A true hacker, according to Steven Levy, is a person who works with computers purely for the joy of using computers, rather than being motivated by factors such as money or academic prestige. Hackers work with their hands, tackle highly ambitious projects, and figure things out as they go along, disdaining the red tape of industry or academia.

A hacker is both collaborative and individual. They share knowledge, information, and programs freely and tinker with each other’s work whenever they want. The Incompatible Time-sharing System (ITS) exemplifies this, as it has no passwords protecting different users’ files—the hackers saw this as a bureaucratic overreach on their freedom. Hackers are also individual, in the sense that they will work solo for days or weeks on a project, such as when Steve Russell spent several months creating Spacewar! mainly by himself. However, once he finished (or at least, completed a rough version), he turned it over to the MIT hackers and let them make it more robust and featureful, which they did to an extreme, adding realistic stars, a strategic component (a central sun with gravity), and a rudimentary joystick for improved control.

A hacker is optimistic in the goodness of people and will freely share information. The Spacewar! creators freely let DEC use the program as a demo program for their PDP-1 computers, without expecting any sort of licensing royalties or recognition. Hackers are also trusting in people to behave (mostly) ethically with the power they wield. They had great skill in lock-picking and breaking and entering—even possessing rare master keys that gave them the run of many campus buildings—but they only used it to get what they needed, or sometimes just for the thrill and challenge of penetrating the bureaucracy’s defenses. The questionable activities they did, such as rewiring a computer to add a new instruction or accessing phone company lines for free, were done with pure intentions of exploring or improving their own workflow.

I aspire to some aspects of true hackerdom, such as their motivations and genuine enjoyment of what they do. It is inspiring how they enjoy their work so much that their meager pay is just an added bonus. So many people see their job as solely a way to make money, and they resent the time that they “waste” in order to make a living. I have not started working full-time yet, but the work I do for class is for the most part enjoyable and fulfilling, so I hope to continue and improve on that throughout my career.

However, Levy’s description of a true hacker leaves much to be desired. For starters, they spend so much time tinkering with computers that they have little time for anything else, leading to an unhealthy physical and social lifestyle. Several times he describes the hacker–computer relationship like a romantic human relationship. I hope I never become so invested in computers (or anything) that it regularly leads me to sleep or eat poorly, and I prefer to have a good balance between my work and hobbies, relaxing, and friends. Hacker culture is also problematic in their elitism and strict meritocracy. They reject anyone who disagrees with their lifestyle as a “loser,” and their preference for already-skilled hackers leaves out anyone who is curious and wants to learn, particularly those who were not privileged enough to have significant exposure to computers growing up.