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Take a look at this classic title to see what I mean (it's in the paragraph beginning "October, 1993 [Etext #85]").

In terms of large & venerable Web-based collections of just about anything, Metalab (formerly Sunsite) is still going strong.

By the way..

I have a box here at the apartment that I picked up from the University of Arizona Surplus auction.. Its a big honkin' patchcord synthesizer from the late 60's or early 70's, originally designed as a hearing tester.

It has a 100-step programmable sequencer, 4 VCO's, 3 bypass filters, AGC control and a few other oddities. The name on the front is "Starkey Hearing Sciences Laboratory".

If anyone has any information about this box, or this company, please contact me. I've figured out how to play it and all, but im more interested in its history than anything else. Any ex-Starkey Labs employees out there?


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

While Bob Moog was important (and does rule), there's also another guy whom Moog worked with in the late 60's and early 70's who is probably the biggest unsung hero in the history of electronic music.

Hop over to RaymondScott.com and have a look. This guy built a goddamn self-programmable synthesizer out of thousands of pieces of discarded telephone switching equiptment in his basement before the era of MIDI. A 6 foot tall, 30-foot long array of telephone switching relays, tone circuits and oscillators to be exact.

Scott is also the person credited with inventing the sequencer, and ambient electronic music in the early 1960's..A double-album set of pure electronic music designed for babies to listen to, believe it or not.

For those of you who want to hear what the giant array of telephone relays sounds like, go here. Decompress the file and cat it to >/dev/audio ...its crude, but its all I can do on short notice. :) Its terrible quality, but, thats what buying CD's are for. I basically pointed my laptop at my stereo and recorded it straight off a console prompt. Hehehe..



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

While Bob Moog was important (and does rule), there's also another guy whom Moog worked with in the late 60's and early 70's who is probably the biggest unsung hero in the history of electronic music.

Hop over to RaymondScott.com and have a look. This guy built a goddamn self-programmable synthesizer out of thousands of pieces of discarded telephone switching equiptment in his basement before the era of MIDI. A 6 foot tall, 30-foot long array of telephone switching relays, tone circuits and oscillators to be exact.

Scott is also the person credited with inventing the sequencer, and ambient electronic music in the early 1960's..A double-album set of pure electronic music designed for babies to listen to, believe it or not.

For those of you who want to hear what the giant array of telephone relays sounds like, go here. Decompress the file and cat it to >/dev/audio ...its crude, but its all I can do on short notice. :) Its terrible quality, but, thats what buying CD's are for. I basically pointed my laptop at my stereo and recorded it straight off a console prompt. Hehehe..



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Its called a joke. Look that one up.

And yes, i'm sure there are many secure NT servers out there. The problem is, people keep plugging them back into the wall.


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Quoting from the Hacker's Lexicon:

"(...) 5. To mass-mail unrequested identical or nearly-identical email messages, particularly those containing advertising. Especially used when the mail addresses have been culled from network traffic or databases without the consent of the recipients."

If its email, and its trying to sell me something I didnt ask for, its spam ..Regardless of its IBM or Habib's House Of Rice sending it. The phrase "legitimate spam" falls into the same category of "military intelligence" and "NT security".

Oxymorons.


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Well, I wouldn't consider alcoholism a death-sentence. Its not like its some incurable disease you have no control over. I'd imagine its very difficult to get a handle on it, but its certainly seems possible to do so.

There are drugs on the market which will cause you to become violently ill if you attempt to drink anything with alcohol in it. Of course, you have to take the drug religiously..but in any case, that usually solves the physical side of the addition. Going into therapy to correct the psychological part of the addition is likely the next step, i'd assume.



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Remember Clifford Stoll? ...Einsteinic hair, Cuckoo's Egg author turned luddite?

Saw the inside of his house once, it was about the same as the description of the Katz guy... incredible amounts of useless junk piled up everywhere, some places stacked as high as the ceiling..Cliff was quite at home in all of it, even entertained by the sight of it, it seemed. The woman living with him didn't seem to mind it either.

