Clifford Stoll > Quotes

“Im a scientist, once I do something, I want to do something else.”
― Clifford Stoll

“Why is it drug addicts and computer aficionados are both called users? ”
― Clifford Stoll

“I claim that this bookless library is a dream, a hallucination of on-line addicts; network neophytes, and library-automation insiders...Instead, I suspect computers will deviously chew away at libraries from the inside. They'll eat up book budgets and require librarians that are more comfortable with computers than with children and scholars. Libraries will become adept at supplying the public with fast, low-quality information.

The result won't be a library without books--it'll be a library without value.”
― Clifford Stoll

“Of course. NSA is rumored to tape record every transatlantic telephone conversation. Maybe they’d recorded this session.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“The astronomer's rule of thumb:
if you didn't write it down, it didn't happen”
― Clifford Stoll

“The word “hacker” has two very different meanings. The people I knew who called themselves hackers were software wizards who managed to creatively program themselves out of tight corners. They knew all the nooks and crannies of the operating system. Not dull software engineers who put in forty hours a week, but creative programmers who can’t leave the computer until the machine’s satisfied. A hacker identifies with the computer, knowing it like a friend.”
― Cliff Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg : Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage

“Cliff, I’d like to take over, but our charter prevents it. NSA can’t engage in domestic monitoring, even if we’re asked. That’s prison term stuff.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Computers force us into creating with our minds and prevent us from making things with our hands. They dull the skills we use in everyday life.”
― Clifford Stoll, Silicon Snake Oil: Second Thoughts on the Information Highway

“By analyzing public data with the help of computers, people can uncover secrets without ever seeing a classified database.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Life was full: no hacker is worth missing a Dead concert for.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage

“Computers deliver an abundance of symbols yet offer an impoverishment of experience. Do our children need to see more icons, corporate logos, and glitzy fonts... or do they need more time climbing, running, and figuring out how to get along with each other?”
― Clifford Stoll, High-Tech Heretic: Reflections of a Computer Contrarian

“The hacker didn't succeed through sophistication. Rather he poked at obvious places, trying to enter through unlock doors. Persistence, not wizardry, let him through.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage

“Si realmente quieren saber sobre el futuro, no le pregunten a un técnico, a un científico o a un físico. ¡No! No le pregunten a quien escriba en código. No, si quieren saber cómo va a ser la sociedad en 20 años, pregúntenle a la maestra de un jardín de niños.”
― Clifford Stoll

“So what? Somebody’s always had control over information, and others have always tried to steal it. Read Machiavelli. As technology changes, sneakiness finds new expressions.” Martha”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“As computers replace textbooks, students will become more computer literate and more book illiterate. They'll be exploring virtual worlds, watching dancing triangles, downloading the latest web sites. But they won't be reading books.”
― Clifford Stoll, High-Tech Heretic: Reflections of a Computer Contrarian

“Don't forget that computer programming teaches students to think," says a friend of mine who's a computer jock in Silicon valley. He's deeply invested in technology and has no kids. "Programming is a logical system that rewards clear reasoning."
Uh, sure. Nineteenth-century schoolmasters used the same reasoning to justify teaching ancient languages. According to computer scientist Joseph Weizenbaum, "There is, so far as I know, no more evidence that programming is good for the mind than Latin is.”
― Clifford Stoll, High-Tech Heretic: Reflections of a Computer Contrarian

“Our software is fragile as well — if people built houses the way we write programs, the first woodpecker would wipe out civilization.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage

“VI was predecessor to hundreds of word processing systems. By now, Unix folks see it as a bit stodgy—it hasn’t the versatility of Gnu-Emacs, nor the friendliness of more modern editors. Despite that, VI shows up on every Unix system.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Over the past decade Stallman created a powerful editing program called Gnu-Emacs. But Gnu’s much more than just a text editor. It’s easy to customize to your personal preferences. It’s a foundation upon which other programs can be built. It even has its own mail facility built in. Naturally, our physicists demanded Gnu; with an eye to selling more computing cycles, we installed it happily.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Astronomers saw me that way. “Cliff, he’s not much of an astronomer, but what a computer hacker!” (The computer folks, of course, had a different view: “Cliff’s not much of a programmer, but what an astronomer!” At best, graduate school had taught me to keep both sides fooled.)”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“it’s a part of the Internet, a computer network that cross-links a hundred other networks.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“As much as I love computers, I can't imagine getting an excellent education from any multimedia system. Rather than augmenting the teacher, these machines steal limited class time and direct attention away from scholarship and toward pretty graphics.”
― Clifford Stoll, High-Tech Heretic: Reflections of a Computer Contrarian

“Η γνώση δεν είναι δύναμη. Ποιοι από τους ισχυρούς έχουν γνώση; Κανένας ισχυρός δεν ξοδεύει το χρόνο του στο Ίντερνετ και στις βιβλιοθήκες.
Ποιοι έχουν τη γνώση; Οι βιβλιοθηκάριοι. Δεν υπάρχουν λιγότερο ισχυροί άνθρωποι από τους βιβλιοθηκάριους.”
― Clifford Stoll Αμερικανός αστρονόμος

“Its programs aren’t labeled, “Danger—medical computer. Do not tamper”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Our software is fragile as well—if people built houses the way we write programs, the first woodpecker would wipe out civilization.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“It's easy to mistake familiarity with computers for intelligence, but computer literate certainly doesn't equal smart. And computer illiterate sure doesn't mean stupid.
Which do we need more: computer literacy or literacy?”
― Clifford Stoll, High-Tech Heretic: Reflections of a Computer Contrarian

“Richard Stallman, a free-lance computer programmer, loudly proclaimed that information should be free.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Not often—with six-letter passwords a hacker had a better chance of winning the lottery than randomly guessing a particular password. Since the computer hangs up after a few log-in failures, the attacker would need all night to try even a few hundred possible passwords. No, a hacker couldn’t magically enter my system. He’d need to know at least one password.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“And there’s no way to reconstruct the avocado from that guacamole.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Weaned on educational games and multimedia encyclopedias, kids naturally seek out the trivial when forced to read books. While visiting a school librarian, I listened to a high school senior seek help with an assignment: "I'm writing a report about Napoleon," he said. "Can you find me a thin book with lots of pictures?”
― Clifford Stoll, High-Tech Heretic: Reflections of a Computer Contrarian