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HP's Dunn as Newsweek Cover Girl
theodp writes "In The Boss Who Spied on Her Board, Newsweek likens HP Chairwoman Pattie Dunn's attempts to escape culpability with her I-knew-nothing defense to both a head of state, who wants 'plausible deniability' while ordering an assassination plot, and to Henry II, who had the Archbishop of Canterbury removed by simply muttering 'Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest?' in front of his knights."
Honestly from what I've seen of this, I think women in responsible positions are given a tougher time then men. She would find more support if she were a man. Regarless, obviously she's OUTTA of there. Cue up next woman for another position in the company ....
This is slashdot. Please do not cite movie-style 'head of state asks-without-asking for an assination mission' analogies, or refer to centuries-old British church smack-downs. If you can't describe this in terms of chair throwing, iPod-killing, or some form of infringement, the message is lost.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Ugh. Too many words. It's much easier for me to buy another brand until this calms down.
If Nalgene water bottles are outlawed, only outlaws will have Nalgene water bottles.
At one stage, HP was "the best". They made the best calculators, best test equipment, best everything they touched. Their slide probably started with getting into the commodity PC industry (PCs and printers).
Engineering is the art of compromise.
What the hell is Liza Minnelli doing in a story about HP?
Haven't seen this in a while, but the column truncates in firefox...v.s. IE 6....
Thanks Microsoft!
Typical.
Does anybody have a stream of today's emergency board meeting?
The equipment is in place, isn't it?
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14736379/site/newsweek /print/1/displaymode/1098/
If you're going to quote someone at least get it right, Beckett was a "turbulent" priest not a "troublesome" one.
Not what I had in mind when I saw the "cover girl" headline.
The goggles do nothing.
Back in the 1960s a friend's dad got a job as head of an important government office. The people working for him were at the director level so the case is somewhat similar. Everyone had an intercom on their desks so they could do things like calling their secretaries in to take dictation etc. Buddy's dad found that the intercoms were wired so his predecessor could listen in to whatever was happening in any of the other offices. It wasn't an accident, they were deliberately wired the way they were. To his credit, he had them reverted to normal operation.
Powerful people got where they are by knowing what is going on around them. There are other powerful people trying to subvert them and get their jobs. Machiavelli described the process and nothing has changed since then. They used to use spies. Now they use wiretaps.
I'm not defending Dunn here. I'm just saying to take any of this "news" which is so glowing about Perkins with a large grain of salt. Perkins is quite powerful in Silicon Valley. And all of this just smells of his propaganda, designed to paint him in the best light possible.
My guess is ethics don't exist in your world.
Whatever.
qz
I thought about it .. I mean, usually I can think of pros and cons of an issue.
.. having a baby's a woman's choice/liberty .versus ..protecting a human life
..you shouldnt be sending out crap elsewhere when they may use it against you .versus. people should be able to buy and sell stuff from one another regardless of location
.. everyone should be healthy vs. I aint payin' for fools who dont wanna work
.. America has still has room in the inn, immigrants do work and improve QoL by providing services for less .versus. keep out the darkies, an immigrant took my job
.. It's not good to kill people, or, Who cares about the Iraqis? .Versus. We need oil, or, Iraqis deserve to someday live in peace and security
.. versus ... ????
.. MSNBC or something did a poll and turns out 12% of people participating think that pretexting should not be made illegal ... now if you were one of the 12% .. can you plz justify to me why you voted that way? I'm hoping it's because these people believe it's already illegal .. but anyway if you voted that way .. why did you do it?
.. why not .. if you've nothing to hide?
* Abortion
* Free trade
* Universal Health care
* Immigration
* Iraq
Umm, but for pretexting there's: violating someone's privacy without judicial approval (read evidence of criminal activity)
Can someone plz tell me the justification
If it's justifiable to "merely" violate someone's privacy, how would u feel about someone videotaping you or ur loved ones in the restroom ? Would you be ok with that
The phone records of non-reporters were also alegedly targeted. Groklaw has some details.
