[Tutor] A rant about Tutor homework policy

[tutor.python.org]

With all due respect to the great minds which inhabit this list, I wish 
to make known my opinion that this list would be more beneficial to all 
if homework-related questions were not discriminated against.  To my 
mind, one of the key values of the hacker culture is the free flow of 
useful information, with each individual deciding for themselves what 
knowledge to partake of.  When I am attempting to solve a problem, I 
believe I know better than any third party what kind of assistance I 
need.  No matter how many solutions are given away to me through this or 
any other list, there is a never-ending supply of new problems to chew 
on.  In high school I had books which only published the answers to 
odd-numbered questions, which drove me absolutely nuts.  Supposedly, 
this was to make think and come up with the answers independently, but 
what it really did was deprive me of valuable feedback which I needed to 
make sure I was doing things correctly.  Each person is unique, and in 
the course of their education come to unique stumbling blocks.  Why 
should we be concerned about whether or not we are helping someone cheat 
their way through school?  Why should we care about sabotaging this or 
that educational system?  Ultimately, it is the individual who decides 
whether they will pursue real understanding, and no amount of integrity 
policing by this list will change an individual's inner motives.  I for 
one would love to see this list set politics aside and provide more 
answers to standard computer science problems.  I have never been 
enrolled in a university as a student of computer science and probably 
never will be.  If valuable resources on the Internet decide not to 
publish fundamental information regarding computer science for fear of 
stepping on the toes of "educational institutions", then the knowledge 
will effectively be limited to participants of those institutions.    I 
say, make the information available to everyone, and let the cheaters 
cheat!  After all, they're going to cheat anyway.  The rest of us will 
avail ourselves of what information we need when we need it in order to 
gain as much understanding as possible in the few short years we have 
before the task of pushing up daisies falls to us.

Sincerely,

Poor Yorick
tutor.python.org@pooryorick.com