In the second part of “Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution”, Steven Levy describes a new kind of hacker: a hardware hacker, bent on spreading the use of computers and the Hacker Ethic to the masses.
Chapter 8 begins with Lee Felsenstein’s story, a passionate hacker eager to “break computers out of the protected AI towers, up from the depths of the dungeons of the corporate accounting departments, and let people discover themselves by the hands-on imperative” (p. 154). Already we can see some of the differences between the True Hackers of the first part of the book and the Hardware Hackers. These Hardware Hackers valued and promoted the free flow of information and access to computers beyond the institutionalized AI labs of MIT. In chapter 8, Levy quotes the novel, “Revolt in 2100,” one of Felsenstein’s high school inspirations, writing “secrecy is the keystone of all tyranny” (p.156). This notion is clearly in line with the Hacker Ethic, but by the end of Part 2 in chapter 13: Secrets, we see secrecy and commercialization start to emerge in the Hardware Hacker community.
Prior to this, however, the Hardware Hackers were driven to bring the computer to the people – at first just to more hobbyists – but eventually to the average person’s home. In chapters 8-13, we see how impactful and important community groups were to the Hackers’ movement to democratize the use and building of computers.
Bob Albrecht started the People’s Computer Company (PCC) in 1972 to chronicle the movement after the success of his “medicine show”, where he and a few passionate programmers went to high schools across the country to spread excitement and knowledge about computers and programming. Albrecht was particularly excited about BASIC, a language that was English-like and interactive, and wrote instructional books on the language in his effort to make programming more accessible to the average person. This brings up another point of contention between the Hardware Hackers and the True Hackers of MIT – while Hardware Hackers embraced BASIC and saw it as a way to make programming more accessible, True Hackers denounced it as a “fascist language” due to its limited structure, decreasing the programmer’s power (p.170).
Hackers Fred Moore and Gordon French eventually became frustrated with the PCC (as Albrecht wouldn’t let them teach a hardware class), and started perhaps the most important community group to the computer revolution of the 1970s: the Homebrew Computer Club.
The Homebrew Computer Club emulated the Hacker Ethic in a number of ways: there was no membership requirement, no minimum dues, and no election of officers. It simply existed to share information, cool hacks, and new developments by its members. However, by 1975, there was some conflict around the Hacker Ethic driven by would-be Microsoft’s Bill Gates. Ed Roberts’s Altair supposedly had a BASIC but no one at Homebrew had seen it run. Gates and Paul Allen had written a BASIC for the Altair and Roberts hired them to complete it for his company, MITS. The software library written for the Altair was controversial because it was essentially the first time that software was for sale, and not freely passed around to any hacker who wanted it as the Hacker Ethic might suggest. Unlike the software the MIT hackers were writing, this software actually had a market, and Gates and MITS wanted to take advantage of that. This was the first compromise of the Hacker Ethic in favor of commercialization of software. In chapters 12 and 13 we see this on a much larger scale with Steve Wozniak’s (Woz) hacking and Steve Jobs’s business plan.
While working at HP designing logic for calculator chips, Woz was regularly attending Homebrew meetings and building a computer. In building this computer, Woz created one board of chips and circuitry, doing “what it took other people two chips to do”(p.257). Levy compares Woz’s hacking to that of the True Hackers of the TMRC, like their attempts to “whittle a subroutine down to the fewest instructions” (p.257). At last the computer was finished and Steve Jobs, Woz’s friend, wanted to sell them. At first, the Hacker Ethic was in full swing: even while on sale, anyone in Homebrew could see the schematics, BASIC was given away free with the purchase of another part, and even Apple’s philosophy was to “provide software for our machine free or at minimal cost”(p.258).
Eventually, the Hacker Ethic began to be compromised. It seemed that in order to continue spreading computers beyond hobbyists, it was essential to commercialize and make money. Although I don’t think Steve Jobs was particularly concerned with the Hacker Ethic, I do think he would’ve been glad to hear that “making money would perhaps not be harmful at all to the Hacker Ethic” (p.271).
Levy writes on page 271 that hackerism would not survive if not for a “merger of the two cultures, hacker and industrial”, and that is where I stand as well on the necessity of commercializing computers into an industry (p.271). With the rapid growth of companies like Apple, MITS, and Processor Technology, who were all charging for their software and machines, what would the alternative to joining this new rat race be? There would be no competition to the large companies and little opportunity for growth in the industry outside of the giants. In this sense, I do think it necessary to sacrifice parts of the Hacker Ethic in order to spread other parts of it further and allow the ordinary person to perhaps become a hacker themselves.
For example, where would I be if not for the development and commercialization of personal computers? Certainly not studying computer science or discovering a hacker-esque passion for low level programming and hardware!!! Ultimately, compromising some ideals in favor of commercialization is a little unfortunate for the pure Hardware Hackers and the Hacker Ethic, but worth it for giving just about everyone the opportunity to use computers and discover their capabilities themselves.
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