It's just not cricket

I know that this blog only has three readers and even then no-one gives a rat's arse about my opinion anyway (given we've all got one) but I do want to publicly register my strong disapproval of people who "leak" other people's stuff.

The lastest thing I'm reading about in the blogosphere is a supposed email correspondence between Bill Gates and some guy called Ray Ozzie. I see other examples almost daily. More often that not, it's so freaking banal that it astonishes me that anyone's even interested, such as the recent email spat between two legal secretaries in Sydney which circumnavigated the internet within hours.

I don't CARE whether Posh whoosit and David whatsisface have "issues". I am more likely to think very poorly of spiteful, avaricious and unscrupulous people who try to profit by betraying another person.

The only time I think that kind of behaviour may be called for is if there's something really important at stake, like politicians lying or crimes being committed or other scenarios where the greater good is served by breaching someone's trust and privacy. But those sorts of examples are rare. Or if not rare, the more corrupt among us seem to be better at covering their tracks and staying out of the newspapers.

The surest way to stop this sort of traffic would be to simply refuse to engage. Don't buy the magazine that contains "stars without makeup" or saucy, intrusive telephotos that rival NASA's zoom capability (and would be considered "stalking" under any different circumstances). Don't read mail that wasn't meant for you. Don't engage with behaviours that shame people, like passing on those terrible "joke" emails of people breaking up with a lover or discovering infidelities or whatever.

Just don't buy into that shit. It diminishes us all.

Apologies for the boringly serious post. Normal programming will resume on the morrow.

(Thx to carribeancricket for the photo)