The problem is that a person can only die once. It's a big new. It appears in the main newspapers. Everyone comments about it. But in a few weeks it will be not a new new and it will be replaced by another new (a plane crash, a hurricane, a terrorist attack, or even something unimportant like a football match).

Another possible plan could have been: Go to trial and proclaim innocence. Get a guilty verdict and proclaim innocence. Go to the appeal court and proclaim innocence. Go to the supreme court a.p.i.. Start a hunger strike a.p.i.. Get a reduction of the sentence a.p.i.. Offer to create free software for charity institutions a.p.i.. Get the disallowed by the penitentiary system a.p.i.. Try to start a vocational school in jail to help rehabilitate the inmates a.p.i.. Also denied a.p.i.. Get out on parole a.p.i.. Give as many conferences about the case a.p.i..

In each of these steps there is a new to publish and get coverage in the media and explain that the laws were unjust. And each time explain his position about the restrictions of some information. It's like a PR campaign. Some messages only are understood after a lot of repetitions.

I understand that it's easier to say "just go to jail and start a pr campaign" that really doing it. It was a difficult situation and I don't want to judge him. But I don't think that suicide was obviously the best alternative.

And as I say in another comment: Some people did important things after incarceration or unjust persecution:

Nelson Mandela: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Mandela

Galileo Galilei: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_Galilei