this weekend i was lucky enough to catch the Fifth HOPE, a biennial hacker conference. i was surprised when brian decided to come along with me, but i think he was glad he made the decision. we had a great time learning about the hacker culture and popular topics in technology and politics, (if i said much more i would definitely get flagged by a higher authority.. so pardon my vagueness) and ended up staying for 2 of the 3 days of the conference.

there were many aspects of the conference that were amusing.. for example, demographic observations. most hackers in attendence were smelly, unkept, caucasian males wearing black tshirts with assorted nerdy logos/slogans (e.g. “RedHat”, “MY PIPE IS THICKER THAN YOURS”, a penguin, something demoralizing about microsoft, a current or past HOPE tshirt) who looked like they never exercised, and many of them had long, icky hair. another funny thing is that they gave out armbands at the door, and to gain entrance into the conference you had to show your HOPE armband. i’ll admit, i wore the armband, and i even kinda thought it was a cool idea.. but definitely very nerdy. since the conference ran 24 hours from friday morning to sunday night, i was sure that there was a large group of attendees who basically lived there.. and didnt shower. yeah, by sunday you could pick up BO in the air..

anyways, it was fun! and remember, big brother is watching you.