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The Happy, Benign Strivers of 2600
westfirst writes "The Washington Post has a front page story on those nice young boys in the food court from 2600. Here's one choice sentence: "Patrick thought 2600 would teach him how to hack. Instead, it taught him about job hunting, stock options and business plans." The press and the government were wrong along. 2600 isn't about learning how to launch the nuclear missiles at that fascist gym teacher-- it's about working hard and getting ahead. So, is 2600 better off with a reputation as Wally Cleaver or Eddie Haskell?" All I know is that it's good to see positive coverage of hackers/hacker culture.
Even though I don't agree with you, I have but one thing to say. Please, please PLEASE stop it with the house analagies [sic]. Please use something else.
This is such a good point that it needs some attention drawn to it beyond yapping about the typo. Houses are physical and in the real world, and so many things don't match up. First of all, every host on the internet is potentially a server, and potentially contains useful, intended-for-the-public information. How can you tell if a given host is meant to be accessed remotely? Well, you connect to it and look. This isn't the equivalent of checking the doorknob of a house -- it's more like looking in a shop window to see if they're open. (And that analogy is full of flaws too.)
Sure, we could depend completely on centralized human-created directories, but that puts control back in the hands of the few. The internet isn't supposed to be Just More Television. If it becomes illegal to connect to port 80 of someone's machine to see if they're running a web server, that's a huge loss for us all. You might think http is different somehow, but do you really want the goverment maintaining a list of what ports are legal to use for services?
Well, you have to remember, there's more then one kind of 'hacker'. First, there's the ones that snoop around and tell us that, indeed, yes, Windows 2000 has a bunch of security holes that need to be addressed. (Who says they HAVE to be snooping on someone elses computer, by the way?) Second, there's the ones that do the same time of snooping, then exploit those holes for their own purposes (the ones we -should- be scared about). There's also the 'hacker' who takes things apart to learn about them for their own knowledge and/or does things seemingly impossible (ie, beetle bug on a roof, gets a business tower's room lights to spell a word, etc.). We neededn't be word about two of these types of hackers, so by you saying that all hackers are bad and that they all cost billions of dollars, well, you're just wrong.
Hackers are the people who put the internet together, they are not the ones who are going to take it apart.
Yeah, lots of people find God following bomb making recipies in that book. You see, there are some important safety steps it leaves out...
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If I was part of a group of people who came into your house and just looked around, claiming they were only testing the security of your locks and so on, what would you do?
Just the other day someone knocked on my front door to tell me I had left me car outside unlocked. I said thank you and then locked my car. He must have either looked into the car to see the physical position of the lock, or else he tried the door. Either way, he was uninvited. What would you have done?
Slightly less recently, I was given directions to a friends house on a piece of paper. I drove to the street only to discover that the number of the house I had written down was smudged. I took a guess, but it could have been wrong. I went up the pathway to the front door and knocked, (remember if I was wrong, then i was on somebodys land uninvited here) There was no answer. I tried the doorhandle and it was unlocked. I shouted hello through the door. Nobody answered. Just as I was going to leave, my friend appeared from the back garden. Did I do anything wrong? I potentially entered a property without permission. Some people I know would have walked right in to check of things were okay when they got no answer. Would that have been wrong? What if my friend was lying injured somewhere in the house? Is it still not allowed because i might accidentally be in the wrong house.
My point is this... I agree there are parallels between cars, houses etc and computers. But in all these cases there are legitimate reasons for entry other than simply invitation. If you have a car/house/computer in a public place (yes, the internet is a PUBLIC network) then expect that to be the case. Even if you get rid of all malicious hackers, you still find people entering your systems for various reasons (accidentally is probably the most common) so you MUST be prepared for it with proper security. And we all (I hope) know by now from experience that understanding how to make a system secure follows from knowing how to exploit an unsecured system. Thats the way it is - like it or not. You WILL NOT be a good security admin until you know how to crack systems yourself. Anyone who tells you otherwise is an academic.
-- MartinG To mail me: echo kewyjlcxyzvjfxbqwh | tr bcefhjklqvwxyz
You can['t fool me! those 2600 boys hacked into the New York Times! That's what happened!
I can relate! The Anarchist Cookbook changed my life though...
I thought that it was going to teach me how to make home-made napalm and exploding lightbulbs out of bubblegum but instead it helped me find God!
Of course I am writing this because after finding God the ER techs got my heart started again....
I think it's about time we, as a community, give this one up. It's tilting at windmills.
I still use "hack" and "hacker" in my normal speech, and sometimes have to explain, but I think it's time to turn off our --pedantic flags.
--
The kid's father says "Without 2600 (he would) probably be one of those pot-smoking, crack-sniffing guys...
Read the article again. The kid (Patrick) said that, not his father (Michael):
Now I have to rush out and grab my copy of Huckleberry Fin, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and Harry Potter.
