I'm a firm believer in the "renaissance man" style of teaching. Everyone should know a a little bit about everything. It leads to a well rounded person with varied interests and lots of life experiences. The teachers of America are responsible for the amusing stories told at the cocktail parties of tomorrow. In the interests of mutual education I present: Lock picking!

The most famous underground work on the subject was done by an MIT student, and he's affectionately been "Ted the Tool" to his kinsmen. Every hacker with a toolbelt knows his name; even if his poorly photocopied treatise didn't make him wealthy it did make him infamous. The only problem with Ted's how-to lesson was that it was only exceptionally useful if you already understood the basic theory involved and just needed refreshers on the internal mechanics of locks.

Locksport International has produced a successor to The Tool's work. "A Locksport Primer" is a simple guide to starter lock picking techniques in graphic novel form. The guide explains the basic techniques of the locksmith's trade with lots of photographs and word bubbles! It makes fun work out of lifting bound pins and re-keying a lock cylinder.

The discussion on tool making is some of the most concise that I have ever seen. Trying to fabricate lock pick tools can be intimidating, but the LSI tutorial makes it fun and simple. Handmade lock picks aren't guaranteed to work better than the mass produced versions, but they are cheaper and worth a lot more street cred.

I would encourage the LSI to keep producing these guides. I have sixteen books on the subject, and I still found it educational. Good job, guys.

Shout out to Hack A Day for the link.