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Hackers
After reading a reference to Steven Levy for the nth time on Slashdot, or hearing him discussed at a LUG meeting, I decided it was time to find a copy of his book and see what it was all about. Slashdot has made a few statements over the past months in effect trying to educate those new to hacking. One way to do this is to spread the rich history of the hacker ethic. There are certain books that have made their mark among hackers over the years, and I think Steven Levy's, Hackers, is near the top of that list. For that reason, I thought it would be useful to reexamine a book that was first published 16 years ago and hopefully convince some people to go find a copy and read it.
Getting the Book
The first challenge to reviewing this book was finding a copy. It was first printed in 1984, and as far as I know it ran its final printing in 1994. Not having a used bookstore nearby, I decided the Net was the best choice. So I set out looking it up on the usual Amazon and Barnes and Noble sites. Amazon suggested checking back soon, but seeing as the last printing was six years ago I wasn't holding my breath, plus the fact that Amazon's "defensive" patents make me leery of giving them my business. Similarly, B&N did not have the book either, but they did have several copies listed in their network of rare and used book affiliates. But the cheapest version of the Hackers I could find was over $60. So, the next step was to search Yahoo, but after trying a dozen or so sites, I had no luck. All of them seemed to carry an unrelated subset of the subject I wanted: Hacking. That's when I stumbled on Abebooks.com. This site is one of my favorite discoveries of the year. This site brings together over 6,000 local bookstores and puts their catalogs online. Best yet, the site does not mark the books up any higher than they are in the local shop. And, they give you the option of buying through Abebooks, or going directly to the local site by Internet or phone to purchase. Here I happened to find several different copies of this book, many of them the same entries as I found on the B&N site. The great part though, is that the version from B&N for $60 was selling directly from the shop (through Abebooks) for $35! So, I bought it. Of course, there is always the public library.
SynopsisLevy's narrative talks about three different generations of hackers: the Orthodox Hackers, the Hardware Hackers, and the Game Hackers. The story starts in the very late 1950's at MIT -- not at the console of a computer, but in the cave-like home of the miniature models of the Tech Model Railroad Club (TMRC). The MIT professor who shepherded the TMRC, and hence the first hackers, had connections to the phone industry (which of course had the best electronics of the day). These Hackers used them to build an incredible railroad model. Work was affected however, when the hackers discovered a punch card machine in the basement of building 9. Levy describes in intricate detail the first hackers' interaction with first the punch card machine and then, their TX-0 and to the Hacker's paradise, the PDP-6.
Along with those first hackers, Levy describes the bureaucracy that they hate, and its incarnation at MIT, the IBM "Hulking Giants."
From MIT, Levy branches out in his exploration of the early hackers to the West Coast and the Stanford AI lab. He discusses in depth how the movements in the 60's affected the hackers, and how some of them shared their populist views by taking hacking to the streets to support the ideas of free speech and access to information. Levy discusses the debate that raged over whether or not hacking for MIT was The Right Thing, considering almost all of their funding came from ARPA (which was a part of the DoD).
This eventually leads into the second generation of hackers, the Hardware Hacker s. These individuals were, unlike the MIT and Stanford Hackers, decentralized, with no academic structure to support their activities. The second generation of hackers cared less about software but instead, fought for the idea that computers should be liberated from the massive industry bureaucracies, led by IBM, the maker of the Hulking Gi ants. They formed computing clubs which eventually fostered the introduction of kit computers. Levy talks in depth about the Homebrew Computer Club and its rivals. He entitled an entire chapter, "WOZ." Levy diagrams the introduction of the Altair, to the building of the Sol, the TRS-80 and finally the Apple II.
The Apple II sets the stage for the third generation, the Game Hackers. These were anyone who could write software for the meager processors in the Apple II and the Atari 800, the vast majority of which were games. Levy tells the story of the game company Sierra On-Line and its humble beginnings. And, he tells the story of the game hackers, who were the first in large numbers to become wealthy beyond their beliefs (spurred by 30% game royalties.)
The narrative is not all happy either. Levy discusses the controversy Bill Gates caused when he found out that hackers were "stealing" his BASIC interpreter for the Altair. He also talks about the chaotic split that occurred between the original Game hackers and the game publishers as the industry matured and its new bureaucracy cut out hackers, no longer giving them authorship credit for games and slashing their royalty shares. Finally, Levy discusses the tragic split of the MIT Orthodox Hackers as the first LISP machines went into production.
The final chapter is entitled "The Last of the True Hackers" and tells the story of a young MIT hacker named Richard Stallman who liked to be referred to by his initials (RMS) because it symbolized his login name.
