing, "tears welling up in her eyes."

Later that night, Laing played some tribute videos on a big screen behind the stage. These included comments from science fiction writer Cory Doctorow, a member of the Aaron Swartz Institute in Brazil, and Cindy Cohn, executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Former Twitch CEO and YCombinator partner Emmett Schell is one of the few people who knows Swartz personally. "I'm glad that he became a symbol and that he would agree to do this," he shared, his voice breaking slightly. "I really miss him."

Starting next week, the bust will be moved to the [Internet Archive] lobby, where it will remain until Peniche gets permission to place it in a local park [Internet Archive community and events coordinator Evan Silchuk said]... "Aaron is really important to the San Francisco community," [Lane said]. "He could inspire generations - even those who were not alive when he died."

Technology blogger John Gruber believes that Swartz would be grateful that the bust comes from someone who "shares Aaron's own obsession with justice." But at the same time, "I think he would have felt a little weird. He wasn't a 'I hope they build a larger-than-life statue of me' kind of guy. If he had been that kind of guy, we wouldn't have loved him as much as we did. It's terrible that we lost him so young."