Ask HN: What are the books to learn the hacker culture? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What are the books to learn the hacker culture?

26 pointsinp15 comments

What are the books to learn the hacker culture? What is the best for you?

I know there is "Hacking: The Art of Exploitation" by Jon Erickson but the last edition was in 2008.

Although its not a book, Eric Raymond's essay "How To Become a Hacker" is my favorite read on the subject: http://www.catb.org/esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html

Thank you for this reference.

The hacker culture itself is just a movement that embodies the principles one would naturally grow once one fully immerses oneself in an intellectual pursuit such as computer programming, model train hacking, math, lock-picking etc. Hence you don't 'have' to learn the culture from some damn book

Cultures are complex things; encompassing, amongst others, habits of thought, a common vocabulary, shared values, a sense of group history, and so on. The hacker culture is indeed quite heavily defined by its ways of thinking and shared values, which don't need to be learned from "some damn book". However, all the other aspects that together constitute a culture do need to be picked up from other members of said culture - and with a culture as distributed as hackerdom, that would indeed be best done by reading books.

To understand the hacker culture, you must understand its background and history. Here are some good books:

"The Jargon File", Eric S. Raymond (ed.) http://www.catb.org/jargon/

"The Cuckoo's Egg", Cliff Stoll

"Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution", Steven Levy

"Where Wizards Stay up Late", Katie Hafner

I'd also suggest "the innovators", Walter Isaacson, on top of those.

I’d add “The Soul of a New Machine” by Tracy Kidder.

Great! Thank you for all these references.

Not a book, but view «Project Code Rush»

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Q7FTjhvZ7Y

I'd say the culture classic is the Hacker's Manifesto by The Mentor, published in Phrack 7.

http://phrack.org/issues/7/3.html#article

That was a cringy, painful read.

Kevin Mitnick's "The Art of Deception" comes to mind. While it's more the black hat type, it's a good look at social engineering from the perspective of an expert. I'm always intrigued at how a lot of hackers start with an interest in magic tricks.

I’d suggest listening to the Sex Pistols and Operation Ivy.

Yes that’s punk music. I think the cusltures are similar and have similar ideological roots.

Maybe you’re asking about hacker skills. Of course punk music won’t teach you hacking skills.

+ The Clash

Yes, it's not hacker skills but thank you for the hacker culture.

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