[unalone]

Woody Allen is a hacker. Look at his innovations in cinema - Annie Hall was dated by the time I finally saw it but still pulled some awesome quirks. In Without Feathers, from which this story is taken, one of the plays is incredibly recursive and meta. I still want to perform it.

That's not defending this story, though. Just expressing a little love for Woody.

[davidw]

Can't someone be smart and innovative without necessarily being a "hacker"?

[unalone]

That raises the discussion of what a "hacker" is.

I don't like the word hacker myself. I think it's an unnecessary descriptor that raises more irritating arguments than it's worth. In that regards it's similar to calling somebody an "artist", though in the latter case there's slightly more weight behind the word.

If we're going to use the word "hacker", though, then having a play that features the cast calling up Woody Allen and asking him what to do next is a hack in that it subverts the format of the play.