Re: "Hackers"-- brief review and anecdote...

[hallam@w3.org]

>I saw "Hackers" yesterday. It's not bad and its political sensibility is
>very cyberpunk. The ad campaign even uses the tag line, "Their only crime
>is curiosity." 

I know companies who have spent millions cleaning up after a hacker breakin. 
I've been up at two in the morning trying to stop a person with known mental 
problems breaking into a site with some very dangerous computer controlled 
machinery. I've dealt with people trying to get rich quick by defrauding others. 
I've met some real evil bastards who simply want to ruin as many other peoples 
lives as they possibly can, including people that thought they were their 
friends.

To me teenagers who break into computer systems are not funny at all, its like 
joyriding, its funny until someone gets hurt. I know people who have got hurt 
real bad.

I like having privacy, part of the cost of that privacy is respecting the 
privacy of others.


	Phill