Post 2: Networking

This chapter begins with a quick summary of all the uses of the Internet, and then it quickly goes on to describe the many moral issues that rise up when so many people are connected to each other.

First, the book looks at email and spam. Spam is a huge problem on the Internet. In 2003, 40% of all email traffic was unsolicited spam. This begs the question: is Spam moral? and, do governments or ISPs have the right to block spammers? The book then evaluates spam with the four workable ethical theories: Kantianism (spam is wrong), Act Utilitarianism (spam is wrong), Rule Utilitarianism (spam is wrong), and Social Contract (spam is wrong) (I sense a pattern here). It gets a little more complicated when you talk about blocking spam though. Personally, I think people should be more responsible with their email addresses, and deal with spam themselves, instead of the government or ISPs.

Secondly, the book looks at content control on the Internet. Is it moral (or possible) for governments to control what is put on the Web? I personally don't think it is possible. So, morality doesn't really come into question about something that is impossible anyway.

Thirdly, the book quickly skims through the issues of phishing, online predators, and internet addictions. All of these issues show how complicated the morality of anything can be, especially something dealing with so many people.

-Pieces