--
Wooden armaments to battle your imaginary foes!
Thanks to MP3, Silicon Valley cash, www.everyfuckingthingyouwantinporno.com and media hype over anything and everything to do with the Internet, it seems like things created by geeks have really done a number on society. The evolution of 2600 into semi-responsible corporate wannabes rather than Phiber Optik wannabes was expected, by me at least. When all is said and done, the more morally-ambiguous types will tend toward the path of least resistance, which these days, appears to be the corporate grind for the remnants of the dot-cash.
Just look at Think Geek. Hey, there's a lot of cool stuff there. But who other than a corporate flunky can actually afford any of it? Geeks have to be rich now, to stay geeks. We're being driven to it.
I guess I'll just have to stay at my community college support job until my contract ends, then contemplate surrendering my unfunded geekness. It's too expensive.
Either that, or I'll just have to start coding in C and work on kernel patches. Gotta do it old school.
My own pointless vanity vintage computing page
Reading about underground technology is probably the most stimulating form of reading that I know of. Slashdot often deals with such a broad story range (.com funnies to extreme details about a complex emerging technology) and can often only cater to specific audiences (like today's jabber and UDDI stories), where as 2600's technical stuff is so watered down one can usually easily understand the basic concepts.
So, even tho it might be a simple magazine for simple minds and occasionally those that are prone to be idiots are idiots and try things in 2600, atleast the forum is there. They've always looked for writers, and I think Eric Corely is probably the last true old-media free-speach technology journalist.
----
In a corner removed from the rest of the group, Watson and another man were huddled together discussing what annoys them the most about the modern Internet--the banner ads. They were trying to come up with a way to "solve" that problem. They talk about whether it would be possible to intercept the ads and replace them with the words "Free the Net!" Or maybe the easiest way to make them disappear would be would be just to bring down the server computers for DoubleClick, the company that manages much of the Internet's advertising.
"If we could find a way to get rid of those ads for a week we'd be the heroes of the Internet," Watson said.
Just go to your client's (or better still, proxy server's) hosts file (C:\Windows\hosts on Windows,
Add entries for every server you don't want to connect to, i.e. ad1.doubleclick.com, etc. and point them to 127.0.0.1 (localhost). That'll time out extra-fast. Example here.
Alterately, you could block *doubleclick.com at a proxy server. Or you could put a proxy on your local machine (Like a content-checking porn filter), that checked all files with *.gif extension for banner proportions, then replaced them.
Blocking banner ads is easy. The question is: Would the benefit (whatever that may be) outway the problem of sites not being funded by advertising, and maybe changing to subscription, or closing. This is the real issue.
Michael
...another comment from Michael Tandy.
"Goodness me, how unlike the FBI to abuse the trust of the American public." -- The Onion
Okay, even ignoring momentarily the media reputation of everyone lumped into the category of "hackers," from script kiddies to Alan Cox, it's nice to 2600 of all people getting some good press.
Even though 2600 (the magazine) isn't what it used to be, 2600 (the magazine, the meetings, etc.) deserve some respect they never seem to get. I was sick of seeing 2600 bashed in Wired, even in /. comments for supporting Kevin Mitnick. Okay, yeah, he broke the law and deserved to get caught, but the treatment in his case was extreme, and you didn't see anyone else constantly reminding people that four years in jail without a trial or bail hearing is wrong.
Even igoring the Mitnick saga, 2600 provides a really great entry point for kids who've seen War Games and... okay, maybe today it would be (god forbid) HAckers, but you get the point. In the pages of that mag, people find out that you don't just guess a password and launch bombs, if you want to do things (even illegal things) you have to learn... a lot. I started learning everything I know now, from system security, to TCP/IP, UNIX, C, everything, because when I was 11 I wanted to be a kr4d 31337 h4x0r d00d. Hell, I used to type on BBSs like that... but by the time I learned how to write an IRC bot, I didn't have time to transpose letters in to numbers, so I had to remap the keyboard in my terminal emulator so I c0u1d 7yp3 a11 l337 w17h0u7 5p3nd1ng 51x h0ur5 534rch1ng 4 34ch k3y. So I learned things, even for the sake of being stupid.
And I feel like I owe a lot of this to 2600. when I found an old acoustic coupler, I took it to the local 2600 meeting to figure out how to rewire it to work with my built-in modem... I learned half of what I know about hardware there... Hell, I learned what a front-side bus was from those people.
So it's nice to see 2600 getting some good press, and to see the meetings described as something other than a bunch of lurking, black-clad teenage misfits in doc martens and 2600 t-shirts.
just my deux centimes.
telekon
To understand recursion, you must first understand recursion.
