* * * * *
                                        
        Geek Power: Steven Levy Revisits Tech Titans, Hackers, Idealists
                                        
> In the last chapters of “Hackers”, I focused on the threat of
> commercialism, which I feared would corrupt the hacker ethic. I didn't
> anticipate that those ideals would remake the very nature of commerce. Yet
> the fact that the hacker ethic spread so widely—and mingled with mammon in
> so many ways—guaranteed that the movement, like any subculture that breaks
> into the mainstream, would change dramatically. So as “Hackers” was about
> to appear in a new edition (this spring, O’Reilly Media is releasing a
> reprint, including the first digital version), I set out to revisit both
> the individuals and the culture. Like the movie “Broken Flowers [1]”, in
> which Bill Murray embarks on a road trip to search out his former
> girlfriends, I wanted to extract some meaning from seeing what had happened
> to my subjects over the years, hoping their experiences would provide new
> insights as to how hacking has changed the world—and vice versa.
> 
> I could visit only a small sample, but in their examples I found a
> reflection of how the tech world has developed over the past 25 years.
> While the hacker movement may have triumphed, not all of the people who
> created it enjoyed the same fate. Like Gates, some of my original subjects
> are now rich, famous, and powerful. They thrived in the movement's
> transition from insular subculture to multibillion-dollar industry, even if
> it meant rejecting some of the core hacker tenets. Others, unwilling or
> unable to adapt to a world that had discovered and exploited their passion—
> or else just unlucky—toiled in obscurity and fought to stave off
> bitterness. I also found a third group: the present-day heirs to the hacker
> legacy, who grew up in a world where commerce and hacking were never seen
> as opposing values. They are bringing their worldview into fertile new
> territories and, in doing so, are molding the future of the movement.
> 

“Geek Power: Steven Levy Revisits Tech Titans, Hackers, Idealists | Magazine
[2]”

My own copy of _Hackers: Heros of the Computer Revolution_ [3] is worn out
from so many readings and re-readings that it's falling apart (and when I
first got it, back in 1986 or so, I read the entire book in one sitting,
which lasted all night—not something I should have done on a school night).

So now here is Steven Levy, revisiting his own book from a twenty-five year
perspective, and following up on the changes to the industry, and the people
he interviews, since the early 80s.

[1] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0412019/
[2] http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/04/ff_hackers/all/1
[3] http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0141000511/conmanlaborat-

Email Sean Conner at sean@conman.org

.