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I have so many stories about his absolutely terrible behavior at conferences. He once refused to pay the entry fee to a charity event and had to be physically ejectedy.

Absolutely better at PR than any actual work, pay careful attention and none of his early stuff was particularly novel, from a technical perspective.

But for whatever reason, we venerate him just because he was victimized by the state. The world is not a dichotomy -- sometimes bad things happen to bad people.

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He got all of the "Free Kevin" attention because of how long he was left in jail before trial and then being stuck in solitary confinement after sentencing for months.

If he had been treated fairly by the justice system he wouldn't have gotten nearly as much attention.

He was also autistic, a lot of the behavior can be explained through that lens.

>He got all of the "Free Kevin" attention because of how long he was left in jail before trial and then being stuck in solitary confinement after sentencing for months.

That was uncalled for on the part of DOJ.

>He was also autistic, a lot of the behavior can be explained through that lens.

I'm autistic. Maybe I should go commit a bunch of felonies to increase my chances of a good job and stature in the hacker community, since things like publishing code, publishing peer reviewed papers, and mentoring newbies have not been productive ways of finding gainful employment nor respect of my peers.

I have friends who did things like take a gap year to travel the world or met their spouses on nights I stayed in to study, and some evenings when browsing HN I feel very sad that I wasted my 20s on a society that does not care about me.

Anyways, sorry to wall of text, but what you said really struck a nerve with me -- there are hierarchies in any community, and one thing I've noticed with the hacker scene is one group of people can mess up over and over using the same sets of facts or diagnoses, but others can expect to have worse outcomes with better behavior for reasons that elude me to this day.

> I have friends who did things like take a gap year to travel the world or met their spouses on nights I stayed in to study, and some evenings when browsing HN I feel very sad that I wasted my 20s on a society that does not care about me.

I'm glad you have finally recognized the problem.

Stop living for your idea of others and start living for yourself.

>Stop living for your idea of others and start living for yourself.

Unfortunately, I exhausted my emergency fund trying for certs and attempting to escape a domestic violence situation, so I do not have that option. I'm trapped.

Kevin was famous for being mistreated by the DoJ and writing some books which were perhaps not particularly true in hindsight. After he got out of jail and rejoined the community he lost a lot of respect for being himself, though it's not impossible that years of imprisonment and a long time in solitary had some permanent negative effects. In other words... you shouldn't envy Kevin's life.

For the rest: nothing's stopping you from having fun, regardless of age.

It's good that somewhere the quality of work is rewarded more than the quantity

Vienna waits for you

>Vienna waits for you

I've been there before, but its my understanding I'd have visa issues doing anything beyond tourism.

Is Vienna the place to be for security researchers in their 30s starting to doubt their life choices?

The OWASP conference is being held there next week, so in a way, yes?

But is it a good place to meet future spouses?

Because missing that that seems to be the main problem of the poster above.

I was more lamenting that I thought I was trading my time for income, and ended up with neither income nor free time.

I'm involuntarily destitute, not involuntarily celibate :-)

Anywhere where you meet people is a good place to meet future spouses.