Sounds like some of the guys I knew from zerostate.net. Some of these ideas can be a serious rabbit hole, and articles like this only barely scratch the surface. Losing one's mind in the process is a real risk of entertaining such philosophies for the wrong reasons.

Is this the geohotz that found PS3 exploits?

FTA

> He landed himself in hot water when he jailbroke Sony’s PlayStation 3, leading to a contentious lawsuit that was later settled.

yes.

And one of the first (if not the first, but I can’t recall) jailbreaks and carrier unlocks for the iPhone.