Though the discussion of the last 40 years worth of computers is in depth, Levy's is a story of people, and how their interaction with machines created a new kind of ethic. Levy defines and explains what exactly The Right Thing is, and why it was so important to the hackers. He discusses all of the computers in terms of the people who us ed them. From the MIT Hackers Greenblatt and Gosper to the Berkeley street Hacker Felsenstein to master of Atari 800 assembly language John Harris to Apple Computer's Steve Wozniac, Levy's narrative runs deep into the Hacker ethic within these individuals and what they did for the fledgling computer industry.
Levy's book chooses to follow the course that the Hackers made. In fact, the word "UNIX" is mentioned exactly one time in the entire book, on page 434. The invention of UNIX is not covered, and the only languages Levy mentions are: assembly, LISP and BASIC. There is also no mention of the development of ARPAnet, it just sort of appears when the hackers start to utilize it. This is truly a story of people and not simply a history of the Computer "Industry."
ConclusionThe most important reason to find a copy of this book, though, is to read with the now 15 years of hindsight. It is truly amazing to see the concepts Levy helped define take form and continue to prove themselves true. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested "where it all came from," especially to those who have only stumbled upon hacking in the past few years. I wonder now if Levy is still around, and if so, whether he has updated his copy of Hackers to include the forth generation of hackers, the GNU/Linux Hackers.
Who moderated this "Me too" post up to +2? Are the moderators on crack again?
I still love my dads stories from when he was in the Army (UK) as one of their first people to have a computing background (for reference the univeristy degree he did became the UK's first computing degree the year after he graduated).
Theres lots of cool stories about checking memory with a volt meter (gotta love that magnetic core) or debugging programs from a hex core dump over the phone!
But my personal favorite is how they had a machine which didn't have enough IO instructions to run all the tape machines they had connected up to it... so after some thought they realised that they never used any floating point operations on that system so they replaced that CPU board with one with an interface to an extra tape drive and then drove it with the replaced instruction set.
About six months later they had a problem on that system and got in a tech from the vendors company - this guy spent a week going absolutely nuts as to why the code would occasionally do a random floating point operation and discard the code before anyone thought to mention the mod...
*sigh* sometimes I think they must have had a lot more fun back then.
Posted anonymously because I just don't want to risk that there is someone in the UK MOD reading this without a sense of humor - just not worth the hassle.
Rented the movie several times. Was hard to get at Blockbuster for a while.
Even got the CD. Have the Hackers II CD too, hope the movie is as kewell as the music.
I am not a kid at all and I just like to stay in touch with the younger set. They are our future! On my AOL account I try to talk to as many young people as possible in the chatrooms.
Boy, those kids sure are jokers, they have told me all sorts of things that really messed up my computer, but all in good fun I am sure. That's what hacking is all about, right?
I still have not figured out what this "Back Oriface" program does. Installed it when a nice young girl sent it to me and said it was k-rad. Go figure.
Since nobody is talking about the movie, maybe you should try to find a copy. It sounds like the movie is much more entertaining than the book.
I read 2600 Magazine too. Is Emmanuel Goldstein mentioned in the book as prominantly as he was in the movie? He reviewed the movie in 2600 and liked it as much as I do. Since 2600 is the only magazine that I can find that does not accept ads or outside money, I am sure that his review was as sencere as mine.
I wounder why Emmanuel never uses his handle "Cerial Killer" any more? I guess everybody grows out of that eventually.
But back to the big picture. The young folks on AOL helped me out a great deal on our companie's latest project.
Posting Anonymously because I have not been sent an account yet.
David Mathews
Vice President of New Technology
Digital Convergence
Check one of the guetenburg FTP server's and save yourself the 30+ Bucks....
Cheers.
I don't want to borrow the book, but I must compliment you on your action. There's nice to see that there's some nice people in the world. =)
For all that work devoted to find a copy of the book, did the thought about trying your local library cross your mind? That's where I first read Hackers in its hardcover glory. :)
Chris
For once we can get something the Americans can't! ;)
Keeper of the Wedding Shenanigans Home Page
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Indeed, and it gives a great insight into the corporate culture at DG (where I'm currently working).
"The invisible and the non-existent look very much alike." -- Delos B. McKown
Sort of, but not for much longer. They were bought out by EMC last year, and the DG name is slowly being retired (much like you don't see any new products from DEC these days). AViiON is the name of the server products. The storage products are called CLARiiON, and are what EMC were primarily after when they bought DG. They haven't become a complete service company -- more yet another Microsoft lackey, although it's amusing that they still have to resort to Unix for their higher end servers, because although NT can run on them, it can't scale to use all the processors, unlike DG/UX. Although it's a bit spartan in places, DG/UX is one of my favourite Unices, particularly from a programming point of view. Although originally a SystemV variant, the DG/UX kernel was completely rewritten in house, and contains some nice goodies, like dg_xtrace(2), and of course ccNUMA supoprt.
