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Please stop perpetuating this myth- started by Eric Raymond and happily encouraged by SV "thought leaders"- that hackers must, by definition, be laissez-faire capitalists who love Ayn Rand and treat breaking laws as a noble goal in and of itself.

Nice strawman. Luckily I didn't say anything about esr, laissez-faire, capitalism, or Ayn Rand in the post you replied to. Hell, I didn't even say that breaking the law is a "noble goal in and of itself".

All I'm saying is that it's disturbing to me how so many HN'ers have just completely sold out to the idea that the State is their proper master, and should regulate / control pretty much everything and anything. It seems to me that in the past, there was a more individualist / freedom oriented mindset around sites like this - whether it was from "American style libertarians" or socialist anarchists or whatever. Personally I find the change to be a bit depressing.




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