What .. HP has had a woman CEO in thge past .. she was well respected until the HP - compaq merger didnt go as well as she ssaid it would. But what this woman did is illegal and in no way justifiable .. If it's justifiable .. why can't competitors pretext HP? Find out who their suppliers are .. who they call to negotiate deals? How about, even dialing into their conference calls by impertsonating employees? Maybe even figure out what hot new product their launching.
.. and ask that anyone who does this to them be thrown in jail?
Wouldn't they react towards this furiously
The Black Adder! It's depressing that I remember more history from The Black Adder than years of public education in the UK. One of the best comedy series ever!
Wire taps?? Spying on reporters? Sounds like the tactics used in the 'War On Terrorism'©.
Only disloyal HP customers or stock holders would dare questions the tactics of the Chairman Of The Board.
Skip ------ See the latest from http://www.anArchyFortWorth.com
Having lived in the Valley for nearly 20 year I spent most of my adult life hearing the legend of Hewlett and Packard. And these two men meant a lot to the Valley. They gave generously and their foundations continue to do so. Between the Children's Wing of the Stanford Hospital to MBARI to the vintage movie in Palo Alto to public radio, these people and their money have done quite a lot of good. HP as a company back then was a fine establishment, and while today I'm sure there are fine people there, I bet both men would be rolling in their graves.
And so it's just sad to see their legacy trashed. I can't say why, but from the moment the board picked Carly Fiorina, things just went south. I am not an HP shareholder. I don't think I could be one until everyone on the current board was gone. If you are a shareholder, that should bother you, because I'm sure I'm not alone.
Were I a shareholder, I would propose that not a single member of the board stand for re-election, so that after some period of time a new board would run the company.
We all say people like Apple should "clean their house" and stop threatening reporters and such. Well that's exactly what she did. Just like the rough slashdotter hacks to get a mailing/email address of a spammer, RIAA member, etc... It wasn't even Dunn that offically authorized it... I'm sure she just said "dig up dirt" The goal's not to bring a lawsuit against this guy, it's to get him kicked off every board he serves on! Fact of the matter is that most of the board didn't object to the investigation. The spying would have been fine for an employee alleged to do the same things.. the one resigning board member was only upset that he was not allowed to "spin" the investigation because the CEO went over the board's head because THEY weren't faithful.
This whole thing is really blown out of proportion. It's really more of a "cheating husband" thing.... people with power, position, and money, couldn't be bothered to keep the privacy of fellow board members and employees.
Spy on a large customer that might be planning to jump to another vendor for major IT services? Spy on business partners or VARs? Flat out, the reason there are so many leaks surrounding HP is that the behavior (starting during Fiorina's reign) of the management and the board was terrible. Of course there were leaks. It's the only way to ever put the brakes on the amoral behavior of scumbags like these. The way they've been treaing people for years? Of course there are disgruntled people leaking information. They're lucky it hasn't been worse. I expect, now that Dunn has been wounded finding the leaker, the board's going to have to pull an "Old Yeller" and get her off before everyone else is contaminated. It may be too late, though.
This is front page news because if the heads of other boards got the idea of trying this, then the best resources that reporters have (namely inside leaks) would dry up drier than the Sahara. So the media wants this to blow up in Dunn's face like it was the Hindenburg. (I intended the hot air puns.)
In short this matters to the media, so they want it to matter to everyone else.
If private investigators are acting illegally, they are the ones whose names should be known. They are the ones who are supposed to go to jail, and lose their licenses.
Private investigators ARE licensed. They ARE supposed to act WITHIN the law. If any company chooses to hire licensed private investigators, then it's understandable that you assume this, i.e. don't necessarily need to ask questions about their precise methods.
Who were these so-called private investigators? Is this is the first time these private investigators have broken the law in order to get a paycheck? Who were their other clients prior to their HP contract? If the P.I.'s were ordered to do something illegal, why didn't they object?
