HN Explorer

Thank PG: For reclaiming the word 'hacker'

93 points by user24 ↗ HN
It's great to see that the web at large is mostly past that 1990s phase of being obsessed with green text on black backgrounds and lists of copypasted and sometimes just made up 'information' on 'hacking'.

I know you didn't start the movement to reclaim the word (that credit probably goes to ESR[1]), but I think between HN and your essays, you've done a huge amount to reinvigorate the hacker scene.

It's now acceptable to ask what someone's hacking on without having to worry about strange looks or tirades about script kiddies. This is really good.

So thanks.

[1] http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html

49 comments

[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 104 ms ] thread
updog
I still think hackernews is inappropriately named. It should be called startup news, but that doesn't have the same ring to it. Hacking is now a security word. It hasn't been reclaimed at all, it's just confusing to everyone that doesn't read this site (and still many that do).
cuchoperl
I think HN's name is appropriate. Most people who write here are not (just) computer hackers (as in '90s definition) but people who hack themselves and the world around. Entrepreneurs are hackers. Most world-changers are hackers.
pavs
Its very easy to "dilute" a meaning by calling everyone a hacker. Yes strictly speaking you are right, there are Economists hacker, Financial hacker, Life Hacker, Music hacker and so on and so forth.

In the world of the internets the most commonly associated meaning (rightly or wrongly) of the word Hacker is for computer nerds.

In that sense "Hacker News" has nothing to do with hacking, Startup News is more apt description of this community.

wildmXranat
Indeed it is. In addition to making it easy to dilute, it's a good search term to capture and stream a specific audience with.
frb
I would agree if startups were the only topic covered on HN. But they aren't.

HN has always a lot of interesting stuff that has nothing to do with startups. E.g. general CS, psychology, physics ans so on...

bad_user
Being a world-changer doesn't imply being a hacker ... adapting the world to your needs, that's just human nature and it's what people always did.

Hacking really means going against the status quo, and that's a different thing altogether.

Example: building something like Facebook is not hacking. That's just good engineering and opportunistic use of human nature.

The simplest test you can have to call something a hack or not: did other people laugh or got angry when hearing about it?

Of course you can still call yourself a hacker, for feeling good and all that, but I like how ESR puts it: you're not a hacker until other people start recognizing you as one.

smackfu
The misnaming works well though. The hacker part covers all the technical posts, and the fact that it's on the YC domain covers all the startup posts.

If it was called startupnews, everyone would complain about the technical posts.

aquateen
It used to be called Startup News, not much has changed w/ regard to submissions.
gloob
If accuracy was the highest priority when choosing the site's name, it would be called "Web Pages Voted on by a Reasonably Polite Community with a Curious Taste for Speculation About What Might Eventually Become News, Rather Than News Itself".
jhpriestley
What technical posts?
smackfu
Heh. This is startup news? "The ~200 Line Linux Kernel Patch That Does Wonders "
burgerbrain
No, though there is certainly a notable lack of hacker discussion on that article.

"Hacker" news seems to not even be the second most popular topic of discussion here. Startup crap and politics shit both do a great job of drowning it out.

Then you have the always creepy "article about steve jobs' personal life, which has absolutely nothing to do with computing or even his business"...

noarchy
When I first stumbled upon Hacker News (I don't even recall how it happened, anymore), I asked myself, "Why are there all of these articles on startups and business in general??"

I had to learn about the group behind the site to understand. I still think that calling it "Hacker News" will prove misleading for some, but I've long since become used to the theme of this site.

jgrahamc
I disagree that the word has been reclaimed. In the media and in non-computing circles the word hacker clearly means someone who breaks into computer systems. Within the computer world I don't think the meaning of hacker ever really went away.

Sure, here on Hacker News we all use hacker to mean something, but I think outside of this little group little has changed.

