The Hacker's Encyclopedia 1998

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ZDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD? IMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM; ZDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD? 3 Founded By: 3 : Network Information Access : 3 Mother Earth BBS 3 3 Guardian Of Time 3D: 12SEP90 :D3 <DOWN> 3 3 Judge Dredd 3 : Judge Dredd : 3 See EOF If Any ? 3 @DDDDDDDDBDDDDDDDDDY : Guardian Of Time : @DDDDDDDDDBDDDDDDDDY 3 : File 50 : 3 3 HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM< 3 3 IMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM; 3 @DDDDDDDDDDDDDD6 50th Anniversary Issue! GDDDDDDDDDDDDDDY HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM< Network Information Access. The 50th file. Well, this means a different issue. Something odd. Causes for a celebration and other stuff like that, nothing technical, nothing intelligent! alright! PART 1. Nootropic Drugs [Drugs That Make You Smart]...................... PART 2. Portrait Of J Random Hacker (time for comparisons!).............. PART 3. (censored)....................................................... PART 4. Some Thoughts.................................................... PART 5. BBS Software Review As Seen By SysOps............................ PART 6. Hellos, Congrats, and Respects To:............................... PART 1. Nootropic Drugs ['Drugs that Make You Smart'] Centrophenoxine (Trade name: Lucidrile) This is an intelligence booster and an effective anti-aging therapy, shown to cause improvements in various aspects of memory function and a 30% increase in life span of laboratory animals. Human dosage is rated at 1000-3000mg per day, Centrophenoxine takes effect VERY quickly and results are noticable in alertness and slight stimulation. Not available in USA, available in mexico. Choline/Lecithin Choline can be found in several forms including cholrine bitatrate,chorine cholride or phosphatidyl choline. All thes forms will produce memory boosting effects. Choline compounds have the ability to break the blood-brain barrier. 3 Grams per day in three divided doses. These drugs are considered Nutritional supplements and can be purchased at health food stores. Phosphantidyl Choline has some intresting effects unlike standard Lecithin though. It functions as a source of structural material for every cell in the human body; particularly those of the brain and nerves. It also aids in the metabolism of fats, regulates blood cholesterol, and nourishes the fat-like sheathes of nerve fibers. Piracetam Piracetam improves memory and learning functions in normal persons. Its used in the treatment of alcholics, vertigo, stroke. It seems to promote the flow of information between both hemispheres of the brain, and its said to be so safe that one FDA employee has been quoted as saying that it can't have any pharmacological effects because of its very low toxicity even in extremely high doses. The effect of Piracetam can be enhanced if taken with DMAE or choline. There's a synergetic effect when taken with choline that causes a greater improvement than the sum of each when taken alone. Adverse effects are rare. Piracetam is supplied in 400mg / 800mg tablets the usual dose is 2400 - 4800mg / day, in 3 divided doses. Some literature says that you should take an high attack dosage for the first two days. Not sold in USA. Can be purchased OTC in mexico. Nootropics are generally considered to be any substance which (1) improves information acquisition AND (2) protects against learning- and memory- impairing agents (3) without having either (a) sedative or stimulant effects on one's general behavior, or (b) dangerous toxicity. As one might guess, we don't know of too many of these yet. Caffeine's out, for example; too toxic. Since we don't know the mechanisms of most of these (choline probably being an exception), it's not really clear how to classify cognitive enhancers. However, there's a fairly large class structurally related enhancers which are probably the paradigm nootropics: the 2-pyrrolidinones. Of these, piracetam is the most studied (it was discovered first, around '72), so I'll free associate about its various quirks for a bit. Even though piracetam et al are cyclic derivatives of GABA, they don't seem to be involved with GABA's regulation of neurotransmission. One current hypothesis is that piracetam (can I just call it "P," people?) activates the cholinergic system (acetylcholine and its system are believed to be important in memory, natch). However, cholinergic drugs typically help episodic memory in Alzheimer's patients and P doesn't. Oddly enough, P has no effect on adrenalectomized rats (even when given 3000 mg/kg po). P decreases 5-HT (serotonin) and increases noradrenaline at low doses (20 mg/kg ip) in rats; yet higher (100 mg..) doses have the opposite effect. Basically, what I'm trying to say is: everyone's