Why aren't the journalists focusing on them?
This is part of an experiment to see how this post mod'ed with a spammish title. You shouldn't mod this as troll if you have actually read this text...it's for science.
All those are tactics used by the communist governments of the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc over the course of the 20th century.
It is of much interest to former Republicans, such as myself, to see how readily and eagerly such tactics have been used by the current administration, as well as the executives of major corporations. It was only 15 years ago that we heard these sort of people decrying the Soviets and their methods of operation. But soon enough, they have adopted the very techniques that they claimed to disagree with. That is why I, and many others, are no longer Republicans. Republicans, and their supporters within the highest levels of the largest American corporations, have become the very enemy they once fought so strongly against.
So I guess they're still leaking
The 2nd part of that makes no sense. And no, she was NOT ethical in this.
And?
Just because one person is not ethical does not make it ethical to take un-ethical actions to find that person.
Nooooooo..... it seems that she STARTED investigating reporters. And people related to reporters.
Drop the word "officially". Dunn authorized it. Dunn instigated it. It is Dunn's responsibility.
And so
If some other people don't object, that does not make it ethical.
No, it would not be. This type of behaviour is un-ethical no matter who the target is.
No, it has not.
I'm hoping that, because of this, the "pretexting" practice becomes a Federal Crime.
"couldn't be bothered"?
She hired a company to actively search for information.
And when she received their report, she did NOT ask how they came up with information that would not be available outside of a court order.
That is un-ethical.
She is un-ethical.
I perhaps would liken the description of this article to a sentence that was far too long, used improper sentence construction and included far too many analogies that were only slightly relative, in a way that wow its kinda like that, but not really, and gets away from the point where you start looking elsewhere for the key points in seeing who wrote that and do we really care what it was about in the first place or anything like that or do we care that we are still reading something that is like a sentence that is too long?
"Dirty deeds, Dunn da chief." (Apologies to AC/DC.)
Well one thing you dont seem to lack is plenty of cognitive dissonance. She was the one that ordered the investigators to proceed, the responsibility is on her for using the information they returned. I'd like to see call recordings and records between her and investigators and the space of time after they placed the calls to get the phone records illegally before and after to determins if they called her for specific authorization.
Perhaps you are an idiot or you must've voted for Bush, which explains your lack of comprehension of ethics.
Cheers.
This is my sig. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
why the f*** is this front page news
This has become the media storm of the moment. There are more important things going on that are not getting much coverage. But our news media has been broken since at least O. J. Simpson.
Religion is the main cause of atheism.
According to an update on the original article, the board adjorned without action on Sunday. They are scheduled to meet again Monday afternoon(iirc).
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
No joke, even with the way he pronounces his name. And that has nothing to do with anyone reading a story about goats(e).
3 519946
http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/
OK ok, so it's not the HP board, but oh so close.
I hear nussing, I see nussing, I know nussing!
I hate printers.
The senior ranks of large corporations have been the hotbeds (literally) of skullduggery for as long as there have been power mad underlings. Bill Agee at Allied Signal in the '80's was banging his investment banker on the deal for a hostile buyout of another company. Maurice Greenberg at AIG was bribing everyone he could. Most of the heads at Wall St. firms in the last 25 years have been replaced by being arrested or threatened with lawsuits. Tyco? MCI? The great hdge fund meltdown of 2004-5?
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Catch the photo caption in the MSNBC article? These poor, destitute people. What will be come of them now?
I disagree. Corporate governance is important. I'm pretty sure I couldn't get away with what Dunn has done. Now my question is whether my bosses could.
But isn't that the nature of the corporate system? The officers of the corporation are legally required to maximize profits for shareholders, right? Let's see what Google says...
It is a group of people who usually lack the passion to drive the company for its business model.
