4 ms·

It's hard to reconcile lines like "was born in 1981, and as a young computer enthusiast I quickly became aware of my unfortunate place in the history of computi

It's hard to reconcile lines like "was born in 1981, and as a young computer enthusiast I quickly became aware of my unfortunate place in the history of computing. I thought I was born in the wrong time. I would think to myself I was born long after the glory days of hacking and the computer revolution." with entryism.

generic_user 10y ago
> "was born in 1981, and as a young computer enthusiast I quickly became aware of my unfortunate place in the history of computing. I thought I was born in the wrong time. I would think to myself I was born long after the glory days of hacking and the computer revolution." This passage is intended to cast the 1980 as an 'oppressive' era full of 'sin' that we should feel guilty about and strive to repent for at the alter of 'equality' that we can have in the new age of 'justice' if only we fallow the new commandments. Where have I heard that before? The appeal to 1950's and 60's computer culture is very much like the appeal to 'old time religion' employed by preachers to herd there flock. Be careful that your not taken in by religious rhetoric in progressive drag. There are powerful archetypes in religion that unfortunately certain parts of the left have been increasingly using.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 10y ago
  I was born in the 70s and when I was a young computer enthusiast my reading experience is similar: there was a glory era of hacking and experimentation and lisp machines and fun but now it was over and we had to live in this era of professionalism and msdos and you couldn't phreak a phone anymore. Then I got to college and discovered the internet just as the web was getting started and I started to realize that even though that old era was gone forever, here's a thing that's new and exciting and at least as world-changing. I still see that 'wow those old timey hackers were really something, and we'll never have the like again' mindset floating around the internet, even here on HN. (For example, people talking about how great lisp machines were or how great smalltalk environments were and how it's such a tragedy that we'll never see their like again).
  - generic_user 10y ago
    There is a similar dynamic with first wave Linux people who love the decentralized community oriented 1990's and 2000's that have been reshaped by the 2010's which have been highly centralizing and corporate driven with systemd, containerization etc. Are the 2010's going to be looked back at in 30 yeas as a horrible decade that destroyed the ambitions of thousands of 12 year old female SysVinit scripting wizkids? Its possible but it seems highly pedantic and silly to think so. Projecting our current arguments onto history usually ends up as colorful revisionism that is historically inaccurate and politicized. I think people are quite rightly skeptical of such attempts. The tactic is used endlessly in politics, which is certainly not the bastion of accurate factual argument and reasoned discourse.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]

generic_user 10y ago

> "was born in 1981, and as a young computer enthusiast I quickly became aware of my unfortunate place in the history of computing. I thought I was born in the wrong time. I would think to myself I was born long after the glory days of hacking and the computer revolution." This passage is intended to cast the 1980 as an 'oppressive' era full of 'sin' that we should feel guilty about and strive to repent for at the alter of 'equality' that we can have in the new age of 'justice' if only we fallow the new commandments. Where have I heard that before? The appeal to 1950's and 60's computer culture is very much like the appeal to 'old time religion' employed by preachers to herd there flock. Be careful that your not taken in by religious rhetoric in progressive drag. There are powerful archetypes in religion that unfortunately certain parts of the left have been increasingly using.

GFK_of_xmaspast 10y ago
I was born in the 70s and when I was a young computer enthusiast my reading experience is similar: there was a glory era of hacking and experimentation and lisp machines and fun but now it was over and we had to live in this era of professionalism and msdos and you couldn't phreak a phone anymore. Then I got to college and discovered the internet just as the web was getting started and I started to realize that even though that old era was gone forever, here's a thing that's new and exciting and at least as world-changing. I still see that 'wow those old timey hackers were really something, and we'll never have the like again' mindset floating around the internet, even here on HN. (For example, people talking about how great lisp machines were or how great smalltalk environments were and how it's such a tragedy that we'll never see their like again).
- generic_user 10y ago
  There is a similar dynamic with first wave Linux people who love the decentralized community oriented 1990's and 2000's that have been reshaped by the 2010's which have been highly centralizing and corporate driven with systemd, containerization etc. Are the 2010's going to be looked back at in 30 yeas as a horrible decade that destroyed the ambitions of thousands of 12 year old female SysVinit scripting wizkids? Its possible but it seems highly pedantic and silly to think so. Projecting our current arguments onto history usually ends up as colorful revisionism that is historically inaccurate and politicized. I think people are quite rightly skeptical of such attempts. The tactic is used endlessly in politics, which is certainly not the bastion of accurate factual argument and reasoned discourse.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]