H.O.P.E.

HOPE (abbreviation Hackers on Planet Earth or the first two letters in Hotel Pennsylvania) is a conference series sponsored by the hacker magazine "2600 The Hacker Quarterly." There have been seven conferences to date.

Conferences

HOPE: Hackers On Planet Earth

(Hotel Pennsylvania, New York City, August 13, 1994-August 14, 1994):This conference marked 's 10th anniversary. Well over 1000 people were in attendance, including speakers from around the world. Admission included a 28.8 kbit/s local network.

Beyond HOPE

(Puck Building in New York City August 8, 1997-August 10, 1997):There were 2000 attendees. Bell Technology Group helped to support the hackers. A TAP reunion and a live broadcast of Off the Hook took place [http://www.2600.com/offthehook/1997/0897.html (hear it here)] . Admission included a 10 Mbit/s local network.

H2K

(Hotel Pennsylvania, July 14, 2000-July 16, 2000):More than 2300 attended this conference, the first H.O.P.E. to run 24 hours a day for the three dates it was on. Jello Biafra gave a keynote speech. In this historic cultural exchange between the punk rock icon/free speech activist and the hacker community, Jello managed to draw powerful connections, despite not having any actual computer experience, and the EFF raised thousands of dollars. The conference admission included a working ethernet and a T1 link to the internet.

H2K2

(Hotel Pennsylvania, July 12, 2002-July 14, 2002):This conference also ran 24/3 with a theme of the United States of America homeland security [http://www.nationalterroralert.com/overview.htm Advisory System] , the con included two tracks of scheduled speakers, a third track reserved for last minute and self scheduled speakers, a movie room, Retrocomputing, musical performances, a State of the World Address by Jello Biafra, keynotes by Aaron McGruder and [http://www.nyu.edu/classes/siva/ Siva Vaidhyanathan] and discussions on the DMCA and DeCSS. Freedom Downtime premiered on Friday evening (July 14). The conference admission included wireless 802.11b coverage and places to link in with wired ethernet, an open computer area for access to a 24-hour direct uplink to the Internet at "T-1ish" speeds, [http://claw.ees.com/~myke/h2k/ a public cluster] [http://www.the-fifth-hope.org/5hwiki/H2k2ClusterPics (pictures here)] made available by [http://www.dhp.com/ The DataHaven Project] , as well as an active internal network.

The Fifth HOPE

(Hotel Pennsylvania, July 9, 2004-July 11, 2004):The Fifth H.O.P.E. had a theme of propaganda and commemorated the anniversaries of both the H.O.P.E. cons and Off the Hook (with a live broadcast of the show from the con like at Beyond H.O.P.E.). Keynotes speakers were Kevin Mitnick, Steve Wozniak and Jello Biafra. There was also a media presentation by some of the "members" of the Phone Losers of America who celebrated their tenth-year anniversary. Additionally, Cult of the Dead Cow celebrated its twentieth anniversary at the conference. The conference admission included access to a four layer public network with two T1 lines + backup links to the internet via a [http://www.the-fifth-hope.org/5hwiki/PublicTerminalCluster Public Terminal Cluster] , various wired means, a [http://www.the-fifth-hope.org/5hwiki/WiFi WiFi network on three floors] and a [http://www.the-fifth-hope.org/5hwiki/VideoNetwork video network] .

HOPE Number Six

(Hotel Pennsylvania, July 21, 2006 - July 23, 2006):Speakers [http://www.hopenumbersix.net/speakers.html (full list here)] included Richard Stallman and Jello Biafra. Kevin Mitnick was scheduled to be at the conference but was unable to make it; while on vacation in Colombia an illness postponed his return. Hope Number Six had a 100-megabit Internet connection, claimed by the organizers to be the fastest Internet connection at any US hacker conference. The event's theme was based around the series "The Prisoner" (as this event is titled "Number Six," a designation shared by the titular "prisoner,") and around the number 6 itself.Notable occurrences:
*Steve Rambam, a noted private investigator who runs Pallorium, Inc., an online investigative service, was set to lead a panel discussion titled "Privacy is Dead ... Get Over It." A few minutes before the start of the panel, Rambam was arrested by the FBI on charges that he unlawfully interfered with an ongoing case prosecutors filed against Albert Santoro, a former Brooklyn assistant district attorney who was indicted in Jan. 2003 with one count of money-laundering. [Brian Krebs [http://blog.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2006/07/fbi_charges_hope_speaker_with_1.html "FBI Charges HOPE Speaker with Witness Tampering, Obstructing Justice"] "Washington Post" Security Fix July 24, 2006] [Brian Krebs [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/24/AR2006072401196.html "Agents Arrest Background Specialist at Hackers Forum"] "Washington Post" July 25, 2006; Page D05] [Brian Krebs [http://blog.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2006/07/fbi_arrest_private_eye_speaker.html "HOPE Speaker Arrested by the Feds"] "Washington Post" Security Fix July 22, 2006] The charges were eventually dropped ["United States of America vs. Steven Rombom", Order of Dismissal of Magistrate's Complaint; October 13, 2006] and the talk was held in November of 2006, long after the conference ended. [http://www.2600.com/news/view/article/3975]
*Jello Biafra began his talk by referring to the above arrest, noting the convention had been more "spook heavy" than usual. [http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9001988] He then announced a "special message" to "any Federal agents that may be in the audience", and mooned the convention. [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/

---

]

The Last HOPE

Took place on July, 18-20 2008 at Hotel Pennsylvania

:A notable change from past years is 2600's use of an Internet forum to facilitate community participation in the planning of the event. [http://talk.hope.net]

:The name referred to the expectation that this would have been the final H.O.P.E. conference due to the scheduled demolition of its venue, the Hotel Pennsylvania. A [http://savethehotel.org/ 'Save The Hotel'] campaign is ongoing, but it was revealed at the Closing Ceremony that the hotel's demolition plans were postponed indefinitely, and that The Next HOPE was scheduled for Summer 2010. It was at the closing ceremony that it was revealed that the use of the word "last" could also refer to the previous event, or one that had ended (referring to The Last HOPE itself).

:Steven Levy gave the keynote address. Kevin Mitnick, Steve Rambam, Jello Biafra, and Adam Savage of MythBusters were also featured speakers. Descriptions of talks can be found [http://www.thelasthope.org/talks.php here] .

The Next HOPE

During the closing ceremonies The Last HOPE [http://www.thenexthope.org/ a new website] was revealed which announced The Next HOPE. [ [http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/30321 "There's still HOPE for hackers"] "Network World" Noah Schiffman July 24, 2008] At the time of the original posting the date was simply "Summer 2010". The announcement also mentioned The Next HOPE would be held at the Hotel Pennsylvania.

ee also

*hacker convention

References

External links

* [http://hope.net Main HOPE site]
* [http://talk.hope.net Official HOPE forum]
* [http://www.2600.com/ 2600 Magazine]
* [http://radio.hope.net/ "Radio Statler!" - Hope Conference Streaming Audio Station]
* [http://robvincent.net/photos/hope6/ Pictures from HOPE Number Six]
* [http://www.the-fifth-hope.org/5hwiki A wiki for the fifth hope]
* [http://www.2600.com/offthehook/mp3files/2007/off_the_hook__20070110.mp3 Off The Hook Episode that Announced the Hotel Penn Demolition]
* [http://www.nydailynews.com/business/story/485731p-408941c.html New York Daily Article about the Hotel Penn Situation]
* [http://www.vno.com/ Vornado Corp -- The Company That Wants to Tear the Hotel Penn Down]
* [http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6337 Concept for the new Vornado on the Wired New York Messageboards]