clueless. (Side note: Things like this make me recall that we've only isolated a tiny fraction of the various neurotransmitters and systems in the brain. It may be that trying to functionally decompose the nervous system into separate subsystems is entirely wrongheaded. Perhaps the brain is one big dynamical system.) Ahem. Anyway, since we don't know how nootropics work, "we" try to find them by artificially-inducing amnesia in rodents and seeing if various substances reverse this "amnesia." One of the most commonly used amnesiacs is scopolamine; others are hemicholinium-3 and cycloheximide. P reverses the effects of these amnesiacs, but doesn't help against ketamine-induced amnesia. As I recall, scopolamine is believed to block the transfer of info into long-term memory only, while ketamine (which blocks the ionic channels of the nicotinic receptor) actually prevents the formation of short- term memory. Make of it what you will. Lest you think that these "amnesias" are highly artificial (they are), it's good to remember that similar things are done to study depression (and "we"'re pretty successful at finding new anti-depressants). Besides, it's the way of science to start out with very rough models and continually tweak and fine-tune them. Once "we"ve found a substance with this sort of screen, "we" start to look at its effects in other cases. I recall reading that Piracetam improves learning (using simple T-shaped mazes with brightness as the thing the lil guys have to pay attention to) in both normal rats and also significantly helps rats whose parents have left them or who just didn't get enough to eat growing up. P also helps alleviate the impairment of learning caused by too much booze in rats as well. Oh yes, it has nice anti-ulcer activity (based on aspirin- or immobilization stress- induced ulcer studies in rats). This type of research is hard on rats. As for people, wellll, they're a lot more expensive than rats. I know there's been some success in treating vertigo-patients, elderly people with rheumatism, and people with involutional depression (a type which frequently precedes dementia). P does seem to increase cerebral-blood flow, and has been used to treat people with signs of brain circulation failure (I think at 1.5 grams/day, but am not sure). I haven't seen anything in the literature about toxicity, although I know that it was given in children at 170 mg/kg with no subjectively-felt problems (I don't recall their ages, sorry). There's been evidence (in mice) that P may increase the effects of some antidepressants. Be wary. Some of the 2-pyrrolidinones seem to protect cell proteins against free-radicals, but P isn't one of them. Sitaram, Weingartner, Caine, Gillin ,"Choline: Selective Enhancement of Serial Learning and Encoding of Low Imagery Words in Man," Life Sci. 22: 1555-1560, 1978 Bartus et al, "Age-related changes in passive avoidance retension: modulation with dietary choline," Science (Washington D.C.) 209 (4453): 301-3, 1980 Drachman and Leavitt, "Human Memory and the Cholinergic System," Arch. Neurol. 30:113, 1974 Beninger et al, "Effects of chronic manipulations of dietary choline on locomotor activity, discrimination learning and cortical acetylcholine release in aging adult Fisher 344 rats," Neurobiol-Aging. 1984 Spring. 5(1) P 29-34. Ennaceur and Delacour, "Effect of combined or separate administration of piracetam and choline on learning and memory in the rat," Psychopharmacology. 1987. 92(1). P. 58-67. Fundaro et al, "Effects of chronic manipulations of dietary choline on dynamic behavioral situations," Prog-Neuropsychophramacol-Biol-Psychiatry. 1987. 11(5). P 601-11. Harris et al, "Effect of lecithin on memory in normal adults," Am-J- Psychiatry. 1983 Aug. 140(8) P 1010-2. Leathwood et al, "Phosphatidyl choline and avoidance performance in 17 month-old SEC/1ReJ mice," Life-Sci. 1982 Mar 29. 30(13). P 1065-71. Meck et al, "Organizational changes in cholinergic activity and enhanced visuospatial memory as a function of choline administered prenatally or postnatally or both," Behav-Neurosci. 1989 Dec. 103(6). P 1234-41. Meck et al, "Pre- and postnatal choline supplementation produces long- term facilitation of spatial memory," Dev-Psychobio. 1988 May. P 339-53. Mizumori et al, "Effects of dietary choline on memory and brain chemistry in aged mice," Neurobiol-Aging. 1985. Spring. 6(1). P 51-6. Mohrs et al, "Interaction of choline and scopolamine in human memory," Life-Sci. 1985 June 15. 37(2). P 193-7. Prado-Alcala, "Is cholinergic activity of the caudate nucleus involved in memory?," Life-Sci. 1985. Dec 9. 37(23). P 2135-42. Sahley et al, "Dietary choline augments associative memory function in Limax maximus," J-Neurobiol. 1986. Mar. 17(2). P 113-20. Valzelli et al, "Difference in learning and retention by Albino-Swiss mice. Part IV. Effect of some nutrients," Methods-Find-Exp-Clin-Pharmacol. 1987. 