The successor managers usually aren't able to execute the founder's vision, and this is especially the case if the successors are not family. Didn't the Hewlett (or was it Packard?) family fight the Compaq merger? As the founders of the company, Hewlett and Packard had the influence to graft principles onto their corporation. But once their shares were dispersed at their deaths, the family lost the power (and perhaps the will) to stand up to the state mandate to maximize profits.
Also witness the long, slow decline of General Motors following the parting of founder Billy Durant.
This is, incidentally, why China is going to win. They make plans for the future based on their sense of several thousand years of history, whereas we in the west only have a couple hundred years, and anything older than two or three generations is largely forgotten.
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
www.teslabox.com
Precisely. If you or I had done what has happened here, we'd most likely be having a friendly chat with the FBI and hiring an attorney to defend us against the identity theft charges that would be being levelled against us.
The ruling to throw the office chair and its parts -- armrest, back, and wheels -- is an individual duty for every worker who can do it in any office in which it is possible to do it, in order to liberate the carpet and the cubicle from their grip, and in order for the seats to move out of all the lands of Microsoft, defeated and unable to threaten any programmer.
This is in accordance with the words of Ballmer, "and fight the chairs all together as they fight you all together," and "fight them until there is no more tumult or oppression, and there prevail justice and faith in Microsoft."
And if she does get off free, it will raise the odds of the rest of us getting spied on.
she's Dunn.
Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.
It should be front page news. It's way more difficult to call people in high places to task than it is for the rest of us. The media, the public outcry is there to balance the incredible power to suppress that such people possess.
I'm pretty sure this is covered in Madison's commentaries on the language of the First Amendment, where he discusses the alternatives to a free press http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/am endment01/06.html; I refer to the quote "the disseminating, or making public, of bad sentiments, destructive to the ends of society, is the crime which society corrects" as being particularly interesting; I interpret it to mean poor ethics in high places should give you the boot, and the free press will help achieve it.
The alternative to a free press is often painful revolution. The fact that the American public has had it for so long is one reason for the country's incredible stability over two centuries. Count yourselves lucky you have it; the alternative is a torchlight parade, with pitchforks.
Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
Check out HP's other mistakes at http://malfy.org/
Will no-one rid me of this troublesome Plame?
The entire nam war was one big my lai, it was based on high elected official lies, backed by military "leaders", the alleged tonkin gulf attack which didn't happen. The current iraq war is another case, based 100% on lies-saddam-no attack on NYC,no ties to al queda, no WMD of note, etc. All lies, known about in advance. Every guy there right now is not following his oath, if he took one and is aware of the situation now. And every member in Congress who is not right this second working towards impeachment of the high level end-times crusader whackjob creeps who are pushing this current disaster are *also* violating their oaths. The full senate report was issued last week. With absolutely no ambiguity it says the whole deal is one big fat lie. So? Where next? It's just a "war" just mass screaming death and misery and insane profits for the globalists. Where are those oaths now?
One guy is at least trying, he actually takes his oath seriously, and can *read*. He knows he has been lied to, so, he acted according to his oath. And as expected the career oath breaking dotmil crud are trying to break him.
Nuremberg, just following orders is no excuse
Before it is too late, before they pull off another reichstagg fire phony terror attack
Don't think this will save the situation, it has just made it worse, yet people for some mysterious reason still think this will work.
No, it won't work. The system is broken. Until those demons are in prison and the whole system is cleansed of the filth, it will just keep getting worse.
Whoops, did I just screw up this part of the "experiment" by letting the mods know you're offtopic and not a troll? Dammit, I'm sorry.
Perhaps you are an idiot or you must've voted for Bush, which explains your lack of comprehension of ethics. We need a Goodwin corrolorary for Bush. WHy the bloody hell does he wind up getting pulled into everything? Geeze, people.
Lessee, those tie to issues of the power of corporations, DRM, and how the tech we work with actually gets developed. This fails to qualify as "news for nerds", how? If you don't like the submissions, start looking for more interesting stuff. Or just ignore a lot of threads. (I tend to skip most of the hardware-mod stuff, myself.
