Being a "Hacker: can be a good thing or a bad thing?

This depends on how you see yourself in this area If you see yourself that you will be able to learn and making your tools and do not use science in the wrong deal Go Here vice versa

Its just like you got a gun, now its your choice to use it for your safety or for Robbery

As far as the term is concerned, hacking is an excellent programming knowledge and skill.
It is independet of using the skill for good or bad as Kerman Muhammed said it above.
But it is wrongly used interchangeably with cracking, which is a bad deed.
So, hacker with good professional ethics is good.

The hacker is not a good person since he usualy use hacking for causing troubles as the word it self says, on the other hand a prorammer is a good person who can do everything good that my brevious fellows talked about....