IRL, I have heard the term hacker only as a term for "badly written code that kinda works, but is a mess". It was never something positive.
I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
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Re: I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
#32I never even really hear the term "hacker" anymore. I'm not sure what's driven it out of the industry. I've been programming since I was nine and I was never called a "hacker", even to date. I was called a "nerd", a term which used to be a pejorative for young boys who spent a lot of time on a computer and had a-typical interests and attire. I was made fun of for reading programming books when I finished my other wor…
Ah, exactly same experience. I clearly remember some of my friends stating "I don't want to be 30 an still be playing videogames"... As if it was a bad thing. I thought it was weird at the time to make such statement.
Maybe they meant it like "don't want to ONLY be playing video games" as in they'd be fine with video games in moderation as long as they had a social life, career, money for vacation and travel, a good hobby, family...etc.
Re: I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
#33Yea, if you're driven by social support, you'll need social support to be driven. That's not really traditional hackerism.
Re: I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
That would be a shame really.
Yes, the whole idea sounds like a progressive attack by the word police looking for another target to cancel. A not so long time ago there were these thick stacks of paper bound in twine, glue and leather called dictionaries that contained words and their understood meanings and it made it far more difficult to change a words meaning, it seems as with everything in this modern world the time for a meaning to be chang…
What's particularly funny here is that the "has fun making computers do things" definition of hacker predates the "breaking into things" definition. What you're referring to was called a "cracker"until the 90s.
Re: I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
#35Yea, if you're driven by social support, you'll need social support to be driven. That's not really traditional hackerism.
There's plenty of informal social support within the hacker community - that's what makes it a community of practice in the first place! The very fact that, traditionally, you become a hacker when someone in the community calls you a hacker is testament to that.
Re: I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
#36do a hackathon
could be self-imposed like pick a project that you have no experience in and do it in a weekend (get something working even if it’s hacky)
you will feel like a hacker
Re: I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
#37Yea, if you're driven by social support, you'll need social support to be driven. That's not really traditional hackerism.
I have no other reply to this essay. I am unmoved by anybody who requires social cues in order to decide how to spend time. When I got heavily into programming, nobody I knew had the faintest idea of what it was or what I was doing. I couldn’t be bothered, because I was too busy programming.
Re: I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
#38(2014)
Re: I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
#39Reading this article, I think the reason that the author doesn't feel like a hacker is that it's a cultural label and a lifestyle (almost like "goth" or "punk").
The author recounts three or four occasions when they did some programming at school. They're quite right - that isn't being a "hacker". IMO that requires a level of monomania which means that a significant portion of their spare time is spent on computer projects.
I'd agree with them that "hacker" doesn't necessarily imply "good computer employee" though, and this will increasingly be the case as in the industry matures, but it does mean that the person concerned deeply loves the field, and that's someone you probably want to work with, if they're not also a sociopath.
I know a few people from school who weren't remotely interested in computers at the time, but ended up on CS programmes. Typically those are the people who became managers in the end. A lot of the "hackers" are still programming. I don't think this has anything to do with the Dilbert principle. It's more to do with their having developed decent people-skills in their youth, possibly due to their lack of monomania (or reverse causation). But it also speaks to their motivations.
The article suggests that we not focus on the "hacker stereotype", but it's a stereotype because it's a thing. Ignoring it seems silly as well. Deliberately trying to undermine or change it culturally seems like vandalism. The answer is probably to highlight the fact that a team with only "hackers" on it will probably not do quite as well as a more mixed team including a bunch of people from other backgrounds as well.
Re: I've been programming since I was 10, but I don't feel like a 'hacker'
#40Yea, if you're driven by social support, you'll need social support to be driven. That's not really traditional hackerism.
There's plenty of informal social support within the hacker community - that's what makes it a community of practice in the first place! The very fact that, traditionally, you become a hacker when someone in the community calls you a hacker is testament to that.
Well yea people who feel part of that community would. I don't call myself a hacker either but I was modifying hardware and software in my teens for fun so I probably counted as one. I didn't know of any hacker community. It was just a fascinating thing to do. However, I also don't blame anyone for not supporting me, despite the fact that they didn't. No adults around me even understood what I was doing. One teacher told me off for programming in the computer room instead of sitting quietly or whatever dumb time-killer she had planned. But that was no obstacle whatsoever. The fact that this author was put off by a grade in a school project shows how un-self-motivated she was.