"The invisible and the non-existent look very much alike." -- Delos B. McKown
My dad (who is not a hacker in any way at all) gave me a copy of the book back in 1991, when I started writing trivial programs in AppleBASIC. It's why I'm still using computers (and free software, and coding, etc) today.
It's interesting that back then, even though it was only a few years after the book was published, all the people in it seemed rather distant - I mean, what effect was some old guy at MIT doing LISP hacking going to have on my life (at 8). Now it's 9 years later, and it seems like all that only happened yesterday.
Windows 2000: Designed for the Internet. The Internet: Designed for UNIX.
I bought it new within the last six months from Amazon.co.uk. It cost me about £6.
It's good stuff, though. A second edition covering the open-source revival of the original hacker culture would be well worthwhile; there's a whole new generation of hackers out there who would enjoy this stuff.
Oh, and by the way: all you first-post children are truly contemptibly pathetic, you do realise that, don't you? Don't shit where you eat, you miserable little vandals.
Liam P. ~ "Intelligence is a lethal mutation." (me)
But the book is, indeed, quite a good read.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
Wow! That's a great idea -- hey, wait a minute, the Sims aren't taking reading material before they pixelate! Darn....
- Richie
Michael.
Um. No. ESR didn't "write" it...so go learn something.
It appears that ESR basically cribbed everything he could from Hacks to write his Hacker's Dictionary.
*sigh*.
ESR is only the current maintainer of the Hacker's Dictionary. It is the merging of two works: JARGON.TXT, which had been floating around the 'net for aeons being incrementally revised by various people, and "The Hacker's Dictionary", written in 1983 by Guy Steel.
This predates the publication of "Hackers".
See http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/jargtxt.html for some of this.
Both are good, but Levy captured the scene better, I having been at 2/3rds of the sites and times in his book.
Levy is computer sociology columnist for Newsweek, so you can continue to read his stuff. Stephens (Cringely) still has a weekly column at pbs.org.
What hasn't been fully addressed yet is the history of hacking after it spread from the ivory towers of university computer labs and early PC companies and became a mass phenomenom in every high high school. Katz's "Geeks" is anecdotal account of latter-day hacking.
Well, just in case, I just want to reassert that your book is awesome, and at least IMHO, you're one true hacker yourself, albeit of the journalistic persuasion. Thanks, man!
--
Information wants to be beer, or something like that.
It also gives you historical perspective on a couple of issues that periodically turn up on Slashdot (for the flaming delight of all posters), such as: the hacker vs. cracker (invader, script kiddie, whatever) dichotomy; the attitude problems of the prophet RMS and how he came to be who he is; the personality problems of most hacker types; the gap between the many hacker generations and their slightly differing world views. And really so much more.
And a follow up is definitely due. All the experiences Levy have gone through during the period he wrote the book pale in comparison to the explosion of the hacker culture in the nineties, largely due to the popularization of the web and the free software movement. I wonder what book might come of that when Levy once again puts his pen to the proverbial paper.
--
Information wants to be beer, or something like that.
For all /. readers as clue impaired as our friend above here's the scoop: ESR's version of THD is based upon Guy Steele's version whch largely predates Levy's book, and is even mentioned in it (if my memory serves, Levy even mispells Steele's first name as Gus). Of course, since ESR's version came out after Hackers he does quote the book, and many of its anecdotes, and gives credit where credit is due.
Notice, sorcerer friend, that Levy's book is not a dictionary and is not meant to tell a story. So save your conspiratory theories of who stiffed who for when you write your own ficion. Not that you seem to be good at it, though.
--
Information wants to be beer, or something like that.
I have a signed copy of this book, found for $9 at a used book store. I believe Mr Levy committed suicide rather than spend time in Jail. It's a sad end, but this is a classic book. It shows pretty well the differences between the different classic castes of 'hacker'.
I like music
Ok, I'm retarded. I was thinking of some other hacker suicide.
Whoops,
Mea Culpa
I like music
There's an interesting tale about this. ESR says that Steele's dictionary was original. This may be, but anyone who has taken a look at the historic Tech Model Railroad Club glossary cannot mistake it as anything but the true ancestor of Hacker's Dictionary. (I should scan it and put in online. Another thing for my four-year-overdue website revamp.)
Also, though I like Eric a lot, I am continually ticked that Hackers Dictionary still criticizes Hackers for mistakes made in the first edition. Newsflash: These were corrected in the first paperback, which came out in 1985. OK, mistakes were made, but Geez, doesn't it make a difference that the vast majority of my readers never saw those errors?
Thanks to all for your great comments. Hackers went out of print (for the first time since its publication in 1984) earlier this year when after years of requests I finally recovered the rights in hopes of getting a more diligent publisher. I immediately sold it to Penguin, which will put it in print once more in January, in conjunction with my new book called Crypto (which tells the story of the crypto revolution in the last 30 years and reads very much like Hackers,I think). If you want Hackers now,go to amazon.uk.co and buy the UK edition (paying heavy freight), or wait till the end of the year and get the US edition. But rest assured, HACKERS is not gone, it's just on a well-deserved vacation, like shrinks take in August. Steven
I will have an email coming your way.
