
Ask HN: Computers and counterculture - bambataa
I&#x27;m interested in learning more about the links between computing and the &#x27;counterculture&#x27;, both in terms of the social history and in terms of radical thinking about computing&#x27;s role in society&#x2F;culture. By &#x27;counterculture&#x27; I&#x27;m primarily thinking of the late 60s&#x2F;early 70s hippy movement and maybe the 90s free party scene (seems quite linked to technology, especially in Germany?), but I&#x27;m keen to learn about other links.<p>Some books&#x2F;thinkers I&#x27;ve come across already are:
- Stewart Brand and the Whole Earth Catalog
- Computer Lib&#x2F;Dream Machines by Ted Nelson
- Erik Davis&#x27; &#x27;Technopagans&#x27; essay in Wired
- Jaron Lanier&#x27;s &#x27;Who Owns the Future&#x27;<p>As well as books I&#x27;d be super interested in any links to good mailing list archives, or even first hand accounts, that anyone can share.
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LarryMade2
Steven Levy's book Hackers goes a bit into free/tech culture in both the SF
Bay Area and in Academia.

textfiles.com might give you some of the later era source messages

Mondo 2000 Magazine also did a lot of 90s cyber-hedonism stuff

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veddox
+1 for Levy's "Hackers", especially if you're interested in the counter-
culture aspects of computer folklore.

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indescions_2018
YC did a recent podcast with former Artforum editor Michelle Kuo on
Experiments in Art and Technology

[https://blog.ycombinator.com/experiments-in-art-and-
technolo...](https://blog.ycombinator.com/experiments-in-art-and-technology-
with-artforum-editor-michelle-kuo/)

And then there's Mondo 2000. Defining periodical of "cyberculture". Remains
deeply influential even today

[https://archive.org/details/mondohistory](https://archive.org/details/mondohistory)

I'd also recommend the documentary "We Live In Public" as a cautionary tale
regarding networked utopias ;)

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brudgers
To me, the most radical thinking about the relationship between computing and
society is copy-left. It uses copyright law to subvert the presumed uses of
copyright law. I think it is the most influential new idea from the second
half of the twentieth century. The world runs on Linux.

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jonjacky
Books: What the Doorknob Said, by John Markoff. From Counterculture to
Cyberculture, by Fred Turner.

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detaro
In Germany, history of the Chaos Computer Club.