Then suddenly, Cliff goes luddite. Go figure.


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

What would people recommend for dial-in systems (modem support, PPP, email, etc.) averaging 8 megs of RAM, 250 MB harddrive? X-Windows isn't a high priority (but it would be nice) and if I were to do something like LFS, the parent Linux would have to be Live-CD or -Floppy. They'd be used primarily for software development and Internet use.

Suggestions I've heard so far:

• Vector Linux
• Linux From Sratch
• Debian

According to the article, this guy lived in a luxury condo filled waist-high with rotting food and garbage, infested with insects and mice..Found dead in a hotel room with 5 empty bottles of booze at the age of 37.

An absolute and total waste. It just makes me wonder why he was trying to drown his sorrows.. For a guy with that much success in life, and for someone who actually managed to do something halfway important, why he'd slowly kill himself.

Genius isnt linked with tragedy. Genius is linked with madness.



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

I did the same thing for a year, actually. Except I wasnt Fry Clerk at McDonalds. I was the Network Manager for the Chem department's visualization lab.

Oh, and by the way, you're welcome. I'm glad you enjoy my work.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Because i'm in school, you nugget. Now scurry back into your cave, troll. Sheesh

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Because I dont want _that_ much feedback. 800,000 people dont need to know that i'm scratching my chin today. That puts me on a level with Elian Gonzales coverage. :)

I honestly dont know how many shirts Copyleft is has made. I havent recieved any cashflow from them, although they have told me that sales were "moderate". Heh.

100 shirts means $300 bucks in my pocket from royalty checks. That would make me happy. My landlord too. :)


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Gated speaks the OSPF routing protocol which can handle dynamic routing. This should allow you to switch to the T1 when the cable modem goes down.

I don't think its possible to have all incoming packets come through the cable modem and all outgoing packets go through the T1. If your packets leave via the T1 they will have a different IP address than if they leave over the cable modem. To do this you would need an upstream router to readdress packets to the other ip address.

You may want to look at Linux 2.4 Advanced Routing HOWTO which lets you set up routing rules based on things other than destination address, including port number which may be of interest to you.

1) I'm not sure that its a de facto part of the definition of a reptile that it necessarrilly needs to be cold-blooded.

2) Cows, and other cattle, are domesticated animals. Theyre bred to be complacent, sedentary, and fat. Similar animals in the wild are quite capable of roaming miles per day, and rather quickly at that. Watch Animal Planet sometime. :)

3) Re-read what I wrote. You're way off. Not all herbivores are cold-blooded. Not all carnivores are warm blooded.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

This article isn't trying to assert that all dinosaurs were either cold-blooded or they were all warm-blooded. They were almost certainly members of both groups.

If you look at modern reptiles, the larger species tend lead more or less sedentary lives, whereas the smaller ones tend to be far more active. They are specialized to handle whatever environment they exist within..Larger herbivorous dinosaurs (hey look, I used my big word for the day..herbivorous!) would generally have no need for long, sustained periods of activity. They dont hunt. Meanwhile, other species depend on hunting and scavanging for a living, and perhaps could benefit from the advantage of being warm-blooded.

Also, when talking about a period of time as large as this, there were no doubt adaptations from cold to warm-blooded. After the mass extinction that signaled the beginning of the Cretaceous era, generally the only forms of life which thrived were those which were small, warm-blooded, and smart. :)

Anyway, all that science mumbo-jumbo is beside yje point. If I were a dinosaur, I would prefer being warm-blooded to escape predation. Its kinda hard to hide behind a palm tree when you're 5 stories tall, and as wide as a house. :)


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Apologies, the link shows in the preview but doesn't seem to make it onto the comment. The URL is http://metalab.unc.edu/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/Wearab le-HOWTO if clicking here doesn't work.

