The Hacker Manifesto

[crustyasp46]

The Hacker Manifesto

by
+++The Mentor+++
Written January 8, 1986
Another one got caught today, it's all over the papers. "Teenager Arrested in Computer Crime Scandal", "Hacker Arrested after Bank Tampering"...

Damn kids. They're all alike.

But did you, in your three-piece psychology and 1950's technobrain, ever take a look behind the eyes of the hacker? Did you ever wonder what made him tick, what forces shaped him, what may have molded him?

I am a hacker, enter my world...

Mine is a world that begins with school... I'm smarter than most of the other kids, this crap they teach us bores me...

Damn underachiever. They're all alike.

I'm in junior high or high school. I've listened to teachers explain for the fifteenth time how to reduce a fraction. I understand it. "No, Ms. Smith, I didn't show my work. I did it in my head..."

Damn kid. Probably copied it. They're all alike.

I made a discovery today. I found a computer. Wait a second, this is cool. It does what I want it to. If it makes a mistake, it's because I screwed it up. Not because it doesn't like me... Or feels threatened by me.. Or thinks I'm a smart ass.. Or doesn't like teaching and shouldn't be here...

Damn kid. All he does is play games. They're all alike.

And then it happened... a door opened to a world... rushing through the phone line like heroin through an addict's veins, an electronic pulse is sent out, a refuge from the day-to-day incompetencies is sought... a board is found. "This is it... this is where I belong..." I know everyone here... even if I've never met them, never talked to them, may never hear from them again... I know you all...

Damn kid. Tying up the phone line again. They're all alike...

You bet your ass we're all alike... we've been spoon-fed baby food at school when we hungered for steak... the bits of meat that you did let slip through were pre-chewed and tasteless. We've been dominated by sadists, or ignored by the apathetic. The few that had something to teach found us willing pupils, but those few are like drops of water in the desert.

This is our world now... the world of the electron and the switch, the beauty of the baud. We make use of a service already existing without paying for what could be dirt-cheap if it wasn't run by profiteering gluttons, and you call us criminals. We explore... and you call us criminals. We seek after knowledge... and you call us criminals. We exist without skin color, without nationality, without religious bias... and you call us criminals. You build atomic bombs, you wage wars, you murder, cheat, and lie to us and try to make us believe it's for our own good, yet we're the criminals.

Yes, I am a criminal. My crime is that of curiosity. My crime is that of judging people by what they say and think, not what they look like. My crime is that of outsmarting you, something that you will never forgive me for.

I am a hacker, and this is my manifesto. You may stop this individual, but you can't stop us all... after all, we're all alike.

Post Script by crusty:
I personally do not think they are damn kids who are and that they are all alike. Or that they are damn under achievers either. and most certainly non of the damn attributes cited in this story.

Hacking has been around since the beginning of computing, in many ways innovative and productive, some harmful and destructive, and others just plain criminal. The hacker chooses the road he follows, and I believe most start because they have vivid concepts of computing and that itself puts them a few steps ahead of the average computer user.

Is it wrong, I refuse to judge that, although some of the final concepts of hacks in my opinion is wrong. My personal opinion is that most hacking is more of an expression of in your face, I can do it! Or aboost to the hackers ego, of oh my god, look what I have accomplished.

Maybe some of the large companies who have been hacked of late should be offering rewards to those that hacked them, to make themselves more secure.

Growth Opportunity for Hackers Today?
While Wikibon doesn’t advocate creating worms and viruses, the skill of hacking can be put to good use. Everyone can’t end up an MIT professor, but hacking is also a necessary skill for data scientists. Many hackers find it thrilling and love the challenge, but end up where they don’t want to be. Be smart and put your valuable skills to good use, not evil.

Just my own scrambled thoughts.