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Hacker culture(s)

-- lecture notes, February 23, 2000 --
 

Introduction
Traditional hacker ethics
New hacker ethics
Origins of hacker culture(s)
Dimensions of hacker culture(s)
Hacker culture(s) as seen from the outside
Selected sources

Journalists, investigators and others encountering hackers/crackers often comment on their obsessive urge to brag about their conquests. One might imagine that a social structure where the only criterion for assessment is knowledge needs showing-off to maintain the pecking order. However, this observation runs counter to the ethical principle of keeping a low profile.

Several interpretations are possible. It might be that the ethical principle deduced by Mizrach should really read "Leave no traces in the computers you hack." Another possibility is that the wannabees boast; established and secure hackers have no need to. A third that journalists, investigators, etc. construct an image of the hacker as they would like them all to be.

What is clear, however, is that the meritocracy of (computer) knowledge can make it hard to avoid arrogance and "in-speak" in the eye of the public. An example might be the disclaimer on Linus Walleij's home page.

"Disclaimer: I, Linus Walleij, have put up these pages for political and personal reasons. I often use well-balanced amounts of rude or explicit language, as well as slang, since I think it is the spice that shakes a sleeping brain awake. If you think this could be annoying to you (ie if you want your brain to stay dumb), please get lost at once. This is a page for mature, mindwise grown-up people. If you decide to mail me on any matter concerning these pages or my person in general, please note that I want constructive criticism. This means you should not write: 'This page makes me sick.' but rather: 'This page makes me sick, because...' and so forth. Mail I find stupid, arrogant, lame, unwise of plain boring will be piped to DEVICE NULL without further treatment. Pressing any of the link buttons above confirms you agree with me on this."

Another highly visible trait of hackers is their devotion to hacking. In 1976, Joseph Weizenbaum (an established AI critic) described the phenomenon of "compulsive programming" in the book Computer power and human reason:

"Wherever computer centers have become established, that is to say, in countless places in the United States, as well as in virtually all other industrial regions of the world, bright young men of disheveled appearance, often with sunken glowing eyes, can be seen sitting at computer consoles, their arms tensed waiting to fire, their fingers, already poised to strike at the buttons and keys on which their attention seems to be as riveted as a gambler's on the rolling dice. When not so transfixed, they often sit at tables strewn with computer printouts over which they pour like possessed students of a cabalistic text. They work until they drop, twenty, thirty hours at a time. Their food, if they arrange it, is brought to them: coffee, cokes, sandwiches. If possible they sleep on cots near the computer. But only for a few hours--then back to the console or the printouts. Their rumpled clothes, their unwashed and unshaven faces, and their uncombed hair all testify that they are oblivious to their bodies and to the world in which they move. They exist, at least when so engaged, only through and for computers. These are computer bums, compulsive programmers. They are an international phenomenon."

A different version of the same description would perhaps focus on the intense concentration, flow-like qualities, personal satisfaction and rich social exchanges in and around a good programming session.

Sherry Turkle interviewed a number of hackers on their relations with computers as part of the data for the book The second self. Her explanation of the computer's holding power concentrates on control and compensation. The computer offers a predictable universe where the user has godlike powers to create and destroy once the necessary skills have been acquired. She also points to the strong aesthetical norms of programming.

The perceived association between hacker culture(s) and computer crime is a major subject. There is no room to treat it properly here. Good sources are Walleij: Copyright finns inte, version 3.0 (in Swedish) and Sterling: The hacker crackdown (Bantam Books, 1992). In passing, it should be noted that (1) traditional hackers are careful to make the distinction between hackers and crackers, (2) many of the computer crimes reported in media would not qualify as hacks, and (3) most of the ethical principles are flexible enough to accommodate various personal purposes and persuasions (including illegal ones).

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