[free-sklyarov] Please relax, and read this plea for compassion

[Jonathan Weesner]

Over the last several days I have watched with growing anxiety as the 
DMCA battle escalates on all sides while compassion for Dmitry seems to 
fade into the background.

We on this list know that protest and controversy, once taken to the 
net, can ignite and blaze into a firestorm within hours.  But back away 
from the blaze, the rest of America has a calmer, more complicated view.

In the big picture, a few truths are obvious:
1. Many American consumers, academics and software coders are convinced 
that thier rights have been trampled on and stolen.
2. Many American Companies are convinced there property is being stolen.
3. A distracted American Congress is wondering how a unanimous vote 
could dissolve into such controversy.
4. The American Supreme Court is tracking this legal hurricane as it 
moves towards thier doorstep.
5. Without consensus or clarification, the FBI is left to enforce thier 
interpretation of the Law.

But that's just the big picture.  First we must deal with the little 
picture. The one that includes Dmitry.

I believe that somewhere in this confusing little picture, there is a 
simple truth. A young Russian man has become trapped in a firestorm of 
controversial, untested, American legislation.... and he needs to go 
home to his family.

If all five big picture players step back for a while, I think they will 
see that Dmitry is not an evil cracker. Nor a thief of intellectual 
property. Nor a martyr for our cause. He's just a young PHD student from 
Moscow, a Russian father of two Russian children, who does not belong at 
ground zero of the protracted, rapidly escalating battle over the 
American DMCA.

So let's do the right thing. The compassionate thing. Let's rally on 
Monday; but not a protest rally -- a humanitarian rally. Leave the 
"BOYCOTT ADOBE!" signs and the "REPEAL DMCA NOW!" signs at home. 
 Replace them with "PLEASE FREE DMITRY" and "LET DMITRY GO HOME".

Let's allow Adobe to do the right thing. The humanitarian thing. Let 
Dmitry go home.

Let's allow the FBI a respectable out. They cannot tolerate otherwise. 
And we all know they're in need of a little more respect nowadays.

To do otherwise would not only lack diplomacy. It would lack ruth.

Then all players can retrench, raise thier legal arguments and wage this 
DMCA battle through the Supreme Court right back into Congress.

In short, let's push this smelly pile of DMCA pooh back into Congress. 
But lets not pulverise a young Russian in the process!

Jonathan Weesner