I was interviewed as part of an NPR Weekend Edition story by Jon Kalish called libraries making room for hackerspaces (Saturday Dec 10).
A hackerspace is people owning something together, sharing resources, sharing knowledge, valuing curiosity and creativity, engaging in productive inquiry. If one can see beyond the specific tools populating the traditional physical space, libraries and hackerspaces look a lot alike. The resemblance is more than a resemblance; a hackerspace is really just a library by another name.
There’s nothing scary or criminal about the term hacker. A hacker is a person who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems and stretching their capabilities, as opposed to most users, who prefer to learn only the minimum necessary. Using the science/engineering concept of a black box, where only inputs and outputs are visible, not the internal workings, the hacker wants to open the box. The hacker further insists that if you can’t open it, you don’t own it. So in the way that libraries have always existed to understand the world better, to explore how stuff works, to illuminate the inner components of any area of interest, they have always been hackerspaces. Furthermore, as institutions owned by the public, libraries should not be black boxes. We should all be able to look inside and collectively tinker with the inner workings of these places.
The message of the library is that we can learn, we can become aware. We are not forced to remain in the dark. And while becoming aware is an important achievement, I think the public space of a library affords much more; I think it can provide options for activity that can enhance human agency.
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