Which is more 'mindless', 'isolating', 'lonely' and 'arrogant': travelling to Washington to read paper books in an environment where anything you want to share has to be meticulously copied in one form or another, or cutting and pasting quotes with links so that everyone reading it can see the full context for themselves. Furthermore, the Internet in all of its forms encourages interaction between the reader and the writer: comments, corrections, additions. I've learned more from the replies to my comments on Slashdot in any given month than from any single book I've read.

I don't read books in electronic form very much. The hardware isn't as comfortable and convenient as traditional paper books ... yet. I own paper copies of The Hacker Crackdown, The New Hacker's Dictionary and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. When I want to quote them in comments on Slashdot or in e-mail to friends, I don't want to type the quotes every time. And I want to be able to refer them to something closer than the nearest library or bookstore to read a copy for themselves. If my friends are as much like me as I think they are, they do far too much of their reading at hours when libraries aren't open.

Down here in Tucson, we have a wonderful little thing called "The Graveyard". The local Air Force base (Davis-Monthan AFB) carries out a strange task....Portions of the base are used as a gigantic graveyard for decomissioned aircraft, and other aircraft destroyed due to arms-control treaties.

There is a gigantic guillotine-like device which basically chops up aircraft out there -- bombers, fighter planes, etc. What happens is, periodically, some planes are chopped up, and then left out in the desert for a few days so that Russian spy satellites can photograph it. The Russians are basically doing the same thing on their end..chopping up planes and leaving them out in the open so our spy satellites can confirm that they are keeping up their end of the bargain. :)

There are places you can drive outside of Tucson, public roads that run near the perimeter of the graveyard -- 747's with their heads cut off as far as the eye can see, literally hundreds of mothballed F-14s and F-15 Strike Eagles, lots of bizzare stuff. Its all cordoned off with barbwire and periodically patrolled by military police with teams of guard dogs.

You can have a look at a portion of the aircraft graveyard right here.

The truth is always much, much stranger than fiction. :)


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Just incase you thought the severed-head patent was weird, have a look at this:

IBM's "Penis Locking And Lacerating Vaginal Insert" Patent.

Yes, IBM. :) Meant as an "anti-rape" device for women, this little gem will clamp down on a rapist's dick and shred it to pieces. Better have a strong stomach before you view this document --- its basically a dick blender. Leave it to IBM to come up with it, eh? ;) Makes you wonder who road-tested it...heheheheh



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

I simply wouldn't know what to do if Phantom Menace wasn't released on DVD. Thanks to Georgie, now all of us can be irritated and annoyed by Jar Jar in full digital sound and video! :)

Thanks, but no thanks. I'll wait for Lucas to release a 100% Jar-Jar Free Directors Cut of the film. Oh wait, he already did. That was the 2-minute trailer. :)



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Here's an excerpt from an email conversation between Rob and I which took place in April of 1999. It echoes the same sort of sentiments that this (today's) post does. He isn't kidding.

( Me: )

> (or yours) for granted. We were just looking for a creative way to drum up a
> little support, and have some fun in the process. :) The "Beer For Rob Malda"
> poll turned out to be one of the most popular user polls we've ever had. :)

( Rob: )

*laugh*. No problems. I just get annoyed occasionally. You should see the
submissions box. Not posting a story usually == Conspiracy on my part
according to some people. Its annoying ;)


And here's an excerpt out of a different email, two weeks later in early May of '99..

