Levy_S-Hackers-Heroes-Computer-Revolution

This message managed to find its way around the Applefest, enough so knots ofprogrammers began gathering outside the Convention Hall for the buses thatsupposedly would take them to the Stanford Court Hotel, where Electronic Artswas throwing its big party. One odd group included, among others, several On-Line programmers and John "Captain Crunch" Draper.John Draper, whose dark stringy hair was flying out in all directions, had donewell by himself. During his stint in prison after he was caught using the Applephone interface as a blue box, he had written a word-processing program called"Easy Writer," which made him a considerable sum. Amazingly, when IBMsought a program to issue as its official word processor, it chose Easy Writer; thecompany that published Draper's program had the good sense to act asintermediary with IBM, not letting on that the w program's author was thenotorious Captain Crunch. Reputedly, Draper had made a million dollars from thetransaction. You wouldn't have known it from his faded jeans, his old polo shirt,and his apparent need for dental work. Mark Duchaineau regarded him with amixture of awe and repulsion as the former phone hacker harangued him aboutsome technical aspect of the IBM PC.Soon, they gave up on the bus and hailed a cab. The cab driver made the mistakeof smoking. John Draper almost ripped the cigarette out the driver's mouth,demanding at the top of his lungs that all the cab windows be opened in the chilly,damp November night of San Francisco.The hotel was quite fancy, and the hackers, in jeans and sneakers, seemedintimidated. Electronic Arts had prepared for them, though: along with a rock bandplaying dance music, the company had rented over a dozen stand-up, coinoperatedvideogames, adjusted to give unlimited free games. This was where thehackers immediately headed. As the party heated up, it was apparent that many ofthe industry's biggest authors had appeared, some to check things out, othersgenuinely interested in this newer-than-new-age venture.The center of attention, though, was EA board member Steve Wozniak, cited in aseries of speeches as "the man who started it all." It was an epithet that would havehaunted some young genius eager to shake the past and get on to newer things, butWozniak seemed to revel in it; for over a year now he had been traveling aroundthe country to industry gatherings, accepting the same accolades. He had spent aconsiderable portion of his Croesus Mode bankroll on presenting massive rockfestivals. He still fervently believed in the Hacker Ethic, and wherever he went henot only preached that gospel but set himself as an example of it. Tonight, forinstance, he preached to a small group on the evils of secrecy, using Apple's