Conference noted::hackers_v1

78.0. "Good Press at Last!" by PARVAX::PFAU () Thu Nov 29 1984 09:16

The  following  article  is  from the December 3 issue of Time Magazine. The
article  is  entitled  Let  Us Now Praise Famous Hackers (A new view of some
much maligned electronic pioneers) written by Philip Elmer-De Witt.

(reproduced without permission)
============================================================================
Legend  at M.I.T. has it that one night in the mid-'50s some students paid a
clandestine  visit  to Cambridge's Kendall Square subway station, where they
quietly spread grease all over the tracks. The next morning, the first train
that  pulled  into  the station hit the grease and skidded right through the
other  side, taking its passengers to an unscheduled stop in the end tunnel.
When the motorman backed up to see what had happened, the train slid through
the station in the other direction as well. The ensuing snarl is supposed to
have tied up transit officials and straphangers for hours.

For  several  generations of M.I.T. engineers, the subway prank was known as
the ultimate "hack", the rare practical joke clever and elegant enough to be
worthy  of  one of the world's most prestigious technical schools. Today the
best  and  the  brightest  technology  students  are more likely to be found
hanging  around  a computer system than a subway system. But they still call
themselves  hackers,  and although they insist they have been misunderstood,
their relationship with the public is once again on the skids.

Last  year's  hit  movie  War Games and a series of well-publicized computer
break-ins have created an image of a teen-age computer hacker that is giving
the  term  a  bad name. Many people now think of hackers as pests or perhaps
even  criminals. But the hackers themselves claim they are getting a bum rap
from  movies and newspapers. Says Bill Burns, an industrial psychologist and
part-time hacker: "We are the victims of a major press screw-up".

Hackers,  as  most  computer  experts use the term, are distinguished not by
mischievousness  but  by  their  persistence  and  skill.  Some  of  the key
breakthroughs  in  modern computer science, including the development of the
personal  computer,  can  be  traced  to  these  often fanatically dedicated
people.  Even  today, men and women who are proud to call themselves hackers
can  be found in the research departments of almost any major computer firm,
designing  state-of-the-art  machines  and writing the software that runs on
them.

Now  some of the real computer whiz kids are finally getting their due. In a
new  book called Hackers (Doubleday; $17.95), writer Steven Levy argues that
these  "science-mad  people" are the true heroes of the computer revolution.
He  traces  the  history  of hackers from M.I.T.'s Tech Model Railroad Club,
their  first  mecca,  to  Silicon  Valley's Homebrew Computer Club, an early
microcomputer  gathering spot, to a video-game factory in Coarsegold, Calif.
Through  it  all  he discerns a common thread: the unspoken assumption among
crack  computer programmers and engineers that they could straighten out the
world  by  dint  of their intelligence if they could only get their hands on
the control box.

The  overpowering  urge  to compute, as Levy describes it, has always seemed
bizarre  to  outsiders.  At M.I.T. and Stanford the true devotees would skip
meals,  drop classes and give up sleep and social lives to burrow deeper and
deeper into their beloved electronic brains. Once they started on a project,
they  would  regularly  "wrap around", working day and night until, after 30
hours,  they collapsed on the nearest cot or sofa. Programmers at Stanford's
Artificial Intelligence Lab eventually discovered that the space between the
roof  and  false ceiling made a comfortable sleeping hutch, and some of them
lived there for months at a time.

Two  weeks  ago,  130  of  America's  most  devoted  hackers gathered in the
barracks  of a refurbished Army post in Sausalito, Calif., at the invitation
of  a  group of computer experts headed by Stewart Brand, editor in chief of
the  Whole  Earth  Software Catalog. Brand's idea was to bring together, for
the  first  time, people from several generations of hackers, and his guests
included  some  of  the  brightest stars in computing: Ted Nelson, author of
Computer  Lib,  a  widely read handbook from the mid-1970s; Stephen Wozniak,
who  built  the  original  Apple  computer; Lee Felsenstein, designer of the
Osborne  1;  Richard  Greenblatt,  who  developed  the LISP machines used in
artificial-intelligence  research;  and  Burrell  Smith,  a  one-time  Apple
repairman who went on to build the Macintosh computer.

There  were  a  fair share of shaggy beards, silver-winged baseball caps and
even one turban, worn by a Montana-born programmer who now calls himself Sat
Tara  Singh  Khalsa.  But  for  the  most  part the hackers looked more like
backpackers  or professional musicians than any stereotype image of computer
nerds. By day, they met for discussions and debates that included a face-off
between Donn Parker, a computer-crime expert, and John Draper, the legendary
"Cap'n  Crunch", who developed a system for making free phone calls by using
the toy whistle from a breakfast-cereal box to imitate the tone used by AT&T
for  long-distance  calls.  At night the hackers clustered around a dazzling
array  of  computer  hardware  that  beeped  and glowed until 4 o'clock each
morning.

Most  of the weekend conference, though, was spent trying to plot the future
of  hacking  in  an industry increasingly dominated by marketers and venture
capitalists. Everyone present seemed to agree that commercialism had changed
the  nature  of  computing.  What  was less clear was what the new rules for
hacking  ought  to  be.  Said  Bill Atkinson, author of a flashy new program
called MacPaint: "The question is, how do you spread excitement around?"

Many  first-generation  hackers,  having  struggled  with  the red tape that
surrounded  million-dollar systems in the early days of computing, tended to
view  such  things  as  copy-protection  schemes, which make it difficult to
steal  programs, as barriers to the free flow of information. Other hackers,
however,  protested  that  anyone  who  spends  thousands of hours writing a
program deserves to earn royalties on it. Said Robert Woodhead, co-author of
a best-selling game called Wizardry: "My soul is in my product".

As  the industry has matured, so have the pioneers who helped build it. Most
of  the  high priests of hacking have long ago grown out of the pranksterism
associated with their name, and many feel it is time they set an example for
the  next generation of computer fans. "It's one thing for a high school kid
to show off how he can dial the phone for free," say Brian Harvey, an M.I.T.
hacker  turned  high  school teacher. "It's quite another for an adult to go
around encouraging schoolkids to steal".

The last paragraph is quite interesting, because it indicates a two-edge sword.

It's ok for a high-school kid to show how he can make free phone calls,
but not ok for our educational system to encourage such activity.
Although I have to agree, doesn't this also indicate a failing in our
educational system? 

I, for one, remember showing my High School buddies that I had figured out
how to break onto RSTS. But it wasn't until I wasn't allowed to use the computer
again for the next six months (because of this) that I actually started telling
people how I actually did it (plus using them for new methods was the only way
I could try them). The point is, that it will always be a dilemma for our
educational system to encourage the 'exact' kind of creativity they are trying
develop. 

As for the 'hackers convention' written about in the Times article, it
should be noted, that the 'invitations' were quite exclusive, and only
'certain' people were invited.  I wonder if any people 'hacked' the system
and figured out a way to get in anyway. And if they were caught, I wonder
what the hackers would have done about it.... Kicked them out or made them
guest speakers?  Not a big difference between the show and the high-school
dilemma, is it? 

BTW, if my teacher who curfewed my RSTS usage reads this (after all, he can),
although it was quite painful to me at the time (to be without my access to 
a terminal), I am actually quite thankful; there is after all, more to H.S. 
than hacking, and not allowing a hacker to use the computer for a few months 
should perhaps be required of all young hackers-- it is, after all, good for 
perspective.