I just got word that I’ve been added as a speaker on a panel entitled Hackers and Academia this Friday at the sixth Hackers on Planet Earth (HOPE) conference, after having peppered every email address I could find for organizers begging to be let on it. I plan to speak briefly on what I’ve learned in school about the ways hackers and geeks are absolutely correct in their criticism of schools in forums like Slashdot. Research on human cognition and social learning suggests that in fact sitting and listening to a lecture from someone who doesn’t respect the things you’ve been teaching yourself outside of class is generally not the ideal way to learn.
So my panel is Friday at 11:00 a.m., which will be a bit of a graveyard shift but I hope some people who haven’t heard about this stuff already will show. I highly recommend this conference to anyone interested in technology. It’s cheap, the people are tons of fun, it’s right here in New York City, and one of the guys who’s involved in the open-source ripoff version of DDR usually brings his setup. Also they will teach you how to pick locks.
I have to say just being always gives me a pleasant sense of historical completion in my own life. The conference is held at the Pennsylvania Hotel, one of the first landmarks of my own New York history; we stayed there when my youth orchestra played at Carnegie Hall when I was thirteen. And thirteen must have been about how old I was when I read an article in the L.A. Times about Emmanuel Goldstein and just thought he was the coolest thing.
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