[Wolves] Brumcon on Midlands Today

[sparkes]

fizzy wrote:
>  --- Kevan <kevanf1 at yahoo.co.uk> wrote: 
> 
>>Yeah, yet another way a word has been corrupted.  I
>>understood it as being hackers good but crackers
>>bad. 
>>Or am I totally barking :-)))
> 
> 
> The OED says to hack is to: "use a computer to gain
> unauthorized access to data" so I'll stick with their
> meaning.  Trying to change the meaning of a word seems
> pretty pointless to me... Not having a go at you, but
> ESR annoys me.
> 

As I have said before I believe both definitions can co-exist.  Crackers 
that do it just for profit aren't hackers they are generally script 
kiddies with criminal minds.

Crackers who come up with new expoits are 100% hackers it would be a 
rare chance that a none hacker could make *any* discovery.  Let alone 
one that required thinking in a new way (as the best hackers do)

look at the history of all the sciences and you find two type the 
hackers and the ploders.

ploders make discoveries slowly by thinking things through in a 
predetermined fashion.  they make discoveries by applying the thinking 
of a another person in more depth or to a new field.

hackers make radical leaps and change the way ploders think.

it doesn't matter what field you work you will know hackers and ploders. 
  It's just that IT (plus some sciences) have a larger percentage of 
hackers to ploders than usual.

the same thing exists in the arts where some people are just journeymen 
and others are radical in their thinking and change the way other people 
think.

If we understand the ESR meaning of hacker it's easy to apply it to a 
cleaned up OED definition (removing the script kiddie element) then they 
are right and as computer hackers we just apply the word differently. 
Its nothing to get stressed about.

> 
>>Kevan
> 
> fizz
> 
sparkes

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