[zetetic]

Originally Posted by ixian

The only thing sadly typical is that you read through all that and still decided your opinion was special enough to make another post about it in another thread AGAIN.

The major point all of you guys are missing is that NO ONE CARES. All this hypothetical debate does is demonstrate the absolute height of internet nerdism. Jesus but this stuff gets old.

In short, please take your arguments to one of the other threads. Thanks.

I guess the "absolute height of internet nerdism" is a relative speculation. To me, that label is more appropriately applied to someone who takes time out of their day to post on a thread they have no interest in only to whine about the fact that other people are discussing something he disapproves of, while contributing nothing of actual substance to it.

So you don't care about respecting the privacy of your board users. So what? That doesn't make you special, it makes you ordinary. That's why organizations like the ACLU exist. To protect us all from the erosion of our civil liberties that results from ordinary people making ordinary decisions. And yes, we're only talking about an Internet discussion board here. You're right. That's the worst part of this. If you can't be bothered to stand up for the rights of your discussion board users, what are the odds you'll stand up for anyone's rights in real life? Slim to none, I'd guess.

All that aside, as I said and as Dean and others have pointed out repeatedly, the ethical argument isn't even relevant to whether you should warn your board users that this hack is installed and that private messages are not private to protect yourself from litigation. Bira said it best here. Even if you don't have the slightest respect for your users privacy, you should at least have the sense to protect yourself.