Recently, a federal judge in New York ruled that the magazine was guilty of copyright infringement for posting on its Web site some computer code that allows people to copy encrypted DVD movies. The magazine's editor, Eric Corley, aka Emmanuel Goldstein, has said that the publication of the program is protected by the First Amendment and is appealing.
DeCSS doesn't allow people to copy DVDs. That's always been possible, provided you can get a blank DVD and a DVD burner which aren't crippled with access controls. DeCSS allows people to use DVDs in non-approved, or non-licsened equipment.
There is a big difference, especially with the draconian restrictions placed on "approved" equipment manufacturers. I don't see why CSS is considered anything other than what it is, a way of making artificial trade barriers.
Oh, now I remember, it's because the mega-corps say it's an copy control mechanism. They're famous for their honesty to the consumer.
Steven
-- I have marked myself unwilling to moderate-- I don't have other accounts to artificially inflate the karma of
I'm a computer professional who hangs out with 2600 (404), and I consider myself a hacker. Not in the 31337 c001 d00dz sense, which many people assume thanks to various sensationalist media PR. I play with computers and other interesting technical stuff, for both work and fun. I enjoy understanding the most obscure guts of technology.
I learn things that improve my skills in both my professional and personal life, and hang out with cool people. Yes, it's a bit like a "biker gang user group" and there are people I know are doing questionable things. There always are, at least there everyone is (mostly) out in the open about it and there is just as much talk about how to close security holes as how to exploit them. You can't have knowledge of one without the other.
After many years of picking up the occasional print copy at the bookstore, I finally live someplace I can go to meetings. You could say that I've been "in telecom" since high school when a buddy showed me this cool new toy he built, called a "Blue Box." Breaking into things just to be able to say so was never my thing, but it got me interested in how the telephone network works. Combine that with computers, and I found a lifelong interest and successful career.
And I do get a few cool points for being able to say that I make phone bills for a living. I've gotten more useful information out of 2600 than my years of ACM membership, another more respected professional organization in my industry. And it sure is a lot less boring
- Notice how the article (you read the article, right?) uses the word hack, with only a single exception, to refer to what you guys insist may only be referred to as "cracking."
- In Patrick's Roanhouse's words:With what he says is only slight exaggeration, he summed up his daily activities back then: "My mom thought I was playing Sesame Street Grover's ABC, but instead I was hacking into the Chinese government."
The word "hack" is routinely used to describe what you guys insist is cracking, the crackers refer to themselves refer to it as hacking and it's perfectly clear what, say, this guy was talking about. Bitching at him for failure to use proper Jargon File-sanctioned terminiology is unhelpful.He says 2600 taught him the "hacker ethic," a value system that attempts to define what's acceptable and what's going over the top in the digital world. That is, probing systems to learn about their vulnerabilities is okay as long as no damage is done, but flooding sites such as Yahoo, Amazon and eBay with fake packets of data to block legitimate users out is just plain stupid, Patrick said.
While I'm commenting:
Mike Godwin, former staff attorney of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, agrees: "There's no doubt in my mind that the clubs have done more good than harm, in that they've encouraged kids to develop their knowledge and computer skills."
underscores why I've never had much respect for the Wired/EFF/cyberrights axis. I just don't get how these people can drone on and on about privacy when they're clearly untroubled by, if not outright sympathetic to, *ackers breaking into systems where they're not allowed to be.
Unsettling MOTD at my ISP.
The geek subculture has truly lost its status as subculture, and is rapidly being assimilated into the rest of pop culture as a whole. We've all noticed it, some of us have said it, and I really wonder how many of us want it. Thanks to MP3, Silicon Valley cash, www.everyfuckingthingyouwantinporno.com and media hype over anything and everything to do with the Internet, it seems like things created by geeks have really done a number on society. The evolution of 2600 into semi-responsible corporate wannabes rather than Phiber Optik wannabes was expected, by me at least. When all is said and done, the more morally-ambiguous types will tend toward the path of least resistance, which these days, appears to be the corporate grind for the remnants of the dot-cash. Just look at Think Geek. Hey, there's a lot of cool stuff there. But who other than a corporate flunky can actually afford any of it? Geeks have to be rich now, to stay geeks. We're being driven to it.
Yours,
Bob
All the best,
--Bob
The kid's father says "Without 2600 (he would) probably be one of those pot-smoking, crack-sniffing guys who gave up on life a long time ago."
It's good to know that guy has high regard for his own parenting skills. Dammit! If my son didn't meet those hackers who would have raised him right?!
The global economy is a great thing until you feel it locally.
It is really good to see some positive reporting on this subject. Alot of times, organizations like these are the only places a bright and slightly off-center kid can be accepted. It provides a good offset to the bullshit that a person like that will get in their public education institution of incarceration. With your computer group, being a "geek" is no problem, it's a solution.
Where's my lobbyist? Right here.