9(1). P. 5-8. PART 2. A Portrait Of J. Random Hacker (by Eric S. Raymond TNN News) Note: where comparatives are used, the implicit ¢other' is a randomly selected group from the non-hacker population of the same size as hackerdom. General appearance: Intelligent. Scruffy. Intense. Abstracted. Interestingly for a sedentary profession, more programmers run to skinny than fat. Tans are rare. Dress: Casual, vaguely post-hippy; T-shirts, jeans, running shoes (or bare feet). Long hair, beards and moustaches are common. High incidence of tie-die and intellectual or humorous ¢slogan' T-shirts (only rarely computer related, that's too obvious). Hackers dress for comfort, function, and minimal maintenance hassles rather than for appearance. Very low incidence of suits or other ¢business' attire. Reading habits: Omnivorous, but usually includes lots of science and science fiction. Hackers often have a reading range that astonishes ¢liberal arts' people but tend not to talk about it as much. Other interests: Some hobbies are widely shared and recognized as going with the culture, including: music. SF. Medievalism. Chess, wargames and intellectual games of all kinds. Logic puzzles. Ham radio. Other interests that seem to correlate less strongly but positively with hackerdom include: martial arts, linguistics, bicycling. Education: All hackers are either college-degreed or self-educated to an equivalent level. The self-taught hacker is often considered better-motivated and more respected than his B.Sc counterpart. Academic areas from which people often gravitate into hackerdom include mathematics, physics, linguistics, and philosophy. Things hackers detest and avoid: Most team sports. Disco. Bureaucracies. Stupid people. Easy listening music. Television (except for cartoons, movies, the old _Star_Trek_ and the new _Simpsons_). Three-piece suits. Food: Ethnic. Spicy. Oriental, esp. Chinese and most especially Szechuan, Hunan and Mandarin (hackers consider Cantonese vaguely declasse). Also high-quality Jewish delicatessen food is much esteemed. Politics: Vaguely left of center, except for the strong libertarian contingent which rejects conventional left-right politics entirely. The only safe generalization is that almost all hackers are anti-authoritari33, thus both conventional conservatism and "hard" leftism are rare. Hackers are far more likely than most non-hackers to either a) be aggressively apolitical, or b) entertain peculiar or idiosyncratic political ideas and actually try to live by them day-to-day. Ethnicity: Predominantly Caucasian with a strong minority of Jews (east coast) and Asians (west cost). The Jewish contingent has exerted a particularly pervasive cultural influence (see Food). Hackers as a group are about as color-blind as anyone could ask for, and ethnic prejudice of any kind tends to be met with extreme hostility; the ethnic distribution of hackers is understood by them to be a function of who tends to seek and get higher education. Religion: Agnostic. Atheist. Non-observant Jewish. Neo-pagan. Very commonly three or more of these are combined in the same person. Conventional faith-holding Christianity is rare though not unknown (at least on the east coast, more hackers wear yarmulkes than crucifixes). Even hackers who identify with a religious affiliation tend to be relaxed about it, hostile to organized religion in general and all forms of religious bigotry in particular. Many enjoy ¢parody' religions such as Discordianism and the Church of the SubGenius. Finally, many hackers are fascinated to varying degrees by Zen Buddhism or (less commonly) Taoism, and blend them easily with their ¢native' religions. Ceremonial chemicals: Most hackers don't smoke and use alcohol in moderation if at all. Limited use of ¢soft' drugs (esp. psychedelics such as marijuana, LSD, psilocybin etc) used to be relatively common and is still regarded with more tolerance than in the mainstream culture. Use of ¢downers' and opiates, on the other hand, seems to be particularly rare (hackers seem in general to dislike drugs that ¢dumb them down'). Many hackers regularly wire up on caffeine and sugar for all-night hacking runs. Geographical Distribution: In the U.S., hackerdom revolves on a Bay Area/Boston axis; about half of the hard core seems to live within a hundred miles of Cambridge or Berkeley. Hackers tend to cluster around large cities, especially ¢university towns' such as the Raleigh/Durham area in North Carolina or Princeton, New Jersey (this may simply reflect the fact that many are students or ex-students living near their alma maters). Sexual habits: Hackerdom tolerates a much wider range of sexual and lifestyle variation than the mainstream culture. It includes more gays. Hackers are more likely to live in polygnous or polyandrous relationships, practice open marriage or live in communes or group houses. In this as in some other respects (see Dress) hackerdom semi-consciously