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- I, SPo0ky, thought that we should (must) include this text file, "The Conscience
- of a Hacker"! I think that it is one of the best files around that describes a
- hacker!
- If you can identify yourself with the contents of this file you can really say
- that you are a hacker.
- I think that you don't have to be a computer specialist to be a hacker... I
- think that hacking is a lifestyle!
- Most of the today's "hackers" have forgotten this great text file! Most of them
- trade warez to be "37337"! They don't remember the main sense of hacking...
- "...TO GAIN KNOWLEDGE ..."
- Anyway... here it is... read it and you will know what I mean...
-
-
-
- %/%The Conscience of a Hacker/%/
-
- by
-
- +++The Mentor+++
-
- Written on January 8, 1986
- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
-
- Another one got caught today, it's all over the papers. "Teenager
- Arrested in Computer Crime Scandal", "Hacker Arrested after Bank
- Tampering"...
- Damn kids. They're all alike.
-
- But did you, in your three-piece psychology and 1950's
- technobrain, ever take a look behind the eyes of the hacker? Did
- you ever wonder what made him tick, what forces shaped him, what
- may have molded him?
- I am a hacker, enter my world...
- Mine is a world that begins with school... I'm smarter
- than most of the other kids, this crap they teach us bores me...
- Damn underachiever. They're all alike.
-
- I'm in junior high or high school. I've listened to teachers
- explain forthe fifteenth time how to reduce a fraction. I
- understand it. "No, Ms. Smith, I didn't show my work. I did it
- in my head..."
- Damn kid. Probably copied it. They're all alike.
-
- I made a discovery today. I found a computer. Wait a second,
- this is cool. It does what I want it to. If it makes a mistake,
- it's because I screwed it up. Not because it doesn't like me...
- Or feels threatened by me...
- Or thinks I'm a smart ass...
- Or doesn't like teaching and shouldn't be here...
- Damn kid. All he does is play games. They're all alike.
-
- And then it happened... a door opened to a world... rushing
- through the phone line like heroin through an addict's veins, an
- electronic pulse is sent out, a refuge from the day-to-day
- incompetencies is sought... a board is found.
- "This is it... this is where I belong..."
- I know everyone here... even if I've never met them, never talked
- to them, may never hear from them again... I know you all...
- Damn kid. Tying up the phone line again. They're all alike...
-
- You bet your ass we're all alike... we've been spoon-fed baby food
- at school when we hungered for steak... the bits of meat that you
- did let slip through were pre-chewed and tasteless. We've been
- dominated by sadists, or ignored by the apathetic. The few that
- had something to teach found us willing pupils, but those few are
- like drops of water in the desert.
-
- This is our world now... the world of the electron and the switch,
- the beauty of the baud. We make use of a service already
- existing without paying for what could be dirt-cheap if it wasn't
- run by profiteering gluttons, and you callus criminals. We
- explore... and you call us criminals. We seek after knowledge...
- and you call us criminals. We exist without skin color, without
- nationality, without religious bias... and you call us criminals.
- You build atomic bombs, you wage wars, you murder, cheat, and lie
- to us and try to make us believe it's for our own good, yet we're
- the criminals.
-
- Yes, I am a criminal. My crime is that of curiosity. My crime is
- that of judging people by what they say and think, not what they
- look like. My crime is that of outsmarting you, something that
- you will never forgive me for.
-
- I am a hacker, and this is my manifesto. You may stop this
- individual, but you can't stop us all... after all, we're all
- alike.
-
- +++The Mentor+++
-
-