[SGVLUG] loverspy

[Terry Hancock]

On Monday 29 August 2005 06:48 pm, matti wrote:
> SAN DIEGO — A 25-year-old fugitive was indicted Friday for creating and
> marketing a software program called Loverspy that allowed buyers to
> snoop on former or prospective sweethearts by breaking into their
> computers.

While I'll acknowledge that selling such a thing is probably unethical,
why is it illegal?

Aren't we guaranteed the right to bear arms by the constitution? How
can such a thing be regarded as a more offensive weapon, than say,
a lockpick or a semi-automatic pistol?

Certainly lockpicks and guns can be used to commit crimes, but I've
heard it extensively argued that they must remain legal.  Yet we
have completely contradictory standards when it comes to electronic
media -- even though you are far less likely to be harmed by a computer
virus than by a slug weapon, right?

I find this kind of drift towards criminalizing activities which
do not (IMHO) involve material crimes disturbing.

We are fast absorbing the idea of "information crime" or should
say simply "thought crime"?

Yet there was a time when such an idea was considered either
unimaginable or unconscionable -- criminalizing a particular
set of ideas or procedural code is remarkably like criminalizing
religion or political parties, it seems to me.

Or burning books.

Actually, this is a bit worse -- burn the book, and throw
the author in jail.

Isn't this the sort of thing we used to brag about being above,
now that we're not in the "middle ages".  

Or is it just cool to be medieval again?

I mean we've got the guilds, the warlords, the petty regional
conflicts, police breathing down our necks, authorities who
consider themselves above the law, and state control of ideas,
religion, and the press.

What's left between here and the dark ages?

Torture?

Oh yeah, I forgot ...

Cheers,
Terry

--
Terry Hancock ( hancock at anansispaceworks.com )
Anansi Spaceworks  http://www.anansispaceworks.com