In your day, phreakers et al were pretty much barely a blip on the radar screen. A few of you got charged with old laws, several were threatened or intimidated, and many many kids followed in your wake.
How much responsibility, if any, do you think the early phreakers and hackers have for this rash of paranoid law?
Isn't this rhetorical? By your stipulation, early phreakers and hackers were blips on radar screens.
It wasn't until the age of widespread public Internet access and commercial Internet sites that all of the sudden corporate interests took notice of the danger imposed by millions of wanna-be icy hot script stuntaz (and worse) poking at their servers.
The magnitude of paranoia and demand for paranoid law is inversely proportional to the accountability of actions in a given network; where it is easy to determine "whodunit" you don't have people legislatively freaking out because (among other reasons) you can wait for the judicial process to take first pas.
First of all, I should qualify that 'blips on the radar screen' comment. What I meant was that they were the FIRST blips on the radar screen. In other words, "General, I've got something here I think you should see."
The connection between phone service 'in the day' vs. IP addressing in terms of anonymity is a compelling one, but what are we seeing now? A big (BIG) push to localise people by IP addresses. It's a great bit of technology, but it does serve to tear the
Surely, there is no reasonable connection between making free phone calls, giving an academic presentation and watching your DVD under Linux. Bank robber may be responsible for a lot of things, but not government's decision to outlaw cars. This kind of laws were passed because big companies exagerated hacker/piracy threat to get unreasonable control over what their customers do. Or, in the most optimistic case, because lawmakers do not understand technology and are not aware of the side effects that the law
I'm not pointing any fingers. I asked if HE felt any responsibility. I'm curious to see his take on things.
Furthermore, let's not forget--HE broke the laws, and did some things that weren't exactly technically illegal because nobody had imagined that such things could be done before that. Skip ahead to present day, and we have a raft of bad law--possibly (POSSIBLY) because of his actions.
YOUR fault we're in this mess??? (Score:5, Interesting)
Now we're watching a world get built where PhD thesis material might be illegal [securityfocus.com], writing code can get you arrested [eff.org] and charged, and even giving an academic presentation [princeton.edu] is threatened.
How much responsibility, if any, do you think the early phreakers and hackers have for this rash of paranoid law?
Re:YOUR fault we're in this mess??? (Score:1)
Isn't this rhetorical? By your stipulation, early phreakers and hackers were blips on radar screens.
It wasn't until the age of widespread public Internet access and commercial Internet sites that all of the sudden corporate interests took notice of the danger imposed by millions of wanna-be icy hot script stuntaz (and worse) poking at their servers.
By the late 80's, most metropolitan areas
Re:YOUR fault we're in this mess??? (Score:1)
The magnitude of paranoia and demand for paranoid law is inversely proportional to the accountability of actions in a given network; where it is easy to determine "whodunit" you don't have people legislatively freaking out because (among other reasons) you can wait for the judicial process to take first pas.
Re:YOUR fault we're in this mess??? (Score:2)
First of all, I should qualify that 'blips on the radar screen' comment. What I meant was that they were the FIRST blips on the radar screen. In other words, "General, I've got something here I think you should see."
The connection between phone service 'in the day' vs. IP addressing in terms of anonymity is a compelling one, but what are we seeing now? A big (BIG) push to localise people by IP addresses. It's a great bit of technology, but it does serve to tear the
Fault? How about "Excuse" and "Ignorance"? (Score:2)
Re:YOUR fault we're in this mess??? (Score:1)
I'm not pointing any fingers. I asked if HE felt any responsibility. I'm curious to see his take on things.
Furthermore, let's not forget--HE broke the laws, and did some things that weren't exactly technically illegal because nobody had imagined that such things could be done before that. Skip ahead to present day, and we have a raft of bad law--possibly (POSSIBLY) because of his actions.