Voting Station

John Draper

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Computer Tech

The Resume

    (March 11, 1943- )
    Pirate radio broadcaster, phone phreak and computer programmer
    Wrote the BASIC cross-compiler used in the Apple I and Apple II computers and the word processing program EasyWriter
    Appeared in the documentary ‘The Secret History of Hacking’ (2001)

Why he might be annoying:

    In the late 1960s he operated a pirate radio station, broadcasting from the back of his Volkswagen van to make it harder to track the signal.
    After calling a girlfriend and getting a busy signal, he used his phone hacking abilities to listen in on her call. (And discovered that she was seeing someone else.)
    While working as an engineer at National Semiconductor, he stole the parts to make a blue box (an electronic device to reproduce the various tones AT&T used to route long-distance calls).
    He served three prison sentences in the 1970s for defrauding the phone company.
    He admitted to having obsessive tendencies.
    He dropped out in the 1990s to join the rave scene.
    He has poor personal hygiene.
    He lost most of his teeth due to a lack of dental care.

Why he might not be annoying:

    He was bullied in school.
    As a kid, he built a radio station in his bedroom.
    He was nicknamed ‘Captain Crunch’ for using a plastic whistle given away with the cereal to produce the 2600 kilohertz tone that allowed a person to make free phone calls.
    He said he was not interested in making free calls, he just wanted to explore what the phone system could do.
    During his second prison term, another inmate attacked him with a baseball bat, permanently damaging his back.
    He created EasyWriter while on a work-release program during his third prison sentence.

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    For 2024, as of last weekly ranking, Out of 6 Votes: 16.67% Annoying
    In 2023, Out of 4 Votes: 25.00% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 6 Votes: 16.67% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 11 Votes: 54.55% Annoying
    In 2020, Out of 3 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2019, Out of 3 Votes: 66.67% Annoying
    In 2018, Out of 27 Votes: 51.85% Annoying
    In 2017, Out of 14 Votes: 57.14% Annoying