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What about the 1959 TMRC Dictionary? [1] > HACKER: one who hacks, or makes them. > A hacker avoids the standard solution. The hack is > the basic concep

by jt2190 12y ago

What about the 1959 TMRC Dictionary? [1] > HACKER: one who hacks, or makes them. > A hacker avoids the standard solution. The hack is > the basic concept; the hacker is defined in terms of it. (edit: The article claims that the 1963 usage was the "first", however on reading the linked listserv.linguist.org posting by Fred Shapiro, it appears that it's the first citation that uses "hacker" with negative connotations.) [1] http://www.gricer.com/tmrc/dictionary1959.html http://www.gricer.com/tmrc/dictionary1959.html [2] http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0306B&L=ads-l&P=R5831&1=ads-l&9=A&J=on&d=No+Match%3BMatch%3BMatches&z=4 http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0306B&L=ad...

gabemart 12y ago
The Google Ngrams graph for "hacker" may be of some interest: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=hacker&year_start=1950&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Chacker%3B%2Cc0 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=hacker&year_st...
gustavo_duarte 12y ago
Here's what Shapiro says: "The word "hacker" in its well-known computing sense has a first citation of 1971 (contributed by me) in the Historical Dictionary of American Slang. Here is an earlier citation, not precisely in a computing context but obviously the same term" I interpret that as the only condition on the citation being "the well-known computing sense." He's definitely not saying "with negative connotations." Even the phreaking stuff from the Tech is "not precisely in a computing context". I don't think the TMRC citation qualifies here, it's a very specific and different context (check some of its sibling entries), even if it shares some of that early magical MIT spirit. But even then, the TMRC does also say: "HACK: 1) something done without constructive end" So, all in all, even taking the TMRC into account I think the origin of the word was already ambiguous, which it is. I think the small dash of mischievousness adds to the flavor of hacking.

by jt2190 12y ago

gabemart 12y ago

The Google Ngrams graph for "hacker" may be of some interest: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=hacker&year_start=1950&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Chacker%3B%2Cc0 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=hacker&year_st...

gustavo_duarte 12y ago

Here's what Shapiro says: "The word "hacker" in its well-known computing sense has a first citation of 1971 (contributed by me) in the Historical Dictionary of American Slang. Here is an earlier citation, not precisely in a computing context but obviously the same term" I interpret that as the only condition on the citation being "the well-known computing sense." He's definitely not saying "with negative connotations." Even the phreaking stuff from the Tech is "not precisely in a computing context". I don't think the TMRC citation qualifies here, it's a very specific and different context (check some of its sibling entries), even if it shares some of that early magical MIT spirit. But even then, the TMRC does also say: "HACK: 1) something done without constructive end" So, all in all, even taking the TMRC into account I think the origin of the word was already ambiguous, which it is. I think the small dash of mischievousness adds to the flavor of hacking.