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Comment by cdolan | Hacker News Reader

"Responsibility" is a very strange word in your comment to me.

Snowden leaked government program details. How in the world is that the same about thousands of private citizens (aka not public figures) personal financial details?

How are these individuals not being "responsible"?

The only unresponsible person is the person(s) who leaked the details, and ProPublica for monetizing it.

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We have a disagreement in what makes a public figure then. I believe that over a certain level of wealth, the wealth alone makes someone a public figure or a figure of significance (since wealth = power, and public status also = power, and celebrity status = power).

If someone is powerful enough to have power over other people (which the wealthy certainly are), then they should account for that power with appropriate responsibility.

If you don't want to be a public figure, don't accumulate exorbitant amounts of wealth.

When I say public figure (which Mr. Thiel is, despite his harassment by Gawker and other quirks, but I get your point) I am referring to the thousands of non-public figures who have had their personal tax details stolen and shared with ProPublica, who seemingly did nothing to deserve this.

It is in the public's interest to transparently understand the activities and finances of anyone with outsized political power. Since money is freely convertible to and from political power, people with outsized amounts of money have outsized political power, and are therefore public figures. Are ProPublica publishing details of people who are not rich?

Do you know today what they will do with these thousands of files on other people’s personal details?

Do you think they will just… delete them? Because if so I’ve got a great time traveling hot tub to sell you

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