I had no idea either. I started programming in college but it wasn't until we were taught assembly that I realized that what I had been doing as a kid with softice had been assembly all along.
Count this as a "me too" comment. I played on the DOS terminal for years, wired together old machines into LANs and did hex editing of WoW binaries when I was 12 without realizing how close to hacking that was.
I heard about Python / C++ / etc, but didn't try "diving in" until college with CS1. Basically, IT knowledge instead of CS knowledge.
I can't help but feel that anyone that is <22 right now is getting a radically different introduction to hacking than those who are >=22. The <22 grew up on GUI in the Windows monopoly, and probably never needed to dig in to computers to get things "working" as much as the elders did, which would actually introduce them to CS much earlier.
I heard about Python / C++ / etc, but didn't try "diving in" until college with CS1. Basically, IT knowledge instead of CS knowledge.
I can't help but feel that anyone that is <22 right now is getting a radically different introduction to hacking than those who are >=22. The <22 grew up on GUI in the Windows monopoly, and probably never needed to dig in to computers to get things "working" as much as the elders did, which would actually introduce them to CS much earlier.