Theory KITOMARIAN
HACKER’s
LEAGUE
The Hacker's League is modeled loosely
after the American Radio Relay League (A.R.R.L.), an organization of
technological adventurers of the Edwardian period. In its heyday, the radio amateurs moved from
being nuisances to being important contributors to the development of radio
technology. In a field which demanded
governmental regulation for orderly operation, the A.R.R.L. represented the
interests of amateurs in the councils of government and organized ongoing
educational activities through which newcomers to the field could learn not
only the technology involved, but also the human interactions which connect the
technology to the outside world.
The most recent triumph of radio amateurs
has been the development of packet radio, which has recently been adopted by
Motorola as the basis for its "wireless local loop" for wireless
telephone operation. Thanks to the
amateurs, it was developed and tried out in an open environment outside of
commercial pressures which tend toward secrecy and exclusion.
In the area of computers and
telecommunication, there are several parallels between today's hackers and the
radio amateurs of 1915. Hackers are seen
by the respectable technological players as nuisances capable of doing great
damage and generally without redeeming qualitites. They were indistinguishable from rogue
broadcasters who trampled on other signals in their urge to cover the longest
distance. In the corridors of power
there was a movement toward outlawing them.
Nontechnical people did not know quite what to think about this problem
and its suggested solution.
The A.R.R.L. was more than a lobbying
organization, though. It provided a
means for the mutual education essential to the growth of any technology, a
route of entry open to all comers, and a social scene to accompany the
technological forum. Through the
A.R.R.L. green kids could encounter grizzled old timers who would be
unapproachable in their positions the industry.
At field days and other events the cameraderie of being explorers
overcame the barriers of class and position as well as those engendered by
commercial competition. Networking was
possible in the amateur environment which forwarded the operation in the
commercial and professional environments.
The concept of the Hacker's League is
similar but different as befits the different nature of the technology. The aim is to provide a situation in which
otherwise unqualified entrants to the field can engage in informal learning
situations, test their skills as a means of exercising their craft, gain
hands-on experience with systems which would be unobtainable otherwise, and
participate on both sides of mentoring and tutorial relationships.
The Hacker's League would provide an
outlet for the creative energies which are otherwise expended making life worse
for perceived or imagined enemies through unauthorized entry to systems and
other illegal or unethical conduct. Such
energies would be turned toward projects which advance the state of the art,
and in a way which undermines the arrogance and exclusivity of the corporate
managers which hackers find so tempting a target.
To the charge that the Hacker's League
would become a front for the interests of industry may be raised the defense
that by exploiting industry's fear of low-level disorder it would provide an
organizing platform for higher-level attack upon the technological
underpinnings of the existing structure.
Consider the difference between outcomes had hackers in the 1970's been
content to organize politically for access to mainframes. There would have been
no personal computer industry, and the power relationships would not have
undergone the radical changes brought about by the triumph of open
architecture. One might well have said
then that the amateur computer activity was a distraction from the true task of
tugging at the sleeve of power, yet we can all see the effects of that
activity.
The Hacker's League could be seen as a
guild serving to restrict entry to the membership of the technical elite. In fact, the League would be far more open
than the current system of university education. It would provide a means of testing to see
whether one is suited to the demands of the technology without exacting years
of commitment to learning prerequisites.
Within the Hacker's League there would be much more mobility among
specialties than exists in university curricula, and the doors would be open to
underage entrants and those who come later in life after entrance to a
university becomes difficult or impossible.
Still, the human tendencies which lead
toward exclusivity and the formation of cliques will always be with us, and we
must bear them in mind as we proceed in conceptualizing and realizing the
Hacker's League. The technology in which
we work tends to eliminate the need for centralization, and one of the
important outcomes of the League’s development would be the demonstration of
the decentralized mode of organization, as noble an exploration as might be
contemplated, int he opinion of many.
After all, the primary challenge is not so
much in the hardware, or the physical form of the systems of intercommunication
and interaction around which society develops.
The important work is in developing the social forms of use of this technology
which forwards the common good as well as that of the individual. New ways of thinking, as Einstein said, are
the urgently needed ingredient for the humanization and survival of society. The Hacker's League would not only provide a
development bed for social innovations involving the use of information
technology, but it would empower those innovations through the parallel
development of the technology and, most importantly, of the human network
through which the technology is made to come alive.
Practice
The Hacker's League would be membership
organization open to nonmembers for certain functions. It would be organized as a nonprofit
educational and scientific organization.
Its publications would be freely available to all interested readers.