maintains ¢counterculture' values. Personality Characteristics: The most obvious common ¢personality' characteristic of hackers is high intelligence and facility with intellectual abstractions. In terms of Myers-Briggs and equivalent psychometric systems, hackerdom appears to concentrate the relatively rare INTJ and INTP types; that is, introverted, intuitive and thinker types (as opposed to the extroverted-sensate personalities the predominate in the mainstream culture). Also, most hackers are ¢neophiles', stimulated by and appreciative of novelty (especially intellectual novelty). Most are also relatively individualistic and anti-conformist. --Eric S. Raymond PART 3. (censored) Not Availible. (Do you feel like 2 Live Crew?) PART 4. Some Thoughts Just some thoughts. Non-Alcoholic Beer, why? (thats like condems w/holes). Flag burning, why not just make it legal and then make the flag out of non- flammable material? Lightning Rod? When they ship styrofoam, whats it packaged in? Iraqnophobia. American Red Cross "You didn't help us, now we won't help you". Unexpected heart attacks (are you expecting one?). Camoflauge Walets (hmm..). One-Half Billion dollars for an invisible bomber? (someone got ripped off..). PART 5. BBS Software Review As Seen By Sysops Through the course of BBS Evolution, there have been many, many clones, and well, todays article covers some people w/ short mindeness towards software they run. CIRCLES IN TIME "What C.I.T. is a HACK? Man you been smoking something funny..." ELITE "It aint running w/ my modem, DAMN, its cool, all the cool people are running it.." Em/2 "If it doesn't have Batch d/ling from New Scan of files, I don't want to look at it!" "Lazy sysops and lazy users, thats why I run it" "Sure the Doors don't work, but so what? I hate Online Games" "Well thank god that Emulex/2 batch download doesn't takes time away like TCS does. Enjoy!" LSD "Thats right, only ONE copy per area code, and it must be 19.2 ONLY!" "After all TTR runs it, it must be good..." PcBoard "You read the Docs?" "Its increadible, you can do ANYTHING w/ it!, Tag? whats that?" "You gotta check out the Lawyers Base, its funny, can you read it?" MONARCHY "I know the writers, and if I want a change I just call up the author and tell him how it should be..." "After all if it wasn't for me Monarchy would still be just another clone.." "Thats right, updates role out weekly, isn't it amazing??" "This is your last time to be a Monarchy Distribution Site..." (4th time) TAG "I'm just MAD about TAg and TAg is just Mad about me..." "Improve TAG? WHAT you are not running TAG, well I cant believe that, there Is NOTHING better than TAG, how can you improve perfection?" "I dare ANYONE here, to call my system and crash it. I have said this three days ago and not a single person has done it. That goes to show you how TAG is supierior to any other software" "Why look at what you can do w/ tag its super!" "What you don't LIKE TAG?, well only people that LIKE TAG can be on my board" "I don't know why I run it" "What is better? It IS FREE after all" TELEGARD "Hmm, that's very neat. Isn't that program "requires" you to send some $$$ to get a registered program? Well I guess you don't in this case..." "Man TAG SUCKS! Telegard is the way to go" "ALT-F5 is fucking cool !!! #%@@#$#@@#$^$#@^$ Its great right?" "After all they charge money now, yes, but look at the supierior quality and markmenship of a truly great BBS, besides that TAG sucks" "I'm 15 and I like Telegard, after all, my best friend runs his, that is if he passes biology this week..." -As Quoted by Sysops of systems that run the corrosponding software. PART 6. Hello's, Congrats and Respects to: David Lightman and Dallas Hack Shack BBS. The Jolly Bardsman for getting me(JD) started in telecom. Agent Orange and Oblivion BBS. The Dead Zone BBS and SysOp. Cool Hand and Mid-Nite-Oil. Nilrem. Deathmaster of THG. Lethal Injection from The Veiled Society. Emmanuel Goldstien and 2600 Magazine. Members of LOD/H. Scan Man. Racer X. The Pusher. Swamp Rat. The Imortal. Night Lightning. The Phrack people. The Oxidizer and the attempt at NARC. Kid Copy along w/PHIRE. Mallorean and good luck w/950. Dr Ripco and Ripco BBS. The Sensei for TSR. CUD. Dr No and MPL. Chester "the M0E god". Slice. The People of Em/2. Reb00t and Test Site BBS. Sir Garlon from The Veiled Society. To Joe Nowack for starting (GOT) off in telecom. Well the list is getting too long, so thanks go out to everyone thats been cool to us in telecom and all the people that helped us through dificult stages of our telecom hobby. All the users and sysops who have had inteligent opinionated contributions to make, and finally a special thanks to the readers. Guardian Of Time Judge Dredd Ignorance, Theres No Excuse. For questions or comments write to: Internet: elisem@nuchat Fidonet: 1:106/69.0 or NIA FeedBack P.O. Box 299 Santa Fe, Tx. 77517-0299 [OTHER WORLD BBS]