Reading 01: Hardware Hackers

Unlike the “True Hackers,” the “Hardware Hackers” desired to “let people discover themselves by the Hands-On Imperative” (Levy, 127). That’s not to say that the “True Hackers” didn’t believe in creative expression/discovery through the Hands-On Imperative, because, they did. However, the “True Hackers” never made an active effort to spread the Hacker Ethic to a wider audience. The “Hardware Hackers” were greatly involved with politics (like Lee Felsenstein and Jude Milhon) and performed “medicine shows” to “spread [the] magic throughout the land” (i.e. Bob Albrecht) (Levy, 135). Although BASIC was viewed as restrictive by the “True Hackers,” “because its limited structure did not encourage maximum access to the machine and decreased a programmer’s power,” to Albrecht, BASIC was interactive and was easier to learn, so more children could write games quickly and “the games would provide the seductive scent that would lure kids to programming and hackerism,” thereby spreading the Hacker Ethic to a wider audience (Levy, 135).

Spreading the Hacker Ethic to a wider audience is important, as you never know who or where the next Richard Greenblatt or John McCarthy is or could be. Bob Albrecht made it his life mission to teach children how to program; he was teaching the youth that they “can create beauty and art on a computer” and that “computers can change [their lives] for the better.” Because I feel that, as a society, we already do not adhere to all of the ideals the Hacker Ethic promotes, I am inclined to claim that abandoning parts of the Hacker Ethic is worth having a larger impact on the world — not necessarily because it (coincidently) results in more financial success, but because of all the good that has come from spreading the gospel of programming to the masses. While a lot of software is monetized and information is not necessarily free anymore (everything comes at a price), computer programs and software that are meant to aid those in need are still being built, and in this way, computers are changing lives for the better. For example, I was part of a small development team responsible for building open-source eye-tracking therapy application for a child at St. Joseph’s Hospital last semester, and that application would not have been possible for us to build if it hadn’t been for the developers who adhered to the Hacker Ethic (“all information should be free” and “computers can change your life for the better”) and created an open-source eye-tracking library for individuals to use at their leisure. For this reason (amongst others), I agree with Lee Felsenstein that technology can be a force for good, but I also believe Efrem Lipkin is correct in stating that technology is a dangerous tool of oppression — if we choose to mold and use/abuse technology into a tool of oppression. Technology has the potential to be anything we choose to mold it into, and if we choose technology to be a dangerous tool of oppression, then it will be just that — a dangerous tool of oppression. But, if we all choose to use technology as a force of good, then oppression is the last thing we’d have to worry about when it comes to technology.