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I agree with your point, but consider the 'Hacker' in 'Hacker News', that has very negative connotations in mainstream language (thanks, media industry!), but t

I agree with your point, but consider the 'Hacker' in 'Hacker News', that has very negative connotations in mainstream language (thanks, media industry!), but the type of smart, gets-things-done people who use this site can see through the language at the values behind it. Exactly the kind of smart, gets-things-done types who can make a difference in politics, I'd imagine.

tome 17y ago
Yes, I imagine that the people who will vote for a party with the policies the Pirate Party has will not be the ones who would be put off by "Pirate" in the name.
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
- michael_dorfman 17y ago
  But that's the question, isn't it? Could they attract more "mainstream" voters if their rhetoric were not based upon preaching to the choir?
  - tome 17y ago
    I doubt it. I think they just want to get enough votes to make the mainstream sit up and listen.
tspiteri 17y ago
The story of 'hacker' is not quite the same as the story of 'pirate'. I think that 'hacker' first meant someone who can hack things up, then some people did some hacks to crack systems; to crack a system you had to be resourceful, you had to be a hacker to be a cracker. These crackers made so much of a name for themselves that most people use 'hacker' to refer only to this subset of hackers. On the other hand, the original pirates were thieves. We are currently seeing a resurgance of the use of 'pirate' to refer to a thief on the sea. So the word always referred to something negative. So 'hacker' was a positive (or at least neutral) term, and it got its negative reputation by being associated with people who did bad things. 'Pirate' was negative, and some people tried to give other people a negative reputation by calling them that. In summary, 'hacker' got its negative connotations from bad people, but 'pirate' is a negative word that is used to give a negative reputation to people.
- eru 17y ago
  You are right. That's not a problem, though. Terms like `dike', `nigger' or `swiss' where entirely negative in the beginning, too. Now you can see some of them as self-designations.
  - jacquesm 17y ago
    swiss ???
    - eru 17y ago
      Sorry, I can not find the exact source. The Eidgenossen (`comrades in oath') fought against the old German Empire. Schwyz was the name of one Kanton, but soon used by outsiders to describe the whole confedereation. The Eidgenossen did not like this at first, but eventually accepted the name defiantly. However their state's official name - even today - is confoederatio helvetica. (This is in neo-Latin mostly not to give official preference to one of the countries languages over another.) Perhaps not nearly as bad as `nigger', but `swiss' was not meant as a compliment at first either.
george_morgan 17y ago
I always assumed the 'Hacker' in Hacker News was there to gently stigmatise the site, to avoid it going to way of sites like Digg.

tome 17y ago

Yes, I imagine that the people who will vote for a party with the policies the Pirate Party has will not be the ones who would be put off by "Pirate" in the name.

deleted 17y ago
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michael_dorfman 17y ago
But that's the question, isn't it? Could they attract more "mainstream" voters if their rhetoric were not based upon preaching to the choir?
- tome 17y ago
  I doubt it. I think they just want to get enough votes to make the mainstream sit up and listen.

tspiteri 17y ago

The story of 'hacker' is not quite the same as the story of 'pirate'. I think that 'hacker' first meant someone who can hack things up, then some people did some hacks to crack systems; to crack a system you had to be resourceful, you had to be a hacker to be a cracker. These crackers made so much of a name for themselves that most people use 'hacker' to refer only to this subset of hackers. On the other hand, the original pirates were thieves. We are currently seeing a resurgance of the use of 'pirate' to refer to a thief on the sea. So the word always referred to something negative. So 'hacker' was a positive (or at least neutral) term, and it got its negative reputation by being associated with people who did bad things. 'Pirate' was negative, and some people tried to give other people a negative reputation by calling them that. In summary, 'hacker' got its negative connotations from bad people, but 'pirate' is a negative word that is used to give a negative reputation to people.

eru 17y ago
You are right. That's not a problem, though. Terms like `dike', `nigger' or `swiss' where entirely negative in the beginning, too. Now you can see some of them as self-designations.
- jacquesm 17y ago
  swiss ???
  - eru 17y ago
    Sorry, I can not find the exact source. The Eidgenossen (`comrades in oath') fought against the old German Empire. Schwyz was the name of one Kanton, but soon used by outsiders to describe the whole confedereation. The Eidgenossen did not like this at first, but eventually accepted the name defiantly. However their state's official name - even today - is confoederatio helvetica. (This is in neo-Latin mostly not to give official preference to one of the countries languages over another.) Perhaps not nearly as bad as `nigger', but `swiss' was not meant as a compliment at first either.

george_morgan 17y ago

I always assumed the 'Hacker' in Hacker News was there to gently stigmatise the site, to avoid it going to way of sites like Digg.