There is an unflattering picture of crackers and anti-crackers (and crypto-heads?) in Rudy Rucker's new novel, *The Hacker and the Ants*. Here's a sample: * * * * * * * * * * In the valley these days, phreaks were youths who cobbled together their own approximation of a decent cyberspace deck and afterward used it for weird cyberspace pranks. Cryps were phreaks who'd turned professional and gone into the employ of companies involved in industrial espionage. If you broke into some company's machines often enough, they were likely to hire you as a cryp to break into other companies, or they might use you as a security consultant to keep out the other cryps. It was a vicious circle -- the cryps' security-cracking escapades created a demand for the services they could provide. (*The Hacker and the Ants*, page 90)