I enjoy poker and I've found that when I used poker-spy or texes calculatem, it's really helped my strategy. I believe i've learned more in the last week of playing with them over a month of playing without them. Is it fair? who decides that? I'm a software developer, what if i write my own tool to track how well, im doing or others do? Is that fair? No? What if i use a pen and papper? What about then?
Bottom line is this, everyone has an advantage. Some are just skilled players, some are luck, some use programs. Unless you are cheating by looking at someone elses cards, i dont believe it's cheating. What if you had 10 people in the room helping you play (just standing over your shoulder), is that cheating?
just my 2 cents