Weblog on the Internet and public policy, journalism, virtual community, and more from David Brake, a Canadian academic, consultant and journalist

Archive forMarch 25th, 2002 | back to home

25 March 2002
Filed under:Uncategorized at4:59 pm

Well, not really hackers as “true hackers” understand them – disinterested seekers after illicit knowledge – these are just kids who steal people’s credit card numbers. Ira Glass of the terrific US radio programme This American Life interviewed two of them at a hacker convention in October 1997, asking them about their personal morality and whether they thought they were doing wrong. Hearing them struggling to define and justify their moral stance makes fascinating listening.

The feature in question is the first item of the hour-long programme, but I encourage you to dip into the show’s archives (most shows since 1995 are archived on the site) and listen to other gems, including one I mentioned earlier.card bank national credit 1stcredit card 5america creditbest credit cards 10service credit 580-223-6260affilitate creditalcona alpena union credit areaaccreditation for process seta etqa Map

Filed under:Uncategorized at11:59 am

Business 2.0 has collected quite an assortment of blunders from the world of business in 2001 (though in truth they cast the net rather wider, encompassing all sorts of Internet-related blunders).

Numbers 29 and 30 – Great Moments in Privacy – were stunning:

“Eli Lilly sends a mass e-mail in July to users of its antidepressant Prozac but neglects to use the “bcc” header, further depressing its customers by disclosing their online identities to one another.

“Trumping Eli Lilly, in October a graduate student at the University of Montana accidentally posts to the school’s website more than 400 documents relating to the psychiatric treatment of 62 children, including names, addresses, descriptions of sessions, and diagnoses.”

Number 38 also caught my eye:

“38. Excite@Home, iWon.com, and others line up to sponsor “Back the Net” day on April 3, 2001; participants are encouraged to purchase either a product or a share of stock online. The idea is “to dispel the negative stereotypes … that have sent our technological marketplace into a recession.” (Because nothing dispels negative stereotypes quite like an abject plea for charity.)”

Oh, and they were honest enough to mention their own at #11 – putting the CEO of Enron on their cover in August/September – a week before his resignation.

If you have your own tales of e-catastrophe you can add them to their site here (and read other reader-generated ones).