Equally, I think stressing about this is a total waste of time. The average joe thinks of a hacker as someone who breaks stuff. Oh well. I've got better things to do then have a silly argument about the meaning of a word.

user24
I'm starting to see it breaking into more common usage[1]. I agree that we've a way to go yet, and I agree that it's not hugely important. But I still think there needs to be a word for 'innovative tinkerer', and that 'hacker' is that word, and I don't want that word to be associated with criminality or unethical behaviour.

[1] - hackaday, lifehacker, hackathon, etc etc. Still a specialist audience, but I can't see lifehacker being born while hacker still meant 'the manifesto'.

edit:

> Within the computer world I don't think the meaning of hacker ever really went away.

I'm not so sure about that at all. I've only been a developer for ten years (which isn't that long really), so perhaps it's just that I've moved into more aware circles, but when I started web dev work, 'hack' meant 'break into a computer'. The word hack in terms of 'a hacky solution' or 'put a little hack in there' wasn't so popular, but I concede that it was around back then.

But today I can talk to almost any developer and talk about hacking on such-and-such a project and they know exactly what I'm talking about. So I think progress has been made.

gcv
A journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. In my anecdotal experience, the (wonderfully expressive!) word "hacker" has lost some of its stigma. Three years ago, if I casually said "I've been hacking all day" while speaking to normals, I'd get a strange look. Today, people seem far more likely to understand.
younata
I agree with you.

Example: My roommate, a person who thinks I'm boring because I'm in CS (his comment upon seeing my schedule of mostly cs classes next semester: "At least you're taking one interesting class" [class in question is intro to astronomy]), saw me reading HN one night. This led to a half hour discussion on how I'm not committing illegal activities (that I'm aware of).

raganwald
Hacking is the exploitation of the unexpected side-effects. Hacking absolutely and positively started with exploiting security "holes" in telecommunications and shared computing environments. That's exactly what Steve Wozniak was doing when Steve Jobs met him.

Hacking then and hacking now has an air of subversion to it. Coming up with an exploit like Firesheep is hacking. Figuring out how to use PS3s as a supercomputer--and simultaneously subverting the entire business of building and selling supercomputers for ginormous amounts of money AND the business of selling gaming consoles--is hacking. Super-logging out of Facebook is hacking. Renting a botnet and using it to extort money from a business is not hacking, fine, that's just criminal.

But yeah, calling yourself a "hacker" ought to mean frowns from establishment types. "Hacker" is almost the antonym of "professional." If you want to be a super-genius who works within the system, the word you're looking for is "nerd."

I categorically reject the idea that the word needs to be "reclaimed" from script kiddies. If anything, I want the word reclaimed from money-grubbing bourgeois poseurs who happen to be interested in technology businesses.

I respect and admire people who want to start businesses. I respect and admire people who love to create great software. But if someone is ashamed of being associated with Steve Wozniak or John Draper, maybe they need to ask if they are really a hacker rather than asking if the word "hacker" is being improperly used.

p.s. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1914498

user24
I suggest that figuring out how to use PS3s as a supercomputer would be a great hack whether it subverted sony's business or not.

There's nothing shameful in being associated with Wozniak or Draper or any of the great technological innovators.

There is something shameful in being associated with the "l33t h4x0r kr3w" (or Iranian Cyber Army) and those who participate in mass defacements etc.

edit:

Also, I really don't like the idea that you're pushing, that you have to work 'outside the system' in order to be a hacker. I completely agree that important attributes of being a hacker are the ability to see problems from non-traditional viewpoints, to come up with unusual solutions, to challenge the de rigeur way of doing things, to disrupt. And those attributes are shared by many subversives.

But the important difference to me is that a hacker is constructively subversive.

raganwald
Compare to Sales. There are slimy people who sell products that don't work. There are great salespeople who transform businesses and people's lives for the better.

I'm sure lots of salespeople cringe at the thought of being associated with the slimeballs. But yet... It's all Sales and they are all salespeople.