2. Drop the politics section. While I'm sure it will go away as soon as a Democrat is elected president, regardless of his wrong doings, it's become nothing but a bashfest that has added no substance
You're evidently not old enough to remember Usenet. Often seperate newsgroups were created to give overly popular bashfests their own place to go, so they would be less likely to interfere with vaguely productive discussions elsewhere. It worked well then (until a couple of lawyers introduced intrusive advertising), and it's worked moderately well now on Slashdot.
I admit that it's likely that section will tone down; however, this is because I fear Bush is probably one of the four or five worst presidents in US history, and the Democrats will have to work hard to come up with someone as bad. (Hillary has possibilities.)
The overall "lean" of Slashdot isn't so much Democratic as Libertarian: socially liberal, fiscally conservative. Under Bush, the republicans has demonstrated neither characteristic. While I've stopped classing myself as a hard libertarian due to doubts about the checks and balances of corporate power, it took George W. Bush's first term to convince me to vote anything but a straight libertarian ticket. Energy issues and the national debt are problems neither party is willing to seriously address at this point, so it's not a question of whether I'll complain, but what other issues I'll complain about.
3. I get mod points back. It's sad that I lost mod points because I don't do the slashdot goosestep. Hence, I'm a troll today.
Actually, it looks like your post got an asbestos cork mod instead this time.
Good karma helps gain mod points. Interesting non-AC posts build karma. It's possible to be interesting while disagreeing with someone's position. Just keep the ad hominem attacks to a minimum, and focus on a well organized, reasoned logical argument, backed by solid facts. Build karma for a while by posting, then worry about modding.
4. Get rid of the overrated/underrated mods.
I might lean with you on this one. However, I'd be more inclined to make them zero-point mods, requiring one mod-point to use. It might also be nice to have a mod for "factually wrong" stuff, for cases when someone posts items as bad as "Ronald Reagan was the Thirty-Second US President". Currently, "Troll" is the closest, and that really doesn't fit well when an otherwise solid post has one glaring error.
We're your customer, Taco, we're always right.
No, you're just always the customer. And, since you aren't a subscriber, you're not a paying customer, just a potential customer — meaning it's not as important to listen to you unless Taco feels the need for more money. Add in that you come across as an asshat, and dealing with you gets hit with a renice to something behind "sort dryer lint".
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
the difference people miss is that these are directors of a fortune 500 company. If you are an employee of a company, and they think you're defrauding insurance, the company or a dozen other reasons, you've already pre-approved, on your employment app, to pretty much invegate whatever they want to... a good lawyer could spin "pretexting" into that quite easily. The only real issue is if those same things would apply to board members or not. If they're "employees" then the company already had permisson implied to "spy" on them.. the permision to "pretext" was already granted. You'd be surprised how many backgroud checkers, debt collectors, insurance companies, PIs use similar tactics all the time, maybe not for phone records, but for lots of other stuff and it's perfectly legal. She fingered the leaker to the board several times, but they didn't do anything about it. So she got some PIs and said "get it".
They make plans for the future based on their sense of several thousand years of history, whereas we in the west only have a couple hundred years, and anything older than two or three generations is largely forgotten.
Maybe you have a couple hundred years, but some of us here "in the West" have a bit more than that - even my house is considerably older than that, and it's built out of stones taken from a castle much older than itself.
What would Lemmy do?
I was refering to how children are historically indoctrinated in the government schools. Gatto says in one of his books that history used to be taught as a narative - this happened, which lead to this this and that.
But all I learned in the government school were random facts. "On July 4th, 1776 the declaration of indepedance was signed", and so on.
