5 ms·

The word hacker needs to be adopted in broader context. Hacking is essentially a creative process and not always a malicious activity. I would suggest software

• slimsag 10y ago
  At this point, doesn't the word "hacker" just mean "somebody who is good at computers"?
  • suyash 10y ago
    I think it goes beyond computers, for example you can hack a car engine to run on water instead of gasoline. You can even hack mind, look up hacking consciousness.
• got2surf 10y ago
  Interesting point, but why fight an uphill battle? Wouldn't it be easier to avoid the term "hacker" because of the negative connotation? The importance of "hacker culture" (experimentation, clever solutions, etc) goes far beyond the name. As someone who reads Hacker News, I understand what you mean by "hacking is essentially a creative process," but wouldn't it be easier to describe it as something like creative security research instead of hacking? "Hackers" will still understand what you mean, and maybe it would be less intimidating to others. Curious to hear other thoughts.
  • otoburb 10y ago
    Professor Deibert is highly sensitive to labeling and deliberately chose and insists on denying the use of the bare term "hacker" to categorize Citizen Lab activities, instead preferring terms such as "hacktivism", self-styling himself as a "hacktivist", and his team as "researchers" in interviews and his blog[1]. [1] https://deibert.citizenlab.org/ https://deibert.citizenlab.org/
    • developer2 10y ago
      Exactly. Quote from the article: >> Ron Deibert has led a team of counterespionage hackers—he prefers “researchers”—... It's explicitly stated that his preferred term is "researchers", and yet the Globe and Mail appears to go out of their way to sensationalize by first introducing the word "hackers". Upon reading the full article, the use of the term "hacker(s)" is minimal, and used appropriately for what we self-identifying hackers would use it for. I've become so accustomed to the word being used negatively that it takes a lot of mental effort to notice when it is used in a neutral or positive tone. I still find it fairly annoying that they included the word in the headline, as though to attract more views with a "controversial buzzword". It's true: the word "hacker" has long since been poisoned by the media. They cannot get away with using the term anymore, even with no ill intent. They spent over a decade using the term to rip people and communities apart. The damage is done, and no amount of effort on their part is going to allow them to sound sincere.
  • suyash 10y ago
    We are all hackers at one point of another. Here is one source of the origination of the word http://tmrc.mit.edu/hackers-ref.html http://tmrc.mit.edu/hackers-ref.html
    • got2surf 10y ago
      I agree, and that's a fascinating link. I think that "hacker" can be an accurate/valid description, but also a poor marketing choice at the same time.
• darkkindness 10y ago
  It's so interesting that 'hacking' has a negative connotation while 'intelligence'[1] has the opposite, even though it should really be the reverse. [1] Obviously recent news have made this term more negative, but years past, there was nothing wrong with 'intelligence' (at least in my circles)
• mirimir 10y ago
  My favorite hacking tool is a hacksaw :)
• onion2k 10y ago
  "Maker" is a good alternative to hacker though. It describes what people are doing. I suspect software developers want to use "hacker" instead because they actually like the illicit "doing some bad and wrong and so damn cool" connotations that the media ascribes the term.
  • tikhonj 10y ago
    Hah, I think you're right—my first impression of "maker" is that it's just a bit too "wholesome". "Hacker" also has deep historic ties and, as used in "Hacker News", it's a bit of a programmer shibboleth, which is not necessarily a bad thing. If anything, there's something romantic about having a group identity that's so radically misunderstood by the mainstream world...
  • etiam 10y ago
    I'd suggest rather than "bad and wrong" perhaps try "(curious,) mischievous and subversive". If "hacker" is what one is really referring to, "maker" largely misses significant parts of the whole, for instance when it comes to taking things apart to understand them, and creatively subverting things to do something else than they were originally intended for.
  • terminado 10y ago
    But I really don't make anything. More often than not, I'm taking things apart, looking at the guts, and trying to figure out how to use something. Sometimes those things break, and I have to go buy a new one.