Programming prodigy and information activist Aaron Swartz has his fingerprints all over the internet. He was integral to the development of the basic internet protocol RSS and co-founded the global social news and entertainment website Reddit. But it was Swartz's groundbreaking work in social justice and politics combined with his aggressive approach to information access that ensnared him in a two-year legal nightmare. THE INTERNET'S OWN BOY is a personal story about what we lose when we ignore the implications of technology and its relationship to our civil liberties.