As I understand it, HN is a news forum associated with ycombinator, which I understand is all about startups, VCs, and business building. "Hacking" has little to do with that at all, except the programmers who make the bones of these internet businesses may well consider themselves "Hackers". But what about the rest of the team? Sales, marketing, accounts, admin etc. None of them are considered hackers. But even then I don't quite get it. Such programmers "create" primarily. They are not hacking, unless they want to admit to using other's work and hacking it to re-purpose it (which I have no problem with). But they aren't really hacking as such at all. They are building and creating.
Having read the definition of a "hacker", Im even more confused. To me, hacking is not about intimate knowledge, depth, deep interest, or even computer systems. Hacking to me is about knowing enough about something to fix or re-tasking it, even create something new from it. In the case of a media or Hollywood hacker, such a person is not a deep in-depth knowledge person, they are some one who knows the part of the system well enough to attack. That does not mean they know the whole system. Tech wise, I think of something like installing Linux on a PSP, or non IT, the way people in the third world use everything and anything to keep cars going. You don't need in depth knowledge at all. You just need enough knowledge to get the part fixed, or shoe horned in. The modification and re-tasking of open source software is also hacking. Or even something like scrapheap challenge is hacking. Surely all this comes from writing, where a poor journalist or writer is known as a "hack". Not suggesting my definition is universal, its just how I personally see it.
Then, as per the article's 3 bullet points, I dont see how providing flexibility is servicing hackers. All that is doing providing more flexibility as a part of the service or website. So, using such functions is just using the site as designed and intended. Not hacking. Hacking would be getting round problems with such a site, or using the site for something it wasn't originally intended. Although, such tool provided would allow fixing or re-tasking. I accept a fine line there, but I hope one sees the point.
So, to me sites like hackaday and instructables are actual hacking sites, where as this site is a great niche news aggregation site, with a great user base for decent, intelligent discussion, about anything of interest to it's users. HN is certainly not my first point of call for "hacking" at all. Its my first port of call for interesting news and discussion.
Cant help thinking that half the problem here is that this YC news site is called "Hacker News". I think that confuses people.
The best definition of hacker uses the word 'ingenuity'. It's true that you can do clever things with limited knowledge, but the best and most impressive hacks require deep knowledge. It follows from that that a site for hackers will encourage system knowledge and clever, unexpected adjustments. And if you're following complete instructions you're not hacking.
As I understand it, HN is a news forum associated with ycombinator, which I understand is all about startups, VCs, and business building. "Hacking" has little to do with that at all, except the programmers who make the bones of these internet businesses may well consider themselves "Hackers". But what about the rest of the team? Sales, marketing, accounts, admin etc. None of them are considered hackers. But even then I don't quite get it. Such programmers "create" primarily. They are not hacking, unless they want to admit to using other's work and hacking it to re-purpose it (which I have no problem with). But they aren't really hacking as such at all. They are building and creating.
Having read the definition of a "hacker", Im even more confused. To me, hacking is not about intimate knowledge, depth, deep interest, or even computer systems. Hacking to me is about knowing enough about something to fix or re-tasking it, even create something new from it. In the case of a media or Hollywood hacker, such a person is not a deep in-depth knowledge person, they are some one who knows the part of the system well enough to attack. That does not mean they know the whole system. Tech wise, I think of something like installing Linux on a PSP, or non IT, the way people in the third world use everything and anything to keep cars going. You don't need in depth knowledge at all. You just need enough knowledge to get the part fixed, or shoe horned in. The modification and re-tasking of open source software is also hacking. Or even something like scrapheap challenge is hacking. Surely all this comes from writing, where a poor journalist or writer is known as a "hack". Not suggesting my definition is universal, its just how I personally see it.
Then, as per the article's 3 bullet points, I dont see how providing flexibility is servicing hackers. All that is doing providing more flexibility as a part of the service or website. So, using such functions is just using the site as designed and intended. Not hacking. Hacking would be getting round problems with such a site, or using the site for something it wasn't originally intended. Although, such tool provided would allow fixing or re-tasking. I accept a fine line there, but I hope one sees the point.
So, to me sites like hackaday and instructables are actual hacking sites, where as this site is a great niche news aggregation site, with a great user base for decent, intelligent discussion, about anything of interest to it's users. HN is certainly not my first point of call for "hacking" at all. Its my first port of call for interesting news and discussion.
Cant help thinking that half the problem here is that this YC news site is called "Hacker News". I think that confuses people.