I was on the periphery of the 90s "scene" and this rings true to me. One year at DefCon I ended up (somehow) tagging along w/ (some of?) the Cult of the Dead Cow crew and friends to a dinner. I had a decidedly "Wow, I'm sitting at the cool kids table..." kind of feeling.
Age and location had a lot to do with it, too. I was in rural Ohio versus in Boston, Chicago, NYC, etc. I also did community college versus moving away. There were fewer opportunities for face-to-face hacker interactions when you might be the only person in your county into that kind of stuff.
I still lean on my telephony knowledge from back then. It's amazing how much of it is still relevant even in the world of VoIP.
dildog joined the same company I worked at for a short time and I met some of the cDc folks through that. It was a good continuation of my life education on “no matter how good you thought you were [with computers], someone is better.”
Age and location had a lot to do with it, too. I was in rural Ohio versus in Boston, Chicago, NYC, etc. I also did community college versus moving away. There were fewer opportunities for face-to-face hacker interactions when you might be the only person in your county into that kind of stuff.
I still lean on my telephony knowledge from back then. It's amazing how much of it is still relevant even in the world of VoIP.