Hackers and martial arts I get somehow, been training myself somewhat. But for some odd reason climbing is a total black spot for me. Does not grok. Can someone briefly explain what's the hacker appeal in that?
1. Climbing is a mental sport. It's mostly overcoming your fear of falling and trying to figure out the most efficient way up the rock. Every climb is a "problem" and a lot of the climbs are not straight forward and require thought to the best way to do it.
2. More thinking. Getting into the trad climbing you are responsible for setting up your gear and making sure that it will hold in a fall. There are a lot of rules and best practices here so hackers tend to like this aspect.
3. A lot of hackers are looking for exercises that they can do and that is fun. If you look at stereotypes for hacker types there are two main ones that I can think of: tall and lanky, short and overweight. The short and overweight are at a distinct disadvantage in climbing but the tall and lanky are "built" for it.
4. Good way to meet people. Climbers tend to be an welcoming group(unless you go to a gym with a lot of gym rats but outdoors it's better usually.)
5. you get to geek out about the gear. marvel at the amazing simple but powerful design of the modern spring loaded camming systems. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spring-loaded_camming_device
6. I am sure I could think of more but those are a first pass approximation.
As an alpine climber who spends at least 6 weeks a year being cold, wet and hungry, the coding I do the rest of the year, in a nice climate controlled room with ample food and coffee close by, is simply a holiday.
I feel climbing is mostly a mental game, where your mental aspirations meet your physical limitations. Also, life is simple, it revolves around sleeping-eating-climbing where the rhythm is only weather dependent. Not to different from the code-code-sleep-code-more pattern.
Without getting to serious, both require commitment.
It's an extremely technical sport and the focus is on physical problem solving. Plus the rush is incredible...
(If anyone wants to climb in the UK/Europe, drop me a line. I can follow mildly hard and weaksauce lead.)
Also, climbing does get expensive so the people that do it are the people that can afford it or are dirtbags just living in a van at camp 4. I do agree that those types are drawn to climbing though. I think it has a lot to do with the problem solving aspect of climbing.
I suppose this is a similar to developing a drinking problem, but far healthier.