Brought to you by Frobozz Magic Penguin Fodder.
If you would really be interested in reading this book and cannot get a copy, I am willing to lend you my copy (it is a MUST read). I will send my copy free of charge to the first serious individual who responds to this post. My only requirement is that I get the book back when you are done.
Brought to you by Frobozz Magic Penguin Fodder.
I can understand your putting this book on your "never lend" collection. However, it is on my "Lend whenever possible" list. This book was just too good to keep to myself (I have read it about 5 times).
Brought to you by Frobozz Magic Penguin Fodder.
This would be a great subject for a slashdot poll. How many of us keep a library on the back of their toilet?
I have about 3 magazines and four books on the back of mine (and lets not get into how many more my wife has stacked on there).
Maybe houses should be designed with room for a book case in the bathroom.
Brought to you by Frobozz Magic Penguin Fodder.
Hi, I was studying in UCDavis two years ago, and my very good OS teacher Matt Bishop (see here) gave us Hackers as a reading (along with "The mythical man-month"). I remember getting it in the bookstore, paperback edition with a revised intro from the author and a couple more chapters with RMS and all the news on it. It was 12.95$
Fantastic definition. I think it needs to be in the Jargon file. :)
But, upon reflection, this definition would make MacGyver the ultimate hacker, wouldn't it?
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
This book was one of the best portrails of the *true* hacker. Totaly worth every second i spent digging thorugh my public library's paperback section.
I agree that this is a fantastic book, but I would disagree that The most important reason to find a copy of this book, though, is to read with the now 15 years of hindsight.
:-) There's a lot of people coming into computing nowadays who could use the inspiration that reading this book brings. I think that Levy has probably done more to further the hacker (!= cracker) mentality than any other writer.
:-)
That's certainly important, but I think that for the majority of new readers, the most important reason for reading is to get some perspective on the "hacker ethos". Some "old git" history if you will
If you haven't read this - track it down and enjoy
"Give the anarchist a cigarette"
A little planning goes a long way...
Same as always, credit where credit is due :).
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
I asked a similar ask slashdot question (fun literature for geeks for stocking a company library), but it never got posted.
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
Anyway, this is one of those books that I keep lying around to regularly browse through. I read sections randomly. My two favorite parts are the kid who made the robot that found a wallet thrown on the floor ("The grad students went nuts...") and some random Levy comment made when he said "Dance, phone lines, Dance!"
I've often wondered if Levy's interested in writing an updated version of this book. It doesn't have anything (much) to say on the subject of Microsoft, nor on the return of the rise of Unix/Linux. Might be interesting to see if he could find just as good a story today as he did back when he wrote Hackers.
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
Everybody's got their own definition. Levy spends lots of time in the book telling weird stories about hackers hacking a Chinese food restaurant, or a husband "debugging" his wife. Here's the way I explain it to people: "To hack is to see a problem, determine the resources available to you, and to creatively apply them to the solution." That allows me to say with equal validity "hack code", "hack management" :), or just plain "hack life."
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
Hacking, or better yet 'examining the details of formalized systems without clear direction' is a natural part of intelligence. Should it be surprising that this has been going on for a long time. Radio only developed because of the large number of amateur radio explorers during the first decades of this century. A dozen other advances have required 'hacking' to move from a primitive but advantagous state to a developed state. It is natural that we should all want to explore the limits of every new technology. This natural desire to explore a new system and get ahead can be controlled only by severely restricting access to the technology (either via cost or withholding production) or banning the technology (see Japan and guns.) Since ENIAC first went online, I'm sure somebody was trying to hack the system.
So long and thanks for all the fish . . . !!!
I would say in many cases the copywrite is owned by the publisher rather than the author.
Good look getting any of those published online.
Possibly a publisher could post out of date books on their own site, a physical page equals an online page, with a banner ad or something on each page.
Just a thought...
load "linux",8,1
Wow, how insulting. So, if you knew that Tracy Kidder was actually a man, would you complain that he leaves out detail?
Maybe you're really thinking of Margo Kidder? "For someone who played Lois Lane in all those movies, she's actually sort of a journalist."
At least I agree on one point -- Soul of a New Machine is a pretty neat book.
-schussat
The hour of noon has passed. Let us go and get some Kentucky Fried Chicken.
-schussat
The hour of noon has passed. Let us go and get some Kentucky Fried Chicken.
I first read the Hackers book in the early 90's. My paperback copy is part of my "never lend these books out" collection. The book is _very_ readable and mixes history and humor very well, IMO.
If you haven't yet read Hackers, then you should, we all need to know where things came from to understand where they're going...