( Me: )

> Yeah, sometimes. The fun isn`t so much in painting the stuff, as it is in
> actually delivering it, and seeing people use and enjoy it. Much of it is
> just plain hard work..Prop for E alone took me well over a month to
> produce. Making it was an ordeal--but delivering it, and seeing people's
> chins drop was a joy. :)

( Rob: )

*laugh*

Its a little different for me. So much of my feedback is typically
negative that I just ignore most of it. I do what I like- I always
have, but that 'jaw dropping' doesn't work to well here-- I've posted
3500+ stories, and 3400 were fine, but once a week I post one that
someone disagrees with and WHAM ;)


Maybe that gives you a little window on what it might be like to be on Rob's side of the table. The rest of you can give the guy a fucking break and sit on your hands if you have nothing better to do than bitch. If you think about the combined effect of thousands of people whining a similar whine, you wouldn't want to be on the recieving end either. If you appreciate Slashdot, great, show your appreciation by not adding to the noise. Consider using your brain and doing something useful with it.


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

What, you run around hugging bunnies with an assortment of different compliments at your disposal that you can pick up during the game? ;)

Something tells me Carmack may be feeling a little guilty for all the bloody years. Heh.



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

I'd moderate you up if I could. The whole idea behind ICANN is pretty bizzaro to begin with, let alone with Queen Esther at the helm of it.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Hehehe..I hope so.

BTW, thanks for reading my original post carefully. Your response shows that you did.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Well, youre right. It may not be symptomatic of all Linux companies. It may only affect those companies which are publically held versus privately held. Time will tell..but you have to admit..The crowd has grown unruly in the past year..even more than it used to be.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

The fact that Stampede is currently having a few top-level disputes isn't really the main problem here..The fact that another crack has developed in the Linux foundation, however, is.

I think we're in the middle of an interesting time, really. It used to be, a few years ago, that we were all doing this for fun...We didn't care about getting rich. Now, we all wake up and realize that money is starting to get in the way of ideas. The free exchange of ideas and been limited by the fear of getting screwed. Consequently, people are getting pissed off. After all, why should they work for free, when someone else is profiting from what they do?

While I don't think this will eventually spell out an epitaph for the whole Linux movement, it still remains true that a minority of people with less than pure intentions are driving the majority of people apart rather than uniting them under a common umbrella.

Instead of developers doing what they do for fun, now there are nameless people at the top raking in money off their work, and making alot of people very, very sour in the process..It breeds distrust and resentment in a community that bases its whole existance on mutual trust and cooperation.

Stampede's issues are an indicator of a much bigger problem that supercedes what distribution you run, or what platform you use. It comes down to an issue of people, and how they work together. We all have to agree to play one game, not two. We either continue as we have traditionally, or we become suspicious of eachother and suffer the consequences of doing so.

Time to make up our minds, I say.



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

In an industry where hard disks capacities are still measured in 1,000,000 bytes per megabyte, and 19" monitors are still 17.9" viewable, what makes you think that any company would adopt a benchmarking standard that was actually impartial to their product? The whole point of benchmarking your own product is to give the marketing department something to crow about. So, logically, they gear their hardware (and choose their benchmarks) accordingly.

Sure, its a great thing for the rest of us, because we dont have anything we're trying to sell. Just dont expect anyone on the outside to hop on the bandwagon.

Yours In Science,

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

The "language as entire environment" idea recurs frequently. BASIC is the classic example. Turbo Pascal and Smalltalk were also closed world. But with the widespread availability of good integrated development environments, there's less need for such schemes than there used to be. Today, you can write in C++ and have all the ease-of-use facilities, including a source-level debugger, you had in the closed environments of old.

Of course, if you're stuck using GCC on Linux, you may feel you're missing something.

Maybe you'll have to have something like this. ;-)
--

I've actually had a few MRE's.. Theyre not bad, not big, and dont really weigh much.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

I'm hoping that brain uploading becomes possible eventually. The benefits are numerous:

• You can backup and restore yourself anytime
• Instant teleportation
• You can take on any simulated "cyberspace" shape you want. Of course, it will be meaingless, but it'll still be fun.
• You can get smarter just by buying more CPU time.
• You can put in direct neural probes to allow you to simply think commands to the computer or send thoughts to someone else at a much higher rate than otherwise possible, and with parallel channels with multiple conversations being possible. Knowledge of brain functioning is all that limits this. You could fuse your brain with the brain of your loved one.
• Other than the neural knowledge required, you could modify any synaptic connections directly. If you knew how and you wanted to, you could remove all emotion. If you later decide it was a bad idea, just jot down a note about why you were wrong and restore your previous self.

