Twenty Years After
This issue marks the beginning of our 20th anniversary. Never in our wildest dreams did any of us think it would come this far.
Back in 1984, our first issue was Xeroxed after hours in an office we weren't even supposed to be in and sent out to about two dozen people who had heard about us on several BBSes. We fully expected to be arrested shortly afterwards, since there was already an active hacking prosecution focusing on members of our staff and since we chose to put an expose in our first issue that exposed an FBI informant.
As it turned out, the knock on the door never came, the prosecution ended with a relatively fair sentencing (no damage caused, no imprisonment, no crippling fines), and the case that the exposed FBI informant was helping to build collapsed under the weight of the scandal. Even members of the FBI saw humor in the situation.
A lot has happened in 20 years.
We often choose to focus on the negative developments, mostly because they pose an imminent risk to many of our readers and also because there seem to be so many of them. But there have been plenty of good things over the years and we have no doubt there will be many more. It's important not to overlook them.
The fact that we're still here and still strong is really a cause for celebration. From the beginning, we've gotten support from some of the most unlikely places. That was our first big surprise. People within many of the federal agencies we had seen as foes cheered us on with letters of encouragement or warm words at a conference. A good number of individuals inside the corporations we wrote about looked forward to their next issue of 2600 as eagerly as any hacker. They even helped out by writing articles. And the enthusiastic reaction spread everywhere else you could imagine - foreign countries, the military, even a few parents. And none of this seemed to be in any way limited to one end of the political spectrum.
From the far-left to the far-right and just about everywhere in between, people seemed to get it, to appreciate what it was that 2600 stood for. And that, more than anything else, is what has kept us going. It's one thing to stand up for what you believe in and to constantly be speaking out on the issues. But without the support shown from all of you in so many different ways, we would have quickly run out of steam. We can only hope that others who become involved in things they feel passionately about get to experience this remarkable feeling too.
It was ten years ago that our main concern was the explosive interest in the hacker world by the mainstream and how this could pose a threat to our ideals. In 1994, on our tenth anniversary, there was a surge in books and movies about hackers and this in turn led to a huge influx of people who wanted to call themselves hackers without actually learning anything. The dynamics had changed and hackers were in danger of being subverted by this sudden mass appeal. Today the masses still regard hackers with a mixture of fear and admiration but, more importantly, the hacker ethic is still alive and well. If it can survive what's going on today, we think it'll be around for quite some time to come.
It was also in 1994 that we had our very first HOPE conference which originally was organized to mark our tenth anniversary. Ten years later, we're having our fifth conference - The Fifth HOPE. The conferences too have witnessed massive growth and change over the years and we constantly hear how the experiences have made a difference in people's lives and given them all kinds of inspiration and new things to think about. We hope to continue that tradition this July and we're looking forward to seeing many of you there as we officially celebrate 20 years. And if you want to get involved as a speaker or a volunteer, we welcome your participation as always. Just visit www.hope.net for all the details.
While being around for everything that's happened in the last two decades was something truly unique, we need to remember that there is a constant influx of new people who didn't get to witness most of it firsthand. That's why our history is vital and why we're so lucky to have much of it documented, whether it be through our back issues, our archived radio shows, or video from the conferences. Things are always changing but that change can be imperceptible on a day to day basis. It's important to go back and review and realize how our lives, our technology, and society have become different. And for those who are new, knowing how things looked, sounded, or felt in the past is a key to understanding and affecting the future.
We all know about the bad things - the use of technology as a restrictive tool, the increasing paranoia and repression that's all around, the demonization of hackers, the insane and out of proportion punishments... The way things are going it's likely to get a lot worse before it gets any better. That's why our collective voices are so important. Imagine what the last 20 years might have been like had we never gotten beyond that first issue. We didn't know what would happen next back then and we know that even less today. But what we do know is that we have to face it without flinching. This is how history is made.