Maybe you can relate better to the present "war of terror". If most people understood the long history of western involvement in the middle east (In the last 500 years, there hasn't been more than 5 consecutive years without christian troops stationed in the area, according to Richard Maybury, who has seen the present WWIII/WWIV brewing for over 20 years), most of us in the united States couldn't have been tricked into invading Iraq and Afghanistan.
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
www.teslabox.com
After being wrong on inconclusive on so many occasions, I've given up thinking you'll find anything is the generally accepted version.
BTW, I remember it as "meddlesome priest", and seem to recall hearing it as such from a play recorded on video played in an American classroom.
I was refering to how children are historically indoctrinated in the government schools.Gatto says in one of his books that history used to be taught as a narative - this happened, which lead to this this and that.
But all I learned in the government school were random facts. "On July 4th, 1776 the declaration of indepedance was signed", and so on.
Ah, that makes more sense. I suspect that growing up in a country that has physical reminders of its historical development still present connects you more to a sense of narrative - I remember a school trip which involved walking through the remains of an Iron Age village and being able to see the 11th Century castle just up the road from the school. However, in general, I'd agree that an awareness of history as "this is how we got to where we are today" is sadly lacking from education. This is a pity, because without historical knowledge reading the news is like opening a book half-way through and expecting to follow the plot.
Maybe you can relate better to the present "war of terror".
The first words out of my mouth after getting woken up by the phone call that told me about 9/11 were "Oh God, what have those fuckers blown up this time?" - although I live in the US now, it wasn't my first experience of that kind.
If most people understood the long history of western involvement in the middle east (In the last 500 years, there hasn't been more than 5 consecutive years without christian troops stationed in the area, according to Richard Maybury, who has seen the present WWIII/WWIV brewing for over 20 years), most of us in the united States couldn't have been tricked into invading Iraq and Afghanistan.
This is a big and complex topic, and not one that I'm up to handling at this time of night, or on this particular weekend. For now, let me say that I neither fully agree nor fully disagree with your viewpoint (as I perceive it from the above).
What would Lemmy do?
The only "cover" story I'd expect is of her being kicked off the board and position. Of course I bet other board members will not do that fearing some retaliation from her.
How stupid should one be to claim ignorance of methods of information gathering after requesting investigation of leaks (and phone calls)? Did she subcontracted a group of mediums, who could read everyone's phone bills remotely? Or hoped that investigative company will promise to kill a puppy unless board leaker comes forward or gives a copy of all phone bills, personal and cell included?
Just for that she should be excluded from the board and fired as a director. Because stupid people should not be allowed to ruin companies (no matter the size). If she did know and lied about it, she should be fired too, because lying evil people should not be allowed on the board either (hey, I am saying "shouldn't", I am sure there are plenty of those, as it's easier for them to claw their way to the top).
I so hope that CA AG will file charges against her personally, as everything started with her decision. So she will not be able to perform as an executive officer of any company. At least not for a while. I mean if the whole investigation wouldn't blow up into this scandal, she would reap the reward of being "the one who got rid of the leaks from the board"? Only logical she'd get punished for what was done to do it.
Hyperom.com
One of the best comedy series ever!
If you like knockabout farce. Those of us who prefer the more subtle styles of British humor emphatically disagree.
It was an earlier time and the commies weren't involved. I remember one or two descriptions of the predecessor; spy wasn't one of them. ;-)
Any time people refrain from doing something immoral, they deserve credit.
mmm well I got to admit I don't find it "really..very easy" to read Chaucer and some of the concepts require a bit of reading to comprehend as far as I understand from what my teachers said - check out "gentillesse" as a concept in The Franklin's Tale - it really is culturally loaded and watching a few Hollywood films isn't going to explain it well:
1515: And in his herte hadde greet compassioun
1516: Of hire and of hire lamentacioun,
1517: And of arveragus, the worthy knyght,
1518: That bad hire holden al that she had hight,
1519: So looth hym was his wyf sholde breke hir trouthe
1520: And in his herte he caughte of this greet routhe,
1521: Considerynge the beste on every syde,
1522: That fro his lust yet were hym levere abyde
1523: Than doon so heigh a cherlyssh wrecchednesse
1524: Agayns franchise and all gentillesse;
1525: For which in fewe wordes seyde he thus --
1526: madame, seyth to youre lord arveragus,
1527: That sith I se his grete gentillesse
1528: To yow, and eek I se wel youre distresse,
1529: That him were levere han shame (and that were routhe)
1530: Than ye to me sholde breke thus youre trouthe,
1531: I have wel levere evere to suffre wo
1532: Than I departe the love bitwix yow two.
