Over cold cuts and a pitcher of vodka with some orange juice, G., R., and I discussed the ethics of cyber snooping. Well, it was more of me asking about the ethics of cyber snooping and G. and R. (my favorite married couple) fielding my questions.
You see, until recently I've been indulging my curiousity over other people's lives: I've been looking into other people's websites. Blogger, Multiply, Friendster, MySpace, Live Journal. You name it.
As with most things, it started off as completely innocent. Looking up old friends and then browsing through their friends to see if a long-lost college drinking buddy has re-surfaced (he hasn't).
But then I discovered links. People link other sites to their own and typically, the connections are based on meaningful relationships. Current lovers, former classmates, etc. You can get to know a person not only from his/her site, but from the sites he/she links to. It's like making a web of someone else's life from the patches you get on-line. Like a jigsaw puzzle. It is fascinating. It is also addictive.
I got burned a couple of weeks ago when I got "caught" snooping by a friend of a friend. It was for my own good. I needed a wake-up call from this silly (although potentially dangerous) game I was playing.
So there I was last night, trying to convince R. and G. that my intentions were innocent. That my desire to know more about people was borne out of sheer curiousity, not out of some maniacal desire to steal other people's identities.
They both looked at me like I was guilty as sin. I had another cold cut.
And just when I thought R. and G. were going to condemn me as a cyber stalker, they gave me tips on how not to get caught snooping. They recommended getting a second browser, never logging into anything and for best results, creating a fictional person with a fictional blog (back date for believability) and let's not forget the fictional friends.
Ok, so maybe that last one is a little scary....
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