-This sig intentionally left blank
hmmmm... does it mean I am a hacker since I wrote a game for the Atari 800? Or does it just mean I'm old? ;)
Geeky modern art T-shirts
I first read this book years ago - at least 12 years ago - I was probably in High School or something (gawd I feel OLD!). I have since reread it many times, and have a paperback copy sitting proudly on one of my shelves.
Since reading this review, I realize that the time has come for me to re-read it again (right after I finish the current one I am reading - something called "Net-Slaves", not a very "great" book, but OK, and funny in areas).
If you haven't read Hackers, I urge you to pick up a copy and do so - a truely great read.
I support the EFF - do you?
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
I discovered this book while browsing the 15-cent book sale my local library's been running forever, and have had it in my own personal "library" on the back of the toilet since then. It goes a long way towards explaining the hacker ethic and the beginnings of the open source movement back in the fifties, with tapes left in a drawer at the TX-0, to be modified by anyone with the skills. I would definitely encourage Levy to update his marvelous piece of work.
Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. Albert Einstein
I just found out that Penguin publishing will be re-releasing the book in the new year
so save your money if you can wait till then
please.
phillip@ryals.com
_______________
you may quote me
Heh.
"Scriptkiddiot". I like that.
_______________
you may quote me
Is "Hackers", "Geeks", and "Ender's Game".
I'm glad to see that they've now all been reviewed by Slashdot.
If anybody is left that hasn't read all three, go now to the library/bookstore and get them and read them now and don't stop for food/sleep/classes/whatever.
Why are you still here?! GO!
-Ross
I read this book many moons ago. I must say it was interesting reading about the various computer game ports done in the early 1980s.
Hacking is neither good nor evil. It just is. Just like the force. Or guns. Or the written word.
To call all hackers innately good is just as wrong as calling all communists evil. The ability to hack does not conform to any arbitrary definition of good or evil. It's more basic than that. Like gravity or breathing or music.
Would you define a cheetah killing and eating an impala as an evil act? An avalanche killing some skiers?
You can put the labels 'good' and 'evil' on individual actions based on your socio-economic status, upbringing, moral and ethical code, religious beliefs, and whatnot but that doesn't mean that those labels can apply to hacking in general. Just to individual actions.
You need to rethink your basic assumptions. Hacking is a state of mind/being. Information wants to be free.
--
'...let the rabbits wear glasses...'
Y2038 consulting
A number of the people from the video game section of the book, including John Harris, were interviews for a book that came out a few years ago. John Harris, who was a primary player in the original book, talks about how Levy twisted details around and made him look in a much poorer light. Some of the other video game programmers from Hackers are included as well. Good stuff, if you like detailed interviews with programmers and game designers.
read "Halcyon Days", which features interviews with some of the wizards of those days, like John Harris, Warren Schwader, and Bill Budge (Harris and Schwader are feature players in "Hackers").
I first saw this work referenced on Slashdot the last time this book was reviewed. It's a good companion to "Hackers", especially the John Harris interview.
I use Macs for work, Linux for education, and Windows for cardplaying.
I got my copy of Hackers at http://www.bibliofind.com.
:)
They are GREAT....you can order from multiple used bookstores within the network (ie only one shopping cart) which really simplifies things...I've never had a bad experience or an innacurate book description pop up.
My copy is paperback, is in pristine condition, and cost something on the order of $15.
Good luck!
The term among my circle of freinds for people who basicaly "think" they're "hackers" is: "Lamers". A script-kiddie is a lamer. AOL people are lamers. And people who dont even attempt to be hackers are simply "end-users" which has the worst connotation of all. :)
-- Senior Software Engineer, Attorney appearance services, locallawyerapp.com.
You can find affordable links to it at www.abebooks.com from anywhere between $7-$25.
There are currently 3 copies listed. Best price $1.50.
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I hereby inform you that I have NOT been required to provide any decryption keys.
If that's what you took out of the book, I think you need to read it again. The reason behind the early hackers activities was exploration and learning. Code was the beginning and the ultimate outlet for exploration. Case closed.
Besides:
1. Mitnick was and is nothing, the only reason he gained noteriety was because of the way his rights were vioolated.
2. Slashdot did not redefine the word, the media did. With all due respect to Slashdot, they haven't been around nearly long enough to have been a part of early hacker culture (although they are making their place now).
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
A lot of people here talk about "We're hackers, the bad ones are Crackers blah blah blah" but does the average script kiddie (or worse, remeber during WInNuke time?) even deserve the name "Cracker"? They aren't cracking anything. They aren't doing anthing but typing a few numbers and dots into a program - calling them Crackers makes them seem like they're actually DOING something instead of the program doing all the work. I suggest that the term "Cracker" be used only for malicious hackers, ones who actuallky spend the time to figure out how to /write/ these programs, crack software, and break into comps with sweat and elbow greese instead of drool. "Script Kiddies" is a good term, but a shorter one should be put into use- one thats rooted in a instead of a noun. Perhaps "Whackers"? or "Exec'ers" or something?
