There is no question that over his career, Mr. Jordan showed extreme athleticism. However, one of his most underestimated traits that sets him apart from most other professional athletes, let alone other basketball players, is his intensity 5 . His ability to play year after year through sickness and other adversity, with such consistency and passion, and win so many championships, is a testimony to his intensity. Many professionals in other sports, even those who win championships, win one or maybe two over the span of their career. Intensity, or desire, is that extra, non-quantitative factor that often makes the difference between victory and defeat in both sport and war, for that matter.
Hackers clearly have the desire to spend many more hours per day than most security professionals.
They often exhibit passion in their work that is sorely lacking in many working environments. The result is that even though hackers are underfunded and undereducated compared to systems administrators, their dedication, passion, and patience often make up for that lack. Many times, the only hit hackers take is the loss of a cheap dial-up account if they violate their ISP's Acceptable Use Policy. Thus, even if we can find the hackers, our ability to disable or destroy their assets is extremely limited. As long as there is no major disruption in service, ISPs tend to be lax in either preventing or following up on security incidents.