April 24, 2006

Poll question

Is it immoral to look someone up on Google without getting their explicit permission first?

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

depends on the reason for the looking.

~kryssa

MosBen said...

No way, I look up people all the time on Google. It's public information man.

Anonymous said...

it being public information makes it LEGAL to look it up. Has nothing to do with the morality of it. ~k

MosBen said...

I suppose it could be considered "creepy", but I don't think it's immoral. The information is public, which generally means that the person was acting in a public capacity when the information was gathered. The reason we all agree that it's acceptable to Google Kissenger is that he was a public figure. While is may be a difference in degree, when somebody writes something that gets published in a school newspaper, wins a track meet, or does something else that gets published on the web they are acting in a public capacity.

Jenna said...

I do it all the time. Especially when I am bored.

Anonymous said...

i'm the same as jenna. i also look myself up once in a while to see what i'm up to.

Jenna said...

I have done that as well Sarah, I find that when I was in college I was more googlable. There is a lot less of me on the internet now. I wonder if that says anything about my college days...