Magicians and TMs have their respective groups. But one does not need magic to take advantage of a peer group. Hackers now have a common chore to do, too. Membership in a group of programmers requires a certain programming talent, although you can of course chip the necessary skills, too. Up to a certain grade. Chipped programming produces more errors (no edge), and is therefore valued less.

Example:
NorthAmerican Free Coders
Membership: about 20 (core), 70 affiliated
Requirement: core: Cracking Group 2, Software 5, all: neo-anarchist free-source attitude, at least one (Type of Program) knowledge skill 4
Dues: core members have to maintain one program at rating 5 or perform an equivalent amount of small-scale hacking jobs. Affiliated members pay a flat 500¥ per month
Group Ressources: all standard + hacking programs are available to all members at rating 5. The groups central nexus is well hidden, the money earned by the group is used to maintain its close-to-SOTA performance and privacy.

More ideas? Comments?

My thought exactly. A group of 20 hackers should be able to keep all programs up-to-date with (probably) only one week of work per member...

Current Cracking Gangs do this same thing, so carrying it forward into SR4 is excellant.

One could also have a contact in a Cracking Gang so the roll is not needed. Same for a Pirate Warez Gang.

"Peg Leg Jill" Ork Underground Cracking Gang Member 4/4
"Zero Sum" Ork Underground Pirate Warez Gang Member 4/4

Good Idea will flesh out my Cracking/Pirate Warez Groups too.

WMS

Expanded rules for Virtual and Group Contacts will be in Runner's Companion. A Cracker/Warez group or two will likely be in Vice too.

How involved are gangs like the Reality Hackers and the Cereal Killers in this kind of thing?

The Cereal Killers have software piracy on their agenda - they´ll mostly depend on cracked software. Coding your own programs is way more demanding than cracking someone elses (duh), they will likely prefer to pay a few bills and spend the saved time on other crimes.

The Reality Hackers could make good use of self-made programs, as they specialise in infiltration jobs. You are unlikely to get noticed if you are sitting in your own basement coding your own programs on your own hardware. Said programs are also very unlikely to leave conclusive traces.

cereal killers?!

A matrix gang from Runner Havens. Purely virtual operation, Seattle-based. My players paid them for a distraction job once, but thought they were contracting a single hacker. MCTs security division had to deal with quite a lot of chaos and mayhem that day, and the runners were very surprised themselves.