"Ever wonder what people are talking about across the room? With Listen Up, you can discreetly listen in. It's so powerful, you can hear even the softest whispers loud and clear!"

Yes, folks, welcome to Listen Up, the device that lets you eavesdrop on everybody!

There are legitimate uses for a $14.95 hearing enhancement system too, of course, but the makers of this one don't want to narrow their market to just people who need help with their hearing. They want to appeal to voyeurs, cheats, sneaks, Peeping Toms, amateur spies, busy-bodies and eaves-droppers, too---so the text on their website describes what these people do as if it's the most honorable and natural activity in the world. The operators of the ListenUp website are the kind who just assume that Superman used his X-Ray vision to look through Lois Lane's clothes. Privacy? What's someone's privacy but a hurdle to be conquered by the latest technology?

What exactly is the difference between using a listening device to hear private conversations and illegal wire-tapping? Legally, a lot: no law prevents listening in to a private conversation across a room. But ethically, there is no difference at all. Both are equally wrong, except for some special exceptions that are of no interest to the Listen Up marketers. They think it's cool to use the device to find out phone numbers and addresses…great for stalkers, another market the website should appeal to. True, the site says that you can use Listen Up to watch TV while not disturbing others, and a photo shows a man doing so in bed while his wife snores away. That's nice. But the biggest graphic shows the same guy grinning mischievously as he listens to a conversation "up to 100 feet away!" That's rotten. That's unethical.

And that's Listen Up.