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gemfyreUnfortunately I didn't write this either, but an old friend sent it to me and I think it's really good.
One day perhaps three weeks ago, I woke up and I was you. It wasn't strange or
disconcerting, more relieving. I inhaled your breath, made your movements, held
your hands, gazed with your eyes. I was you. I laughed with your humour, I was
concerned with your worries, embarrassed by your failures, and proud of your
successes. I could visualise your aspirations and enjoy what made you happy. I
cruised your street and said hello to your hello people in your own friendly way. I
cried and I felt your tears. I remember your experiences, relived your memories, and
understood your reactions. I knew of your childhood, how you found your place,
your role, and how you became aware of yourself.
I wore your clothes, I wrote your name. I related to your music, appreciated your
colours, and understood your views, however vague they were. I was your age. I
went through your moods, lived your emotions, and expressed your views in your
fashion. In your place I stuck to your labels. I did the things you do. I was you. When
I was you, no one seemed to know any difference, perhaps they were too busy
worrying about themselves to notice. If they could place my identity, it gave them
security to set me in the continuum of their life. Being you enabled me to realise
some people used you and me just as a reference point to their own existence. A bit
like a road sign; go that way and you will get to that. I thought you were completely
different from me until I was you. Like me, you wanted happiness. You ate when you
got hungry, and got sort of annoyed when the sun got in your eyes. You felt the same
sensations; hot, cold, confused, embarrassed. Being you was only different in a
different sort of way. Only cosmetic things, trivial details. It seemed like minor
things separated us. The self-indulgent traps we fall into like how our hair looks, or
what’s the next record we're going to get. The never-ending search for satisfaction
was what drew us apart. But when it came to the act of existing, the act of being
alive, I understood we had more in common than we'll ever have differences. Much
more, all in all, I do what you do.
I am you.
"Mentor's Last Words"
Another one got caught today, it's all over the papers. "Teenager Arrested in
Computer Crime Scandal", "Hacker Arrested after Bank Tampering"... Damn kids.
They're all alike. But did you, in your three-piece psychology and 1950's
technobrain, ever take a look behind the eyes of the hacker? Did you ever wonder
what made him tick, what forces shaped him, what may have molded him? I am a
hacker, enter my world... Mine is a world that begins with school... I'm smarter than
most of the other kids, this crap they teach us bores me... Damn underachiever.
They're all alike. I'm in junior high or high school. I've listened to teachers explain
for the fifteenth time how to reduce a fraction. I understand it. "No, Ms. Smith, I
didn't show my work. I did it in my head..." Damn kid. Probably copied it. They're
all alike. I made a discovery today. I found a computer. Wait a second, this is cool.
It does what I want it to. If it makes a mistake, it's because I screwed it up. Not
because it doesn't like me... Or feels threatened by me.. Or thinks I'm a smart ass..
Or doesn't like teaching and shouldn't be here... Damn kid. All he does is play
games. They're all alike. And then it happened... a door opened to a world... rushing
through the phone line like heroin through an addict's veins, an electronic pulse is
sent out, a refuge from the day-to-day incompetencies is sought... a board is found.
"This is it... this is where I belong..." I know everyone here... even if I've never met
them, never talked to them, may never hear from them again... I know you all...
Damn kid. Tying up the phone line again. They're all alike... You bet your ass we're
all alike... we've been spoon-fed baby food at school when we hungered for steak...
the bits of meat that you did let slip through were pre-chewed and tasteless. We've
been dominated by sadists, or ignored by the apathetic. The few that had something
to teach found us willing pupils, but those few are like drops of water in the desert.
This is our world now... the world of the electron and the switch, the beauty of the
baud. We make use of a service already existing without paying for what could be
dirt-cheap if it wasn't run by profiteering gluttons, and you call us criminals. We
explore... and you call us criminals. We seek after knowledge... and you call us
criminals. We exist without skin color, without nationality, without religious bias...
and you call us criminals. You build atomic bombs, you wage wars, you murder,
cheat, and lie to us and try to make us believe it's for our own good, yet we're the
criminals.
Yes, I am a criminal. My crime is that of curiosity. My crime is that of judging
people by what they say and think, not what they look like. My crime is that of
outsmarting you, something that you will never forgive me for. I am a hacker, and
this is my manifesto. You may stop this individual, but you can't stop us all... after
all, we're all alike.