Hacker: One who hacks for good.
Cracker: one who hacks for evil.
Whacker: One who just pushes a button for evil.
And finally, to fit with the 'cker' theme..
Mac-er: One who just pushes a button for good.
----
ADVENTURERS! - ANTIHERO FOR HIRE - CARDMASTER CONFLICT
Well, maybe $28...Since it is a copyrighted work only the first two chapters are available--kinda like an O'Reilly book. But, these are good chapters!
I read this book in 1990 and loved it, too.
Now hiring experienced client- & server-side developers
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
The whole episode was pathetic. Basically, BellSouth had problems with people hacking into their switches and changing routing info, because they were using an unsecured X.25 network with dialin ports for remote access to switch maintenance ports. Through a series of political errors within BellSouth, they got locked onto prosecuting Neidorf, who published Phrack, a newsletter about his cracker friends. Neidorf was never accused of breaking into anything; he just published submissions. Most of what he published was either wrong or useless; as a technical expert for the defense I had to read through years of Phrack, and was totally unimpressed.
Almost everybody involved was a bozo; the crackers were incompetent, the telco security guy was in over his head, the Secret Service guy basically was conned by the telco guy, and Neidorf himself didn't impress me. Niedorf's lawyer, though, was really good.
It was worth it; the case established that freedom of speech applied to online communication, which was a real issue at the time. Big win. We could have ended up with the Internet being regulated for content like TV. Job done, I got out of the activism business.
John Nagle
Waiting a century for Project Gutenberg to pick things up once the copyright expires just isn't the answer.
Tell me about it. Here's everything you always wanted to know about the Sonny Bono Copyright Theft Act.* It's all a ploy to keep Walt Disney's Company's copyright on one cartoon, "Steamboat Willie" (the first Mickey Mouse cartoon).
*but were afraid to ask<O
( \
XGNOME vs. KDE: the game!
Will I retire or break 10K?
...ok, its been about 9 years since i read this, and i remember wishing it were a bit more technical. Then again, the whole point was that it described nerds to non-nerds. (Levy is the guy that Katz probably wishes he was).
But there was an algorithm mentioned, and a lot of hackers were trying to make it faster and faster. I think it was maybe a square root function? I never found out what this amazing optimisation was.
Does anyone know what i`m talking about here?
"For a woman, Tracy really know her stuff and gets into a great amount of hardware detail."
You fucking dick.
Have you people been living in a freakin' cave? Levy has written three more books and countless columns over the past 15 years. He's currently working on a book about cryptography. Here's a cluepon, kiddies!
Ummm, my hardback copy of the book has a picture of the author on the dustjacket. That's one incredibly butch looking woman, I gotta tell you.
The Hacker Crackdown is Bruce Sterlings view on the world of hackerdom. It looks at Phiber Optik and Acid Phreak and the like, and tries to give the reader some insight into what goes on in the computer underground. If you have not read it, I strongly suggest you do, He is an amazing author, and if you have been a geek for a long time, you'll find find it that much more enjoyable. It was written in '92 so it is a bit more upto date. Jason (The .net should be .com if you want to e-mail me.)
Bibliofind is similar to Abe's, and comes up with numerous instances of this book for as low as $25.00.
http://acomp.stanford.edu/siliconhistory/Levy/Hack ers.1984.book/Chapter10.html
. html
There is also plenty of good material on computer history at this site.
http://acomp.stanford.edu/siliconhistory/reader
on project Gutenburg (and other places): http://promo.net/cgi-promo/pg/t9.cgi?entry=101&ful l=yes&ftpsite=ftp://metalab.unc.edu/pub/ docs/books/gutenberg/
I got an account on gnu.org recently, and what amazed me was the complete lack of security. Everybody can read everything. Everbody can also write most of everything. If you want a mail alias you go and edit the aliases file yourself, you don't even have to _tell_ the sysadmin. (This leads to some hilarious dialogues in the comments in that file)
But other than fun, it's also very easy and quick to work where you don't have to go asking around for permission to do this and that.
also thought that Slashdotters, at the very least, would be a bit more enlightened these days
Slashdotters.
Enlightened.
Mmm. Maybe if you only read at +2 or more?
Hacker: A criminal who breaks into computer systems
"Information wants to be paid"
It is a real shame that "Copyright Law" allows great books like this to become rare historical artifacts after so few years. What would the downside be of having old, out of print books migrate in their entirety to the net much much sooner than is currently allowed?
If you just bung it on the net without asking, then that's wrong. It's impolite and breaks the law. If something could be set up where permission is granted by the author, or the author's family (if deceased), to make an out of print, but not out of copyright book freely available, then that would be a good idea.
