Exploring Hacker Ideologies In System Development And Software Evolution

"Hackers" are identified as a specific subgroup of computer workers. The history of the hacker community is told. The explicit and implicit ideologies expressed through hacking is analyzed and presented. Computer artifacts of origin both inside and outside the hacker community are compared and the embedded properties of the resulting artifacts are inferred. Hacking is discussed in the context of being a method for system development. Finally, it is argued that this system development method under certain circumstances may yield superior software artifacts.

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