From: Steve Grammont (islander@midmaine.com)
Date: Sat Sep 20 2003 - 17:05:38 PDT
Hi David,
I think Dave Winslow did a good counter point by point, so I will just
address the first bit...
>Steve, I'm going to guess that you don't have any kids.
Nope, but I was a kid, I know kids, I constantly read about and see kids,
and I am affected by the kids of others. I think I have an adequate base
of knowledge to understand how parents fit into things.
> Since if you did
>you would know that kids sometimes do things they are not suppose to and
>sometime's parents don't always catch them before something goes wrong. To
>my knowledge, this Kid-Parent type relationship has been going on for
>thousands of years in sort of the same manner.
Obviously kids will be kids. But there is a difference between a kid who
fires a bottle rocket down an empty street and a kid who causes a couple
hundred million dollars in lost productivity around the globe because he
thinks its kOoL.
>Sometimes Kids get into stuff that they should not and do some damage. Is
>that wrong, of course. Should we hang them so they don't do it again, I
>don't think so.
I didn't say "hang them", I said for parents and society to stop coddling
them. With all due respect... your attitude, as expressed in your email,
is exactly the attitude that I am condeming as the root of the problem.
It boils down to you not thinking hacking is that big of a deal and
therefore the punishment shouldn't be either. But you are quite simply
wrong. If a kid broke into your home stole your most valuable
posessions, took a leak on your bed (just for kicks), and smashed
everything he didn't steal... would you just shrug your shoulders and say
"kids will be kids, so as long as the kid's father gives him a stern
lecture I'm OK with that"? I very much doubt it. That is exactly what
hacking is like. At the very least it is like some stranger kid walking
through your house and touching nothing late at night while you are asleep.
The problem is that hacking has been seen as a largely harmless activity.
Inherently it is a criminal act which can range from fairly harmless to
catastrophic. And until parents GET IT, we will continue to have serious
problems from their kids. I think locking them up and fining the parents
huge sums is a good way to start getting parents to wake up to reality.
Sadly, I don't think anything else will do it.
Steve
P.S. I intensely dislike Microsoft, but their code is irrelevant. Dave
explained that very well.
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