[hackerspaces] bring back the crime - "hacker" is starting to mean "creative entrepeneur"

[Mitch Altman]

Why would you want to keep people away from hackerspaces?  So many hackerspaces around the world are thriving communities because we are open to new people.  New people being new ideas, and new energy, and help us grow and stretch in ways that wouldn't be possible otherwise.  The world of hackerspaces has only grown because we are open to new people and ideas. 

"Hacking" has many definitions.  The one Lisha wrote about is a great one.  And it is only good if we share it. 

Let's keep sharing. 

If someone becomes "assimilated", whatever, that's their choice.  Myself, I'll continue to encourage everyone I meet to explore and do what they might love to do.  Hackerspaces are fantastic communities for this.  I'd love to see more people, not less.  More people in the world need these opportunities for creation and community. 

And, if people make some money, or, better yet, make a living from projects they love, all the better!  Sure beats working at some stupid job, yes? 

Best, 
Mitch. 


> To: discuss at lists.hackerspaces.org
> From: hellekin at dyne.org
> Date: Tue, 22 Sep 2015 15:48:14 -0300
> Subject: Re: [hackerspaces] bring back the crime - "hacker" is starting to mean "creative entrepeneur"
> 
> On 09/22/2015 03:19 PM, Mark Rosenblitt-Janssen wrote:
> >>
> >> Miss the good old association with crime - it made all these people stay
> >> very far away.
> >>
> > 
> > Thank [Thor|Athena] that there's someone with some spirit on the list.
> > 
> 
> I said earlier I didn't like the association with crime.  Probably you
> misinterpreted it, so I want to clarify.  Before corporations invaded
> the Internet, before firewalls existed, "computer crime" was probably
> not a term at all.  "Computer fraud" was, with the meaning of "fraud
> committed with a computer".  Fraud was the crime: not using a computer,
> exploring networks, or gaining access to computers outside your premises.
> 
> When I said I didn't like the association with crime, it's because the
> term "hacker" is not a made up thing like "intellectual property" that
> confounds many different things into one meaningless term.  But it has
> become just that, and the association with crime is part of why this
> happened.  When journalists brandish "hacker", they never ever mean a
> clever solution to a tricky problem, or going where nobody has gone
> before (fortunately, hackers don't wear spandex uniforms).
> 
> What is considered crime is another part of the picture: it's certainly
> a crime to penetrate an organization's network, extract secret document,
> and blackmail the organization.  The crime is "blackmail".  Whether it
> is a crime to penetrate an organization's network, extract secret
> information, and blow the whistle is another case entirely; if the
> secret document is revealing a crime, I think it's justice.  I see no
> "crime" in hacking under the hacker ethics, yet most countries made it a
> crime, and often one that makes guns and killing people more appealing
> than hitting the Enter key.
> 
> The problem is not hacking, but the semantic field that's been applied
> to it to blur its meaning.  Is a protest a crime?  In the last years we
> can certainly wonder.  The skin of what constitutes a crime moves with
> the society's breathing.  The original crime of hacking is to not remain
> inside the preloaded squares of your life.  This happens to be the
> original duty of any citizen in a democracy to question authority--and
> I'm not only talking about government.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> ==
> hk
> 
> -- 
>  _ _     We are free to share code and we code to share freedom
> (_X_)yne Foundation, Free Culture Foundry * https://www.dyne.org/donate/
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