The League would hold periodic local
events demonstrating technical achievements of members or chapters, and
offering places for individuals outside the League to exhibit or to engage in
low-level trade, such as swap meets. A
newcomer would most probably make first contact at such events, and might
decide to attend a local chapter meeting.
Meetings of local chapters would be high
in information exchange and low in structure.
Newcomers would be acknowledged and provided with a brief orientation so
that they would not feel put off by displays of technical virtuosity or
cliquishness. If the newcomer desired
further involvement, there would be a set of course tracks available as
suggested paths for establishing, through achievement, one's level of
skill. These might be thought of as
Scout Merit Badges, although the name would probably not be used.
In the early stages of involvement, the
newcomer might interact with a designated instructor who is also working to
establish skill in teaching and coaching.
Later, as the newcomer gains skill and established competence, he or she
would be recommended for more individual instruction and consultation from more
highly skilled mentors. Such mentoring
relationships would be an important feature of the League, both as a means and
end.
The League at the local level would
acquire maintain obsolescent equipment which would be operated and improved by
the members through development projects proposed from the membership. Telecommunication resource would also be
solicited as donations from carriers, on the none-too-subtle suggestion that
the availability of such resource in such a context is conducive to the
development of skilled citizens instead of antisocial attackers. Through this resource the League would
maintain its larger structure, which would be a communication-based overlay of
networks and ad-hocracies.
Through these structures conflicting
positions could be discussed and debated in a functioning participatory
democracy. Informed plebiscites would be
conducted both as a means of determining the sense of the League on issues of
importance and as development projects testing the capabilities of information
technology under various arrangements of use.
The highest structure of organization would be at the local level, and
the administrators at wider levels might be given titles, such as Janitor,
which tend to prevent puffery and self-glorification. Sapiential authority would be fostered within
the League as opposed to positional authority.
The newcomer would progress from
establishing his or her level of skill to a process of exploring the available
courses of self-development. It would be
possible to propose a specific course different from the recommended
courses. The newcomer would then engage
in projects which require the improvement in skill level under the supervision
or review of competent skilled members.
This should be seen as professional
development (where the word has no connotation of "earning a
livelihood") and since it is a responsibility of all professionals to
teach and transmit their skills, the newcomer would along the way be expected
to perform as an instructor and later a supervisor and mentor to future
newcomers. Thus, progress in
self-development would not be simply a matter of the "neat hacks" one
could accomplish, but would require an integration into the society first of
hackers, then the broader society. There
is no reason why technologists must rely on others to represent their work to
the public or the polity.
One of the public service functions
performed by the members of the Hacker's League (and this performance would be
explicitly carried out by the members and not by the "organization")
would be consultation on informational security and integrity of communications
within everyday society. Members of the
League would provide a service of analysis of proposals, investigations of
system misuse and pursuit of abusers which would rest on its own professional
foundation rather than serving direct commercial ends which might distort the
conclusions of investigations.
To use a popular metaphor, members of the
Hacker’s League might be compared to doctors on the Electronic Frontier, with
their own loose medical association to keep quackery at bay and serving a
public health function. Or perhaps the
analogy might be to schoolteachers who also write literature and literary
criticism, as well as turning out works of art and organizing criticism of the
same. Obviously, this metaphoric space
needs work.
One can expect to better one's material
condition through participating in the networks of relationships which would be
the Hacker's League, if one has the skill and aptitude to improve one's
skills. If not, it would be no shame to
cease participation. An important function of the League would be to encourage
the incompetent to go elsewhere without opprobium. They may well turn up as administrators
within industry, and it is in no ones' interest for there to be hostile
relations based upon "loser" status.
In fact, the Hacker's League would be a
way to do away with the "winner/loser" dichotomy. If you try, you win to some degree, and
younger members less secure in themselves need to learn this, at times to a
desperate degree. One can take on more
than one can handle, be allowed to fail with support from those more
experienced, and not incur actual or emotional costs which would otherwise
drive one away from such experimentation.
The Hacker's League wouldn't be working without a measurable degree of
honestly won failure on the part of its members.
What types of projects would be
undertaken? Perhaps the development of
distributed operating systems suitable for networks of variegated intelligent
devices; elegant user front-ends and development environments for intuitive
system configuration; pidgin speech (unnatural language) recognition systems;
new structures of groupware; possibly neural networks at higher levels.
But these are my own conjectures, and what
would actually transpire would almost certainly make these guesses look
ridiculously quaint and primitive. Let's
give it a chance to happen.
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