just wanted to drop by for a quick few words :

” You in the carebear costume, get the f*ck out ! ”

Seriously, have you people lived so many years of blissful ignorance and peace or something ???

That guy was sort of “ebil” but gee this is standard issue amongst human beings.

Although it has to be quite embarassing to see your cock on the web, if you hand a stick to someone you do have to expect to be beaten with it.

If anyone still feels this is unusual or abnormal, I suggest some eye surgery or a good cure of EvE Online (yes, the only mmorpg where people are just as selfish and evil as in reality, with less chocolate topping).

And then a free point to go against general opinion (a sport I do enjoy) : What is your point of view on the educational value of this event ?

How many of the people potentially put at risk by this got away with it and won’t take the risk anymore ?

How many of all the people who like to show their wang and stuff realized this actually had implications ?

In my humble opinion, this was a vicious move, it definitely hurt some people, and as often suffering taught some wisdom (and here to many more people than the hurt ones).

I don’t believe anyone should judge the blogger who did that either as he might also be himself unaware of the real consequencies of his little laugh – and all the same surprised by his results and thus publishing them (either way it’s a weird hobby).

Devil’s advocate signing off.

PS: I never posted pics of my own bazooka and I never will, therefore I declare myself able to consider those who do as ‘somewhat different’ (yes I did judge them, evil me)

Some of the comments speak of police entrapment but this is not a pedophile case, it is supposedly two consenting adults looking for the same thing, nothing illegal in that.

What ever the legal outcome, this guy was morally wrong in what he did. He intentionally misrepresented himself with the intention of causing great embarrassment and hurt to others. He deserves to pay for this in some way.

I think this is all pretty tangential to the topic at hand, but I couldn’t resist.

But isn’t what Jason did essentially the same as what the cops do?

Uhm… no? How about “No, not at all”? First of all, a vigilante is never the same as an actual cop, no matter what he does. One of the has special rights given to him by the state. The other doesn’t. Second, what laws did these people break that cops would have gone after?

One thing I need to make clear… I do not support what Jason did, and really, legally, whatever the precedent or the law says, he’s on his own.

That said, I stand by my assertion that there are two issues here, the line-crossing act in question… and the stupidity committed en masse of sending such sensitive information to a random party over the internet as an act of blind trust.

Also… countless websites and blogs post e-mails submitted personally to them, without consent. maddox.xmission.com is the quickest example that comes to mind. Does that make what Jason did right? Absolutely not… but the legal precedent doesn’t indicate a ruling body can throw the book at him for doing so.

Also, re: a lawsuit… whoever decides to sue him is going to have to embarrass himself in court, by going into explicit detail on the e-mails they VOLUNTARILY submitted, and the language and photographs therein, plsu the intentions of sending said e-mail. Even if it ruins a guy’s marriage, you think the married guy’s gonna go into court and further embarrass himself in a public forum, going into blow by blow details of what he sent and what he was thinking? Even sans the married guy, you think the other regular guys want to blow big money on a lawyer to humiliate themselves tenfold from what they’ve already experienced, and show a courtroom and a judge exactly how stupid they are?

Yes, the guy who published these emails and photos was an asshole. Some subset of the people sending him solicitations and photos (namely: the married ones) are assholes too. The others were just gullible, which is no crime. But this should reinforce for everyone that the best way to maintain privacy in any given type of information is, first and foremost, to not tell anyone about it.

In other words, publishing the personal info might not be illegal. It probably is copyright infringement, however, to publish the photos or videos. How serious that infringement is and how much in the way of damages could be reasonably won might be a different question, of course.

Now — does anyone have a citation to the relevant law(s) that govern this?  In particular, how does the recent Washington State legislation impact the status of “right to privacy” on personal communications?

That’s all separate from the question of whether what the guy did was moral or ethical, of course, but I see this “Oh! But don’t I have a RIGHT OF PRIVACY in information I hand out freely to strangers?” argument all the time. The answer is an unambiguous, perfectly clear, not at all questionable “No.”