I am sick of the media saying "Hacker" when they mean "Black Hat"

[onion2k]

I'm sick of people having prescriptive definitions of how language ought to be used. The term 'hacker' in a media piece about someone 'remotely abusing a computer system' is entirely understandable and consequently perfectly alright to use. Language is a beautiful, dynamic, living organism that evolves depending on how it's used by everyone every day. There is no 'wrong way' when it comes to language. There are ways that work and ways that don't work; which way you go for depends on how well you want to be understood.

Try to delight in the way people use language. Defining a word strictly and pedantically is showing off by demonstrating that you know more about a word's etymology and usage than someone else. Don't do that.

[hamburglar]

I'm pretty well convinced that the motivation for getting upset over the "wrong" use of this word is usually just a desire to claim special knowledge and feel superior about being part of the elite group that knows the true meaning. It's disingenuous moaning about "confusion" while ignoring the fact that the rest of the world seems to get along just fine with the occasional word that has (gasp) more than one meaning.

[3villabs]

Noted thanks for the advice

[czbond]

You do understand that usage has been around longer for that context than the recently popular way of describing anyone that can touch a keyboard?

[pabb]

Precisely. I've read the counter sentiment multiple times from black hats who are exasperated seeing "hacker" tied to any notion of someone who programs or likes to "tinker with shit". I'd much rather keep the word definition at its root. (disclosure: I'm not a hacker)

[3villabs]

Agreed that is my point. It has been around a long term, and yes we are in danger of overuse. Thus the comment on "Sex Hackers" indicating we have gone to far.

[clef]

Spot on.

[stonogo]

When people say "cowboy," they don't mean the hundreds of thousands of working-class guys driving cattle for a living. They either mean Wild Bill or they mean some guy at a rodeo. When people say "trucker" they don't mean the hundreds of thousands of guys driving food deliveries to grocery stores; they mean Jerry Reed from Smokey and the Bandit. When people say "princess" they don't mean Lady Di, they mean any number of Disney characters.

In a similar vein, when people say "hacker" they don't particularly give a shit what side the guy's on, and "black hat" as a term is only acceptable in IT communities -- everyone else smirks at the nerd shit and continues using the terminology accepted by the vast majority of human society.

You're going to have to get used to it.

[Jtsummers]

It's been this way for (EDIT: at least) 30 years. And the discussion has been going on just as long. Though it used to be, especially on /. back in the day, rants about "hacker" versus "cracker". I once tried to point this out to my parents, never again. It just doesn't matter. We've elected to continue applying a label to ourselves that the media uses in a totally different way. Language changes, often in ways counter to what we want, accept this and move on.

[3villabs]

I am not trying to change the world but when a potential business partner hears I am a hacker I don't want them thinking I am going to steal their credit card info.

[peterwwillis]

I'm sick of the media saying "skinhead" when they mean "neo-nazi/white supremacist", but I don't go around whining about it. The use of words is controlled by popular opinion, not only one subclass of people that refer to themselves using the word.

Some words just need to be retired.

[pekk]

But you did just whine about it. And many skinheads ARE white supremacists or nativists.

[Cuuugi]

Forgive my ignorance, but wasn't the word made to describe "black hat" activities?

Everything else is a new definition (white hat etc.)

Language evolves, especially with created words.

Will your opinion win? Possibly, i dont know ( or care). I just get sick of people thinking their way of thinking is accepted fact.

[georgemcfly]

The modern, non "black hat" use of the word originates with the MIT Tech Model Railroad Club (http://www.gricer.com/tmrc/dictionary1959.html) who define "hack" as '1) an article or project without constructive end; 2) work undertaken on bad self-advice; 3) an entropy booster; 4) to produce, or attempt to produce, a hack (3)."

Quite a few words in the "computer geek" lexicon were borrowed from the TMRC.

[blakesterz]

As much as I agree with this we have lost this battle. For most people the definition of hacker is black hat, all the blog posts and comments in the world won't change that. People who get their news from newspapers and TV now know hackers break into things and steal stuff. They know that hackers are the bad guys.

[3villabs]

I understand, but as I plan to use the word a lot and take ownership of it this post is designed to inform those whom might read my stuff that I am not intending to steal their credit cards... yet... (jk)

[StudyAnimal]

So what is the other type of hacker then? And is the difference really substantial enough to warrant a separate word?