EDIT: By all means call yourself "constructive." But it is not a requirement of hacking. How was stealing telecommunications services constructive for the telecommunications companies?

user24
maybe they need to reclaim the word Salesperson from the slimeballs then ;)
raganwald
Yes please!

I suggest that the net harm to society from slimeball salespeople outweighs the net harm to society from black hat hackers by so many orders of magnitude that a comparison involves astronomical entities like red giants being compared to planetoids.

I would ask you to think about the computer business if we could remove the enterprise salespeople, but my mouth is watering so much that I can't finish typing my comment...

user24
This is worrying then. That's a good argument, that phreaking wasn't constructive. I once started making a Lego robot that could play my gameboy. That's not constructive at all either.

But I'd like both of those to be great examples of hacking.

Is the important distinction motivation then? That phreaks weren't motivated by an urge to crash the system but by an undying curiosity about how things work?

raganwald
In the 1970s there were these hackers and they did certain things we admire today. I only fear that we will put them on a pedestal and say that that was hacking but what kids do today is not hacking.

That's a little like saying that Jazz died with Miles Davis and that we should call it "African-American Classical Music" and when kids do something offensive today like slapping a saxophone reed or a tuba mouthpiece with their tongues (James Carter and John Sass, respectively), it's not Jazz, it's noise.

I just don't trust myself to know how to say that subverting the telephone system by emulating tones is hacking but routing 15% of the world's IP traffic through your computers for military purposes is not hacking. I can only say that I admire the first and deplore the second.

p.s. And yeah, Go Go Lego! I suggest there's an "air" of subversion involved with hacking, but just a whiff. If it makes you happy, Hack On!

fractallyte
I wonder if 'lawyer' will ever be (re)claimed...
frb
> There is something shameful in being associated with the "l33t h4x0r kr3w" (or Iranian Cyber Army) and those who participate in mass defacements etc.

I think one problem is that there's no other word to describe such people. The media associates any computer related crime to hacking. Last week the guy who broke into Sarah Palins email account, in the media known as the 'Palin Hacker', was sentenced to jail. Is this guy a hacker? If not, what should he be called instead?

In this context, this article is interesting: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2008/11/palin-hacker-de/

user24
"Cracker" is preferred, but it will take a long time for the media to get that.
astine
Make that never. 'Cracker' sounds stupid and already has racist connotations. Personally, I'd like to call people who illegally subvert computers for financial gain or ego-tripping, 'criminals' and be done with it.
devmonk
I always thought a cracker (beyond the food and ethnic slur definitions) was someone who removed copy protection from software. So, in WarGames, David would have been considered a hacker, but the guys you see in the splash screens of shared old computer games were crackers. Even if that isn't the formal definition, my guess is that is the most common connotation associated with that definition of cracker.
michaelfeathers
I remember reading at one point that "hacker" came from the Tech Model Railroad Club at MIT and it was pulled over into software as many of them made the leap to computing (an alternative obsessive hobby).
zingo
"I categorically reject the idea that the word needs to be "reclaimed" from script kiddies. If anything, I want the word reclaimed from money-grubbing bourgeois poseurs who happen to be interested in technology businesses."

I agree, I don't think it's so much reclaiming the word as making it to something new. Doing something out of curiosity, or just because it is fun, has always been a big part of hacking. Looking at actions alone Goldman Sachs would probably have some of the best hackers around.

I also think there are differences between the US and Europe, when it comes to programming as a business versus as a subculture. If someone has some thoughts on that from a North American perspective I'd love to hear them.

timtadh
"Hacking absolutely and positively started with exploiting security "holes" in telecommunications and shared computing environments. That's exactly what Steve Wozniak was doing when Steve Jobs met him."

Hacking absolutely did not start with exploiting security vulnerabilities in telecommunications equipment.

It is true that phone phreaking and the like have a long distinguished history in the technology community. See for instance almost any issue of the 2600 magazine [The Hacker Quarterly]. However, indicating that "hacking" as an activity is about exploiting security vulnerabilities misappropriates the term.

