The Hacker Papers (1980)

This reminds me of at least a few people in college. I tended to avoid the CS department computer lab for fear of becoming something like the essay describes. I didn't do too much better, though. I did decide to snap out of it, ironically, when I moved to SF to do a startup.

One thing that surprised me upon arriving in SF, is how well-balanced and adjusted lot of the 'hacker' types seemed. I think computer programming has developed another subculture, or maybe a couple other subcultures that are very different from the hacker subculture.

> The hacker will probably not strongly disagree with what has been said so far. But he will ask the question, "So what?"

Exactly. So what?

I fit a big part of this description, though I also disagree with a lot of conclusions of this essay.

INB4 I apologize for the tone, but generally this essay pissed me off.

> We are precluding the human values so necessary for the wise application of this technological achievement. The most brilliant young minds at our top universities are learning how to play with multi-million dollar toys first, and how to utilize them constructively second.

If by "utilizing them constructively" you mean playing Farmville, mindlessly balancing spreadsheets at work or using machines for getting more money for yourself then well, I don't want to be anywhere near this "constructive" usage of computers. There are creative things to do with them. There are also important problems to solve that will determine the future of human civilization. I care about those.

> On the level of actual learning, the same students shut off outside subjects even more completely than their grades would indicate.

Now do they? I'm sorry, but actual hackers are the only people I know that are interested and capable of comprehending many distinct disciplines at once. Most of people seem not to bother. They do some job, they have a hobby, and they spend time with family. It's not an english major I will go to if I want to learn the intricacies of English grammar. I'd rather find a hacker with interest in English, because from my experience, he tends to acutally understand the subject better. Same for history. Or pretty much anything.

> The second thing to go is a normal living pattern. Eating and sleeping are completly rearranged to fit the addiction. The typical hacker thinks nothing of eating one meal a day and subsisting on junk food, or of sleeping from 4 a.m. to noon almost every day of the week.

Well, so what? The junk food addiction seems to be disappearing among geeks anyway, and as for sleeping from 0400 to 1200 - I do that too because hell, the night is the only time I can get anything done. Because people are sleeping then, there are no errands to run, no need to be in the office and waste your time, etc.

> It is simply that the parents of hackers are ignorant of the subculture and cannot relate.

That might be true. But the only cases I know are from somewhat dysfunctional families (I wonder how many of us became geeks thanks to that), and well - it's harder to relate to people with totally different outlook on life, who on top of that can't and don't want to understand your interest. Even though programming is becoming mainstream, too much (i.e. non job-related) programming is still treated as something weird. The society expects people to respect each other's interests and try to at least grasp the basics out of politeness. But strangely, when you're a geek, no one wants to do that with you.

Your average geek is probably well-read about a lot of different things, much more so than an average person, therefore they can hold any kind of non-technical conversation with people. But soon they find it's the only kind of conversation they can hold. So how can one be surprised hackers tend to isolate if no one gives a fuck about their interests?

> Relations with nonhackers become strained, so why force the effort? It is so much easier just to accept social rejection and isolation, and to do it with a spirit of camraderie that's shared by the rest of the subculture.

Yeah, that's true. But can you really blame hackers for that? It's not hackers that do the rejecting.

> Weak-willed people, people with unstable social lives, people in formative stages of their lives, should not become involved in computer science. It should be left until they are truly able to make decisions and be aware of all the consequences. Computers are most often used by people who start when they are immature. This is what causes the single-minded addiction.

Now really? First of all, there is no such time when a person is "truly able to make decisions and be aware of all the consequences". It's always continous learning.

Secondly, this whole paragraph reads more like "people should be prevented from developing intellectual intrests, because they won't fit in well with the dumb grey mass of the rest of society". Well I'm sorry, I prefer my "single-minded addiction" of curiosity, skills and caring about important problems instead of petty soap-opera issues.

Also sadly, in a way this essay has won. Most of the programmers now are not geeks. They're well-balanced part of mainstream society. And it's as hard to relate with them as with normal society. So you can't now just use the proxy of "good programmer = hacker" to find people to do interesting or important work with.

The observation regarding change in behavior and social interaction is probably valid even today - but what difference does it really make ?

Wow.