Re:Where have all the hackers gone?
by JohnFen on Thursday May 18, 2023 @01:31PM
(#35991365)
> Have other people observed the sentiment the author observes, around hackers being less common?
I think that hackers are still around -- I see them a lot -- but they aren't as publicly visible anymore. They aren't interested in making money, and so they won't be in most mainstream technical fora (including HN), because of the cultural shift that made chasing dollars the main thing.
But they are in more private fora, and they get together in person (at conventions, hackerspaces, etc.).
I don't think the hacker community has grown smaller, but I think most of the web has changed so that it's not as appealing to people who want to talk hacker stuff.
All of which is to say -- like when people ask what happened to the old web, back when it was actually good -- they're still there, but they're harder to see in the increasingly dense forest of commercially-minded places.
I think that hackers are still around -- I see them a lot -- but they aren't as publicly visible anymore. They aren't interested in making money, and so they won't be in most mainstream technical fora (including HN), because of the cultural shift that made chasing dollars the main thing.
But they are in more private fora, and they get together in person (at conventions, hackerspaces, etc.).
I don't think the hacker community has grown smaller, but I think most of the web has changed so that it's not as appealing to people who want to talk hacker stuff.
All of which is to say -- like when people ask what happened to the old web, back when it was actually good -- they're still there, but they're harder to see in the increasingly dense forest of commercially-minded places.