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Comment by aneth | Hacker News Reader

This seems like an unauthorized use of the card and could be criminal theft. If I give you my stored value card to buy coffee and you instead steal all the money, it doesn't matter whether you're donating to charity or disagree with my cause - it's stealing.

Regardless, it's certainly a shitty thing to do.

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You no longer control the money once you donate it to an anonymous recipient! You don't get to choose how the money is spent. If you're not comfortable with that, don't put money on a publicly accessible debit card!!

That may be your opinion. I suspect in the UK you might well fall foul of the Computer Misuse act:

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1990/18/section/1

I'm not sure that's the case here. It's not an anonymous recipient, it's Jonathan's stored value card and therefore Jonathan. Jonathan authorized anyone to use his card to buy coffee. He did not authorize anyone to steal his money.

Another way to look at it is as a common fund dedicated to the purpose of buying coffee. Using it for anything else seems like embezzlement.

agreed and sharing the code ensures that others with more devious ambitions will pretty much ruin this experiment.

"I was doing an experiment to find out what would happen if I had a leave a dollar take a dollar jar in an alley, but then some jerk took all the money and ruined the experiment."

1. If the experiment initiator here didn't see something like this coming (someone taking advantage of a free pot of money), he is naive beyond belief.

2. An experiment not turning out how you DESIRE it to does not mean it's "ruined;" to the contrary, it's how learning happens. "Oh, I didn't know that would happen!" takes notes <- Science

Legally, I think the only issue this runs afoul of is his auctioning of a giftcard. Most giftcards do not allow this; however, most gift cards don't allow you to purchase other giftcards with them either, so Starbucks might not have as strict rules about their cards.

Morally, though, I agree this is all kinds of wrong.

Actually, the legality covering this issue is WIRE FRAUD.

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