[sssilver]

And that's awesome. Because that's what hackers are, not just some mediocre Javascript coders :P

[badman_ting]

Language is fluid, and sadly we don't control it. Sorry.

[3villabs]

Oh nothing to be sorry about. Just merely making note of it.

[clef]

>4) a person who illegally gains access to and sometimes tampers with information in a computer system

>This is the last one because it is the least accurate and has been created only in recent times by the media.

By recent times, you mean since the mid/late 80's when hacking sort of got known in the mainstream after phreaking?

>"Anyone that takes a look at a goal and a given set of resources then figures out an unconventional way to achieve that goal"

I want to be rich! therefore I choose to rob a bank (my unconventional way of achieving that goal), does that make me a hacker too? (Like a bank hacker)

Awesome article nonetheless!

[icantthinkofone]

You are confused as many people grow up and enter this field. The original term for the bad guys was "crackers" and all crackers are hackers but not all hackers are crackers.

The media doesn't understand that and now all the young people growing up have the term 'hacker' all confused and messed up and ruined for the rest of us.

[bitsteak]

Ask any random person what they think of when you say "hacker." PROTIP: it's not your typical employee of some random consumer web startup, working 12 hour days and pounding redbull. It's someone who bypasses technical security controls through mastery of the underlying technology.

[StudyAnimal]

Does anyone think the former should be considered a good description of a hacker? To me it is someone using their intelligence, to do something clever (or at least in a clever way) to disrupt or destroy something, make someone uncomfortable or piss someone off, or challenge something, for some result that satisfies them or someone else in some way. And the essence really lies in that first bit. A random programmer isn't a hacker unless that first bit is there, the unorthodox, challenging or subversive bit.

[kaeruct]

but those aren't mutually exclusive

[StudyAnimal]

I used to think there were two separate uses of the word, and one was less correct than the other. I used to insist people distinguish between a good "hacker" and an evil "cracker". Now I understand the essence of the term, there is no distinction between the two. Its all the same. Central to the essence is this notion that good and bad are subjective, and anything characterised as hacking should probably be both good (for someone or something) and evil (for someone or something) combined. Destruction and creation are both equally implied. I think if something is purely 100% good for everyone, I don't think the word hacker applies.

[rainsford]

Language is ultimately defined by popular usage, and the majority of the usage of "hacker" means "black hat" type activities. You can argue for a different usage until you're blue in the face, but the black hat usage is pretty clearly the dominant one and has been for quite a while. Insisting on a different usage and using the word that way yourself just leads to confusion and makes you sound pedantic, no matter how correct you feel your definition is.

[stronglikedan]

Context is important. Most laypersons reading an article don't know the terms "Black Hat", "White Hat", and so on. A good article should differentiate the intentions of the "hacker", so that the reader can imply the morality of those intentions by the context.

[Kurtz79]

Dozen of years of movies and video-games have cemented fairly well the use of the word.

"Look at you, hacker: a pathetic creature of meat and bone, panting and sweating as you run through my corridors. How can you challenge a perfect, immortal machine?"

[coldtea]

Well, you don't control language. Language is language as it's used.

Furthermore, the whole "hacker is the good kind, no the black hat kind" screams "no true scotchman" to me. Lots of black hat's self identify as hackers.

[burtonlang]

My understanding of the No True Scotsman fallacy involves changing a definition during an argument in order to hold on to some assertion.

This is not the same thing as a person feeling that a particular word should have a particular meaning.

[CmonDev]

To me it's someone who creates a messy working solution quickly. This is opposite to developers, who have to care about maintainability.

[olssy]

Whatever kind of hacker you are there's a great convention for us all this summer in NYC, Hackers On Planet Earth: hope.net

[3villabs]

Thanks! I'll check it out

[skrowl]

Obligatory HACK THE PLANET!

[3villabs]

Love the reference!

[chippy1337]

Actually, they mean "Cracker".

[rrouse]

To some people, that means "one who removes copy protections from software"

[stonogo]

In fact, they mean "hacker," because you don't get to define the words they use.

[theandrewbailey]

But if you said that, people would think you're making an epithet against white people.

[icantthinkofone]

You are totally correct!