The Hacker Manifesto by +++The Mentor+++ Written January 8, 1986 Another one got caught today, it's all over the papers. "Teenager Arrested in Computer Crime Scandal", "Hacker Arrested after Bank Tampering"... Damn kids. But did you, in your three-piece psychology and 1950's technobrain, ever take a look behind the eyes of the hacker? I am a hacker, enter my world... Mine is a world that begins with school... Damn underachiever. I'm in junior high or high school. Damn kid. I made a discovery today. Damn kid. And then it happened... a door opened to a world... rushing through the phone line like heroin through an addict's veins, an electronic pulse is sent out, a refuge from the day-to-day incompetencies is sought... a board is found. Damn kid. You bet your ass we're all alike... we've been spoon-fed baby food at school when we hungered for steak... the bits of meat that you did let slip through were pre-chewed and tasteless. Yes, I am a criminal. I am a hacker, and this is my manifesto.
How To Become A Hacker Copyright © 2001 Eric S. Raymond As editor of the Jargon File and author of a few other well-known documents of similar nature, I often get email requests from enthusiastic network newbies asking (in effect) "how can I learn to be a wizardly hacker?". If you are reading a snapshot of this document offline, the current version lives at Note: there is a list of Frequently Asked Questions at the end of this document. Numerous translations of this document are available: ArabicBelorussianBulgarianChinese, Czech. The five-dots-in-nine-squares diagram that decorates this document is called a glider. If you find this document valuable, please support me on Patreon or SubscribeStar. The Jargon File contains a bunch of definitions of the term ‘hacker’, most having to do with technical adeptness and a delight in solving problems and overcoming limits. The hacker mind-set is not confined to this software-hacker culture. 1. 2. 3. 5. 2. 3. 4. 1. 2. 3. 4.
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