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Use Jonathan's card to buy yourself an iPad

sam.odio.com

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Re: Use Jonathan's card to buy yourself an iPad

#181

Post by true_religion »

aforty wrote: post #137
true_religion wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They either guessed or brute forced it. Both of which are essentially illegal computer hacking. I don't know about you, but I'm not going to do business with someone (here the Founder of Freshplum) if they enjoy hacking credit accounts in their free time. His reason for doing so is so poor that I worry about his ethics in other affairs.

But he specifically mentioned having to physically be at the Starbucks. Why would he do that if he had cracked the PIN? I think there's a way for them to transfer from one card to another, physically at the stores POS system. Can't think of anything else.

He went to the starbucks, first, to buy another gift card. Then he used the website to transfer funds.

Re: Use Jonathan's card to buy yourself an iPad

#182

Post by kennywinker »

sequoia wrote: post #42
Sam_Odio wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a valid point. But is pursuing art (or whatsver) admitting to yourself that you value art more than world hunger? After all, that's how you're allocating your resources. Fwiw, anyone who knows me know I don't have a holier-than-thou attitude (though I took one for this post). This was mostly meant as an edgy/controversial twist to the social experiment: how do peoople react when someone takes the money (which…

Do you consider Hacker News threads more important that working to end world hunger? ;)

Wether or not I consciously consider it the case, at this time my actions betray my true belief.

Re: Use Jonathan's card to buy yourself an iPad

#185

Post by uxp »

samoa wrote: post #164
danielodio wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed: @Socialize has paid $625 to @Jonathanscard to promote our SDK Speed Challenge. That's enough for an iPad, @sodio! http://besoci.al/q2I0QE http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2878875

That genuinely is great, but whose brothers are going to pay into @Jonathanscard to cover the results of posting the exploitative code used to fund iPads that enables laypeople to do so on their own?

That script isn't any more exploitative than one that `curl`s weather.com to make sure it isn't raining outside.

Re: Use Jonathan's card to buy yourself an iPad

#186

Post by kennywinker »

flocial wrote: post #70
sequoia wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really... I don't think that the people who put money on the card have any claim to determine how the money is used. It's like giving a gift, once you give it you don't get to control it anymore, and they are giving a gift to an anonymous recipient. If they want to control how the money is spent... perhaps don't put it on a publicly accessible debit card? ;)

It's like a homeless guy taking a gift of food and selling it to buy drugs rather than eating because to him "drugs are more worthy"

Which is a totally valid thing for him to do!!!

You gave them food to reduce their suffering. They bought drugs to reduce their suffering.

You should only give if you can detach yourself from what people will do with it. A gift with strings attached is not a gift.

Re: Use Jonathan's card to buy yourself an iPad

#187

Post by raganwald »

kennywinker wrote: post #178
raganwald wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a social experiment, if I leave my bike on my front lawn over night for weeks, eventually it will be stolen. Everybody expects this to happen eventually. Does this excuse the thief?

Nope, but if you say "here is my bike, anyone can use it for whatever they want. Really, whatever. Go nuts." and then having someone say "I know, I'll send this bike to kids in Africa who don't have a bike!" doesn't count as theft.

We’re speaking to different arguments. Your point appears to be that Jonathan setting up the experiment and the people paying into the experiment did so with the understanding that other people could do whatever they wanted with the money, and the OP has done whatever he wanted with the money.

My point was simply that given any situation, the fact that we expect something to happen doesn’t automatically excuse any of the participants of responsibility for their choice. I am not judging the OP, merely pointing out that “everyone’s expectation of outcome” is not a valid defence if he has done something wrong. If you believe he hasn’t done anything wrong for other reasons, that’s fine, carry on.

Re: Use Jonathan's card to buy yourself an iPad

#189

Post by dotBen »

Udo wrote: post #20

So essentially you're proud of stealing huge amounts of money from a fund set up by people for a specific purpose, and then you channel this money to suit your own needs while claiming moral superiority ? You know, even if the money you stole for "the little children OMG think of the children" really reaches the intended recipients, which it probably won't if this is a typical 3rd world development fund, you still be…

I'm also appalled at Sam Odio's behavior - the fact that the money is going to charity (albeit indirectly) doesn't make this ok.

Re: Use Jonathan's card to buy yourself an iPad

#190

Post by nick007 »

raganwald wrote: post #136
gegegege wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was stated that this was a social experiment. Given the fact that everyone knew what would happen, I hardly think this constitutes abuse. Diverting the money to a more worthy (in his view) cause, as some people were using it to buy food for the homeless, should have been an expected outcome.

As a social experiment, if I leave my bike on my front lawn over night for weeks, eventually it will be stolen. Everybody expects this to happen eventually. Does this excuse the thief?

What if the thief donated the bike to charity?
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