It has to be by consent of the people who hold the copyright. I'm sure the authors, or the families of authors, of books long out of print would rather see people enjoying their work, provided they don't lose earnings - which they don't on books not in print.
Possibly a clause could be made in the contract to remove consent should the book be reprinted in bulk for a re-release. Printing one or two copies wouldn't count as a reprint, it would have to be a proper re-release of x thousand books or the like.
It's a job for the lawyers. Does Project Gutenberg have lawyers?
Hacker: A criminal who breaks into computer systems
"Information wants to be paid"
I would say in many cases the copywrite is owned by the publisher rather than the author.
Here's an exercise for you. Pick up a book. Any book. Look at the first few pages before the book starts proper.
There you'll find a copyright notice. Most books (in a brief sampling session from my own bookshelves at least) are Copyright .
Hacker: A criminal who breaks into computer systems
"Information wants to be paid"
Most books (in a brief sampling session from my own bookshelves at least) are Copyright /. could start a petition to ask Steven Levy to give the text to the community...
Oh Bollocks!
What I meant to say was that most books are copyright their author - so if the book is out of print and the author can be persuaded to let it go into the public domain, that's the author's prerogative.
Certainly with books of this nature - they get more dated as time goes by - there's a chance that future reprints would be unlikely.
Maybe
Hacker: A criminal who breaks into computer systems
"Information wants to be paid"
Levy is still around, of course. As someone else noted, he writes technology columns for Newsweek. He has also written several books besides Hackers, including one that is in progress now. This information and more is available on his website.
There are 10 types of people in the world. Those who know binary, and those who do not.
Another recommended book that reads like Hackers and is very focused on people (at least the first half) is "How Computers Play Chess". It is by David Levy, not Steven (any relation? I dunno), who is a Scottish International Chess Master and (past?) president of the ICCA (International Computer Chess Association), in cooperation with Monty Newborn (professor of CS at McGill University).
Published in 91, the first half of the book is about the people involved and their attempts at making a computer play chess, and ends on the first Kasparov-Deep Thought match in 89. Feng Hsiung Hsu, Shannon, Lasker, John McCarthy (yeah, that one), Botvinnik, and many others are portrayed.
The second half goes into more technicalities, talking about the CS behind the programs, hash tables, move generators and algorithms. It is certainly worth a read.
The details of my copy (don't if there's a newer edition):
How Computers Play Chess
by David Levy and Monty Newborn
Computer Science Press, (c) 1991 by W.H. Freeman and Co.
ISBN: 0-7167-8121-2
Enjoy. I'll go back to lurking now...
CGR
--
If you want to live in a country ruled by religion, move to Iran.
I swear this book was released electronically years ago. I remember reading it as a text file in my dorm room in 93 or 94. At least I'm pretty sure it was that book. If not, I read it somewhere else.... Sorry, I doubt I still have the text file.
Visualize Al Gore with CAT-5 coming out of his nose, inventing the internet.
:^)
Congratulations, your mind has been hacked! That should stick in your memory for a while, and if it doesn't maybe you should lend me some money
I haven't figured out how to get root yet, but you'll know I have when you find yourself with uncontrollable urges to download tasteless porn at 3:00 AM and write programs utilising the OpenGL teapot routine.
z
No need to repeat yourself.
-- the most controversial site on the Web
The interesting thing about the Atari 800 hackers in the book is that they had to reverse engineer an undocumented machine in order to get the same graphic/sound quality that Atari did for their games.
The book is really in two parts IIRC. The beginning talks about the development of "Hacking". The second part is a contemporary history of the beginning of the computer game industry, focusing on Sierra Online.
If Levy or someone else were to update the book, there's really two books that could come out of it: (1) An updated story on MIT's hacking tradition, including the story of the Lisp machines, and of course Stallman + GNU and the story of Linux and 386BSD. (2) A more complete history of the computer games industry, covering the rest of Sierra's history, companies like Electronic Arts and Broderbund and Id, up through to the recent assimilation of the industry into the current console-oriented market.
When I hear the word 'innovation', I reach for my pistol.
Don't make the mistake of buying Hackers - Crime in the digital sublime, though its much tougher going and nowhere near as interesting.
Unfortunately, I think a lot of what Levy touted has been forgotten. At least ethics wise. See this post.
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
*****This file should be named hckrs10.txt or hckrs10.zip******
so i opened up a folder on this here computer, and realized that a guy on my icq list had sent that to me a few months ago, i'd just never bothered to look at the .zip file!
and scarier yet, i seem to remember reading the
**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations*
once even before that
talk about some irony/coincidence
speaking of computer related books, I had my copy of Masters of Deception in spanish class today, and my teacher told me he heard it was a good book! the more i talk to that guy the more i like him. he seems to me like the type that sat on his Commodore 64 and dialed up to a few BBS's in the glory days of hacking. I thought that about him the 4th or 5th day of class. long story eh?
anyone got anymore good computer related books to reccomend?
