This post probably won't initiate a lot of discussion, but there seem to be quite a few youngish programmers around here, so I'm sharing it anyway.
If you're of my tribe, and you haven't seen it before, just bookmark it, and browse it in some of your copious free time. There are gems galour here.
If you know C, don't miss Duff's Device - and everyone should see The Story Of Mel
When I was 13 and just learning to program, I found a paper copy of The Cathedral & The Bazaar at my library and read it along with The Jargon File and How To Be A Hacker. I found ESR's authority as a Real Hacker so compelling that I started taking krav maga classes because at one point in How To Be A Hacker he mentions that Real Hackers do martial arts. (This turned out to be one of the best decisions I made at 13, and I'm still on it.) Since then, I've been more exposed to ESR the bigoted gun-obsessed coprolith, and How To Be A Hacker has taken on a rather more sinister tone for me in its prescriptions and evaluations of people's hacker cred. It did teenage-me a terrible disservice by suggesting that open source is more welcoming environment for women than proprietary software communities and general tech people. I would not, in fact, recommend anything written by ESR to a young programmer at this point.
For those who can't stomach ESR, I've discovered a pre-ESR version of the Jargon File :
It says "glitch" is a hacker jargon word! That's the word I use when describing bugs in software to less tech savvy people sometimes, instead of saying "there's a bug", I'll say "there's a glitch" because I figure they probably know what glitch means vs. bug. But they're both hacker slang, according to that file! Fascinating.
I love hacker lore like this. Here's another classic: http://www.ibiblio.org/harris/500milemail.html
As an up and coming programmer and possible comp sci major, I will heavily take this comical piece of cleverness and knowledge into my consideration and motivation
I love the Jargon File, but it's been out of date for a while, and ESR additions tend to be more about ESR than hackers in general. It was a necessary read when I started out, but these days it's probably not relevant unless you're joining the Lisp or C/Unix communities.
Still plenty of good stuff there though. Learning is the highest virtue in our culture, I'd say.
Yes, ESR can be an ass; he still deserves respect; for maintaining and promoting this, for CATB, and for his body of work. Same goes for his sometime-rival RMS. A lot of great thinkers can be assholes at times; we should honestly acknowledge the "feet of clay" of our "heroes", IMO.
ESR deserves no respect. He's a sexist racist homophobe. Just a small sample for your perusal: ESR denies HIV, praises Nazis, and claims the contemporary left in America is literally run by soviet propagandists: http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=184 ESR says gay men are at fault for AIDS and are pedophiles: http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=26 ESR says that women and black people shouldn't expect equal outcomes in STEM compared to men because they're just stupider on average: http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=129
Ideas are more important than people. ESR deserves no respect, and until the hacker culture disabuses itself of ESR-style white supremacy and misogyny, we're never going to get to that gleaming chrome meritocracy we were all promised.ESR says Obama only won due to voter fraud: http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=586
ESR's influence on techie culture is a betrayal to the hacker meritocracy. His abuse of his prominence is directly responsible for the promulgation of an attitude towards women and minorities which directly creates an atmosphere of exclusivity, which is why tech is so fucked up in 2015. A whole generation of hackers has grown up on his vile drivel and made them the willing tools of the hive of villainy that is Silicon Valley.
I know a little more about RMS than I do about ESR.
I love that damn dirty hippie to bits. He can be an ass too, but he's an ass with firm, justified principles he stands by. I followed his bloggings for a while (years back), and he also likes to poke his nose outside the techonosphere too - and that's also when he becomes an ass, usually.
RMS has become a vending machine for startups to put in money and out comes "You're a hacker and you're a hacker and you're a hacker and EVERYONE'S A HACKER", and then newly minted grads feel better about making their career a part of their identity and working long hours. Or maybe I'm a cynic. Yes, I'm a cynic. I aspired to meet RMS and and earn my Hacker Merit Badge (TM) for my open source contributions all throughout childhood and most of college. When that did finally happen, I lost all respect for him because I didn't feel worthy of being called a hacker; I felt it had been purchased by my school, and that if I had met him in a different context he would think differently of me. Was that just imposter syndrome worming its way through my brain? Probably. It's through writing this post that I realize how deep imposter syndrome can go, to the point when a childhood hero's mark of approval gets twisted into "well this can't have really been meaningful at all". I blame the privileged techie scum. #DieTechieScum :) Actually, I changed my mind. RMS is fine, because at least he responded to criticisms of sexism in his whole EMACS virgin spiel. ESR would never have done that.
I respect your opinion, and I freely admit that I know little about ESR's blogging.
I will modify my statement to say that he deserves some respect; I will not agree with you that he deserves none at all (although that may change when I get the time to follow up on the links you have provided).
I did say he can be an ass. [edit] I also think it's worth noting that ESR didn't author the Jargon file, although he has likely added to it during the time he has hosted it.
If ESR states an technical opinion about software, then he'll get my respect on that front. However, most people fall victim to the logical fallacy of Appeal to Irrelevant Authority. Whenever ESR talks about social issues, it's (ESR - technology). And (ESR - technology) = a racist idiot. Here's how it goes: "I want to learn about hacker culture! Wow, the jargon file! What a great resource! Who maintains this file? Wow, ESR! He must be a great hacker role model! An exemplar of the meritocracy! So smart! So knowledgable! What does he have to say when he speaks his mind?" And then he infects an entire generation of nerds with idiotic, HARMFUL opinions.
Any nerd worth their salt can make up their own mind. People who revere assholes are assholes themselves, and (sad to say) some assholes are decent hackers.
I've never followed his blog, but I have read CATB and found it worth the read.
People who revere assholes become assholes themselves. Some people who revere hackers become decent hackers. Conclusion: If we want to minimize assholes in hacker culture (and we DO), we should not revere assholes. "No TRUE Scotsman...". Nerds aren't very smart, and are very impressionable and prone to hero-worship. They don't form their own opinions through careful and unbiased consideration of the facts; no one does. They're a product of a culture, just like the rest of us. Therefore, we have an ethical imperative to not allow assholes such as ESR to control any amount of social capital, nor have any influence over the youth.People who revere assholes are assholes themselves, and (sad to say) some assholes are decent hackers.
Any nerd worth their salt can make up their own mind.
This seems like a contradiction - I thought it was a requirement. Maybe my terminology is wrong.Nerds aren't very smart
People who identify as "nerds" like to think they're smart. And they're usually perceived as smart, because that's our shitty American culture. You wear glasses? Must be a nerd. Must be intelligent. But no, actually. I once interviewed for a job, and wore glasses during the interview. I had taken my contacts out and hadn't bothered to replace them. I got the job, and when I showed up for the first day of work, I was wearing contacts. The guy who had hired me was visibly distressed that I wasn't wearing glasses. "Where's your glasses?" Nerds are idiots with specialized knowledge, which knowledge our society deems only attainable by geniuses when in fact it's not very hard stuff at all. It's not hard to write web apps.