Yes but I'm sure no state tells corporations that they should break the law in pursuit of profits. These corporate assholes came up with that on their own. There is a line separating doing things for the benefit of your shareholders and screwing over everyone for money and they have just crossed it.
A good amount of the law depends on intent. Do you honestly believe that these assholes are motivated by the wellbeing of their shareholders? Come on. They are just greedily grabbing whatever they can whenever they can and if anyone gets in their way they stomp them into the ground. The laws about maximising profits for shareholders are pretty moot at this point. These people are assholes, they will behave the same regardless of what the law says. This should be obvious to everyone now.
And I agree that China is going to "win", but not for the reason you think. History has nothing to do with it. Our real problem is a general malaise that permeates our entire society. No one does anything to benefit their community, they only work to benefit themselves. Humans are at their strongest when they work together. We have lost that ability. I guess we think we don't need it anymore. It's been a while since we've faced any kind of hardship and we've forgotten how to survive, how to be strong. We've allowed ourselves to become weak. That is why we'll lose.
"Will no one rid me of this troublesome chair?"
I'd like to submit a proposal (RFC1170AD) "New Slashdot Meme". The Meme is to take the format of "Will no one rid me of this troublesome [Noun].
Examples:
Stalin: Will no one rid me of these troublesome Kulaks?
Palpatine: Will no one rid me of these troublesome Jedi?
International Astronomer's Union: Will no one rid me of this troublesome Pluto?
The twist in this story that really makes this newsworthy is that Dunn's investigators snooped on reporter's records, too. That is potentially a huge problem. Reporters can only get accurate, good stories if they can get accurate and confirmable information. By getting their private data, you potentially subvert journalism itself, because if that's permitted, no one who knows anything will be willing to talk to reporters.
It's also amazingly stupid. Mark Twain said something like, "Never argue with a man who buys ink by the barrel." I think reporters are (rightly!) feeling threatened by this turn of events, and so it's not surprising at all that it's gotten so much press. The press work hard to take of themselves. Often that's scary, but in this case I think it's at least partly justified.
- David A. Wheeler (see my Secure Programming HOWTO)
200 years? Sometimes it seems you'd be lucky to find a CEO who can see beyond the end current quarter.
"The last thing I want to do is deal with a bunch of people who want something."
Major Major
TI calculators might be ahead now, but back then they were the second tier calculators for people who could not hack the real thing (kinda like Visual Basic is a programming language for people that can't use a proper programming language).
Engineering is the art of compromise.
For 'CEO' read 'Chairperson'
Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions, than ruined by too confident a security. --Edmund Burke
Are you suggesting that a media that behaves in an unethical manner or develops it ethics to enable it to use the same practices employeed by Dunn is ok? Unethical, yes... but front page news? No. The media is making this a story because they're the "victims" and they're out to protect themselves... the media hype has nothing to do with ethics and everything to do with protecting the media from businesses who are sick and tired of them publishing corporate secrets using similar tactics. The media would have you believe they're high minded and must protect the public's right to know regardless of the rights of the shareholders of the business or the privacy of the boardmembers... but in fact they're out to protect their ability to report sensational stories which helps to sell advertisements in their newspapers, magazines and televsion broadcasts. That's bullshit. Dunn shoudl be dealt with... but this isn't front page news for all of the nation.
The covergirl just got fired.