Rock 'n Roll, Not Pop 'n Soul
Rock 'n Roll, Not Pop 'n Soul
carldrawings.dk3.com
It still remains a good read, though. Wonder if that guy who camped out in MITS' parking lot still has his Altair?
I looked into the abyss, and the abyss looked into me--and we both winked.
Mainstream tech. coverage has been consistently lame, and I've felt that newsweek has an advantage over time with Levy on its side.
:)
One thing I've found quite different about Time vs. Newsweek is the technology coverage. Newsweek tends to have a pretty realistic grasp on things, even if I don't agree with some of the focus. Time, on the other hand, is remarkably lame on computer/software coverage for a magazine of its stature. For instance, in the early 90s, they had a cover story about the Internet being 85% full of porn, or something like that, which was repudiated by another study and caused major embarrassment. Time Digital lists the "Cyber Elite" (that title should tell you something); in recent years, it included John Romero TWICE in a row, AND Lara Croft thrown in among famous net names. I guess it was supposed to make it look hip and trendy, and this is the kind of stuff people sipping mochas at starbucks buy into.
This is somewhat understandable - editors are generally older generation people who are carried away by the gee whiz aura and have difficulty figuring out lame fads from real trends. Somewhat like managers who can't figure out the real tech-heads from the fast talkers. But this has a major impact on tech coverage in mainstream newspapers and magazines. In fact, I generally find most of them not worth even reading on this subject except for NY Times (which has markoff) and newsweek.
I wish media would hire more people who know this stuff, rather than devote pages to crap about hackers breaking into banks, viruses and futuristic nonsense. At least people who know the meaning of the word "hackers".
w/m
if i was l337., i would h4x0r all day and all night.
GMontag wrote:
e text96/hckrs10.txt
ftp://metalab.unc.edu/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/
Might save you a century.
---
Nope - only the first two chapters.
I don't think Gutenberg should even accept partial texts. It is nothing more than subsidizing a book's marketing expenses. Yuck.
Gutenberg only has the first two chapters. Not very useful.
Hackers was a great book, it definately inspired me when I first read it years ago.
It is a real shame that "Copyright Law" allows great books like this to become rare historical artifacts after so few years. What would the downside be of having old, out of print books migrate in their entirety to the net much much sooner than is currently allowed?
Waiting a century for Project Gutenberg to pick things up once the copyright expires just isn't the answer. How many great (and even just 'interesting') works are lost to obscurity because of this?
Bah!
chris
FWIW, Levy writes regularly on technology issues for Newsweek. For instance, here's an article on Stephen King's online publishing experiment. Danno
You could've bought it through half.com. There are paperback copies of the book available for as little as $1.50.
--
www.kitchengeek.com -- Nosh for
If you ever get the chance, Soul of A New Machine by Tracy Kidder if a fascinating read. It deals with hardware engineers making a 32 bit minicomputer at Data General in the 1970's. I highly recommend it.
For a woman, Tracy really know her stuff and gets into a great amount of hardware detail.
I'm sorry, so Tracy is a man.
Is it my fault that most Tracy's I know are women?
Is it my fault that there are so few women in computers? God knows we need more of them around, it would make the field less testerone driven and more caring.
I'm sorry.
I bought a copy last year from amazon.co.uk, who still claim to be able to despatch it in 24 hours. It's well worth having, especially for a proto-lisp hacker if you Merkins can stand a transatlantic shipping delay.
Please read the Introduction to the NHD.
The Jargon File goes back to the 1970s. ESR is merely the current caretaker.
where there's fish, there's cats
Yes, he is still around. See http://www.echonyc.com/~steven
where there's fish, there's cats
There are certain books that have made their mark among hackers over the years...
Here's another excellent one. It's mainly on the technical aspect, including how-to and countermeasures. I can't recommend it enough. Hacking Exposed. Lots of tools on the website, too.
Spooon!
-N
Start here: http://acomp.stanford.edu/siliconhistory/Levy/Hack ers.1984.book/Chapter1.html ...and keep on reading
here.
I wrote a text adventure for the ZX Spectrum 48k.
Ahhhh those were the days, burble, burble, wurble shlupppp..
Shoot me now.
Elgon
I've read "Hackers" a number of times over the last 4 years or so. It came to me by accident, my mother found, thought I'd like it and bought it.
It's true what is said in the review. It's about people and not the machines themselves. It's about a way of life that most people think doesn't exist. And it shows that Hackers are not the evil things that media makes them into.
If you're the least interested in the subject, read it. It's great!
This is my sig, this is my gun. This one's for flaming, this one's for fun.