One day perhaps three weeks ago, I woke up and I was you. It wasn't strange or
disconcerting, more relieving. I inhaled your breath, made your movements, held
your hands, gazed with your eyes. I was you. I laughed with your humour, I was
concerned with your worries, embarrassed by your failures, and proud of your
successes. I could visualise your aspirations and enjoy what made you happy. I
cruised your street and said hello to your hello people in your own friendly way. I
cried and I felt your tears. I remember your experiences, relived your memories, and
understood your reactions. I knew of your childhood, how you found your place,
your role, and how you became aware of yourself.
I wore your clothes, I wrote your name. I related to your music, appreciated your
colours, and understood your views, however vague they were. I was your age. I
went through your moods, lived your emotions, and expressed your views in your
fashion. In your place I stuck to your labels. I did the things you do. I was you. When
I was you, no one seemed to know any difference, perhaps they were too busy
worrying about themselves to notice. If they could place my identity, it gave them
security to set me in the continuum of their life. Being you enabled me to realise
some people used you and me just as a reference point to their own existence. A bit
like a road sign; go that way and you will get to that. I thought you were completely
different from me until I was you. Like me, you wanted happiness. You ate when you
got hungry, and got sort of annoyed when the sun got in your eyes. You felt the same
sensations; hot, cold, confused, embarrassed. Being you was only different in a
different sort of way. Only cosmetic things, trivial details. It seemed like minor
things separated us. The self-indulgent traps we fall into like how our hair looks, or
what’s the next record we're going to get. The never-ending search for satisfaction
was what drew us apart. But when it came to the act of existing, the act of being
alive, I understood we had more in common than we'll ever have differences. Much
more, all in all, I do what you do.
I am you.
"Mentor's Last Words"
Another one got caught today, it's all over the papers. "Teenager Arrested in
Computer Crime Scandal", "Hacker Arrested after Bank Tampering"... Damn kids.
They're all alike. But did you, in your three-piece psychology and 1950's
technobrain, ever take a look behind the eyes of the hacker? Did you ever wonder
what made him tick, what forces shaped him, what may have molded him? I am a
hacker, enter my world... Mine is a world that begins with school... I'm smarter than
most of the other kids, this crap they teach us bores me... Damn underachiever.
They're all alike. I'm in junior high or high school. I've listened to teachers explain
for the fifteenth time how to reduce a fraction. I understand it. "No, Ms. Smith, I
didn't show my work. I did it in my head..." Damn kid. Probably copied it. They're
all alike. I made a discovery today. I found a computer. Wait a second, this is cool.
It does what I want it to. If it makes a mistake, it's because I screwed it up. Not
because it doesn't like me... Or feels threatened by me.. Or thinks I'm a smart ass..
Or doesn't like teaching and shouldn't be here... Damn kid. All he does is play
games. They're all alike. And then it happened... a door opened to a world... rushing
through the phone line like heroin through an addict's veins, an electronic pulse is
sent out, a refuge from the day-to-day incompetencies is sought... a board is found.
"This is it... this is where I belong..." I know everyone here... even if I've never met
them, never talked to them, may never hear from them again... I know you all...
Damn kid. Tying up the phone line again. They're all alike... You bet your ass we're
all alike... we've been spoon-fed baby food at school when we hungered for steak...
the bits of meat that you did let slip through were pre-chewed and tasteless. We've
been dominated by sadists, or ignored by the apathetic. The few that had something
to teach found us willing pupils, but those few are like drops of water in the desert.
This is our world now... the world of the electron and the switch, the beauty of the
baud. We make use of a service already existing without paying for what could be
dirt-cheap if it wasn't run by profiteering gluttons, and you call us criminals. We
explore... and you call us criminals. We seek after knowledge... and you call us
criminals. We exist without skin color, without nationality, without religious bias...
and you call us criminals. You build atomic bombs, you wage wars, you murder,
cheat, and lie to us and try to make us believe it's for our own good, yet we're the
criminals.
Yes, I am a criminal. My crime is that of curiosity. My crime is that of judging
people by what they say and think, not what they look like. My crime is that of
outsmarting you, something that you will never forgive me for. I am a hacker, and
this is my manifesto. You may stop this individual, but you can't stop us all... after
all, we're all alike.