There has been much debate on the correct definition of the work "hacker." For instance a quick google of "define: hacker" gives both positive an negative definitions. In contrast RFC 1392 explicitly defines it in the postive:

   hacker
      A person who delights in having an intimate understanding of the
      internal workings of a system, computers and computer networks in
      particular.  The term is often misused in a pejorative context,
      where "cracker" would be the correct term.  See also: cracker.
The wikipedia page gives a nice overview: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_(computing)

Thus, today discussion of the word hacker needs to be sensitive to both definitions. Your post is not. You reject a long history of positive definitions for a negative one.

[dead] 9ec4c12949a4f3
Woah woah woah, what do you have against green text? I set up a plugin just to make it green.
mcculley
What's wrong with green text on black backgrounds? That is how I have always had my terminal configured. I think that may be because that is what I became comfortable with on my VIC-20.
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marssaxman
I set up the xterm on my netbook with a green/black scheme because it was so charmingly retro, but have come to really enjoy the look; it's also a great way to confuse (or amuse) people when I'm writing code at a bar. Some people get the reference; others just wonder what the hell I'm doing.
KirinDave
While PG & ESR have each played a role in re-claiming the word hacker from the stereotypes of old, there is a lot of lingering damage.

Once upon a time, a hacker was more like what the Maker/MAKE Magazine/MakerFaire scene is now. It was people with a passion for creating and tinkering and creating and tinkering some more. While much of that spirit still remains, it also seems to have gained an air of entitlement about it, and a fixation with legal issues like licensing. I think that, impressively enough, RMS is the main driver behind this, but I think a lot of poorly behaved businesses helped drive his point home.

Don't believe me? Think that the hacker ethos is inextricably or necessarily tied to the free-as-in-speech and open software movement? Counterexamples: Apple and Intel. Both these companies are very closed, but you'd find few people willing to revoke the title of hacker from the hardworking software/hardware engineers and designers at Apple or Intel. These companies are successful, and they are that way in no small part because they manage to tap their employee's passion for doing the the best work they possibly can and effectively channeling that into a product.

pg
Nice of you to say so but I don't think I've had much effect on usage. The greatest change has come from sites like lifehacker, or popular journalists starting to use the word hack.
pig
The unfortunate side effect of reclaiming seems to be dilution. Any programmer nowadays is a "hacker".
user24
True to a degree, but also you've made it more 'ok' for people to describe themselves as hackers, which has rubbed off into the popular consciousness.

Reading Hackers and Painters (the essay not the book) was the first time I'd realised that what I did had a name. I now take it for granted that other developers consider themselves hackers. I'd argue that the term filtering down to lifehacker and popular journalists is a consequence of that kind of mindset change. Which you have helped with.

runjake
This revisionist hacker/cracker thing is an ESR fabrication, and seemingly, it's never going to go away.

To paraphrase raganwald, "Hacking is the exploitation of unexpected side effects".

There are good hackers and bad hackers.I have been on both sides of the fences since the beginning of the 80s. We were always known as hackers. Crackers were always a subclass of hackers that "cracked" software protection schemes, but they were hackers, too.

Virtually everyone inside and outside of the OSS community uses it correctly, but still this small element of ESR followers try to ram it down our brain stems. And then a new, young crowd discovers ESR's essay and attempts to repeat the same with false authority.

kreek
While it has one meaning for hacker news, at my company a 'hacker' is someone who hacks around a problem. They do absolutely no design before hand and bash away at something until it "works".
ssp
The word hacker never meant "good programmer", it meant "good programmer from the culture around MIT". I doubt Brian Kernighan or Dennis Ritchie or Doug McIlroy ever refer to themselves or their peers as "hackers".

But even the MIT meaning of the word is diluted now to the point that it just means "someone who possibly knows how to write programs".

hasenj
While my terminal color is not exactly green, I still use the terminal and vim for pretty much all my hacking endeavors. What do you have against the terminal?

PS the people who can't use the terminal probably can never create a facebook (imho).