It's funny, I am in cybersecurity but I have always liked keeping my laptop free of stickers. Always seemed like "trying too hard" to me. And as much as I love my laptop, much like my Fluke 87V, I value it as a tool, not a means of self-expression.

Maybe I am just boring, lol. I did use an original copy of the PGP source code book as a monitor stand though!

I used to keep my laptop sticker free. I changed that once I discovered how much easier it makes it to recognize which laptop is mine. This was really driven home when one year everyone at work was gifted the same macBook Air as a holiday gift by the company.

> Always seemed like "trying too hard" to me.

My thoughts exactly. It feels very much like they're roleplaying as an ordinary person's idea of a "hacker".

Sticker of a Fluke 87V for the laptop?

I always associated these battle-jacketed MacBooks with Ruby developers. But Ruby developers were the Rust developers of their day.

Our cyber security team told people not to put stickers on the laptop as it can be used to spear phish the owner, can open to industrial espionage.

They even showed us this cheesy video showing.

1. A woman chatting up a developer based on their stickers on the laptop they saw earlier. 2. Someone targeting the laptop for theft because of the stickers.

People still do it, but I've only seen it on the junior people trying to express who they are.