It IS a great idea for all the reasons Jump mentioned. I know there are a lot of USELESS thugs in prison; but there are also talented ones...so why not put them to work helping society? After all, we tax payers are spending to keep them alive; this would be their way of paying us back.
I got quite a kick out of Albert's response and the other comments added to it significantly. Yep, i think Prison labor pays out at something like 20 cents an hour, quite a come down from his previous salary, but this could all be part of a grand scheme by Cisco to begin training prisoners in the configuration of their networking equipment.
But to highlight RedDresses's comment, I am not sure that having thugs and techies mix is all that great an idea.... the thugs could no doubt find creative uses for the techie talent. ID Theft, etc. come to mind immediately.
Some of my comments are somewhat tongue in cheek, I think they are obvious, so if something I have said strikes you as wrong, go back and re-read it... you are probably missing the implied joke.
CyberPro