It gets more fun when the data you’re after is more on the shadowy side of the street. Obviously, that kind of drek is tougher to find and takes a more talented datasnoop to snag in the first place. (Like, say, the same slag who got you a current quotation on Chinese tea futures might get himself brain-cooked trying to dig up deep background on MCT’s exec veep.) Plus you’ve got to start worrying about the reliability and motives of the datasnoop you hire. I know for a fact that Lone Star has "personal agreements" with an indefinite number of datasnoops out there, and every other corp worthy of the name has got to be doing the same thing.