What is a Hacker[edit]

Ties to Theory.

By style and experience of activity[edit]

Collected by user on Telegram channel.

http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/H/hacker.html (many definitions)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker A hacker is a person skilled in information technology who achieves goals and solves problems by non-standard means.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_culture the defining characteristic of a hacker is not the activities performed themselves (e.g. programming), but how it is done[3] and whether it is exciting and meaningful
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_ethic The term "hacker" has long been used there to describe college pranks that MIT students would regularly devise, and was used more generally to describe a project undertaken or a product built to fulfill some constructive goal, but also out of pleasure for mere involvement

"As Levy summarized in the preface of Hackers, the general tenets or principles of hacker ethic include:

Sharing
Openness
Decentralization
Free access to computers
World Improvement (foremost, upholding democracy and the fundamental laws we all live by, as a society)"

They added: "Of course YMMV. There's no central organization that defines what a hacker is. Hacker cultures are living and diverse cultures!"

See:

Steven K Roberts:
- https://microship.com/the-hackers-shack/ (1989) talks about hacker as ~ "deriving pleasure from circumventing limitations ... pushing new ideas past the skeptical mainstream of an industry", and mentions "recent" mainstream media "slander" of hackers as "computer criminals" or "evil-minded revolutionaries".
- That reporting (by CBS) is detailed here: https://microship.com/hackers-1988-cbs/ (1988)

French: bidouilleur (translate bidouilleur back to English on Google Translation), hacker; fouineur (translate back to English on WordReference), finaud