If humanity becomes anywhere near this dependant on computers, companies will jump all over themselves to try to control the software that people exist within.

If such a day comes when we can upload, I want open source to be around so I can live life without a company's restrictions and without the constant annoyance of advertising. I want to know the source code to the software that's keeping me alive and safe.
--

Sorry to spoil your fun, but, I get an auto +1 on any response I write..In addition to the +1 everyone else gets when posting using their real name.

No, I have no special priveldges here. And only one account. How do I get +2 on everything? Its called having good karma. 30+ usually. Look into it.

And have a _great_ day.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Actually, it would probably be a better idea to wait a little while before turning France into a parking lot for EuroDisney. Once the stock market cools off, and the new administration takes over later this year, the economy will be in the toilet. Since everyone knows that war is good for the economy, we should put our national labor force to work on producing bars of soap, to airdrop them in France. We can also put our printing industry to work printing instructions in French on how to use soap.

Then, once France smelled a little better, we'd move all the people we dont want over there, offering them political asylum. Alanis Morissette, Gerard Depardieu, The Backstreet Boys, Elian Gonzales -- all of em, just move em over to France. Then nuke it, pave it, and charge admission to worship Mickey.

Sounds good to me. ;) I'm all for a healthier economy!

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

So somebody is sleeping with someone they shouldnt sleep with. It happens... My first real job as a mighty FORTRAN printout-stacking, xerox-fetching, laserprinter-unjamming boy at the College of DuPage gave me a good idea of how it works. Some women sleep their way to the top. Some men let women think theyre sleeping their way to the top.

Had this guy I worked with (We'll call him Chris, because that was the guys name.. Heh) who I saw enter a darkened classroom with a female coworker of mine once, they stayed in there a good half an hour or so before attempting to sneak back out without seeming suspicious. And wouldnt you know it, I got passed up for hours like a week later, by this very girl. Wonder why. :)

Something tells me this guy in the article got passed up for an important spot by the woman now taking over for him. Arent rumors fun? :)

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

I've said enough. If you weren't listening back when it was important, well..

Good luck.


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Even after reading the buzzword-laden write up for this, its still not abundantly clear how they can insure that individual coders will get a significantly large enough slice of the pie to warrant them even embarking on the task in the first place.

As a coder or project manager, you're probably just as well off securing hosting space on a third-party server with no vested interest in what you're developing.

Besides, this sort of ant-farm implementation seems a little flawed straight out of the gate -- By sheer math, the larger the project, the more people you've got contributing to work, and the smaller the divisions of profit become. The process becomes entirely self-defeating as the size of a project increases. Lay ontop of that the inherent risk of developing openly, and the odds are already stacked even more heavilly against you. No thanks, i'll pass.

Popeyeronic adj. [pop-AYE-rah-nik] -- The tendency of small Linux companies to become destructive and threatening once they get their hands on the green stuff. See: Andover.net, VA Linux Systems, Red Hat.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

A great article, but one thing worthy of note:

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to take a course in Abnormal Psych..One of the first things they told us before giving us our textbooks was, "Do NOT, I repeat, Do NOT thumb through this book, in an attempt to diagnose yourself. Chances are, there are 20 or 30 different illnesses in this book that you'll think you have. You dont. The process of diagnosing mental illness must be done by a qualified professional with years of training and experience.", or words to that effect.

IMHO, its been a fairly common experience..Getting too heavy into anything, computers included, will eventually drive you to the brink of mental illness. Coupled with the sort of lifestyle that hardcore geeks tend to exhibit, its no big surprise.

Human beings need sunlight, interaction, comfort, quiet, good food, clean air, and clear water. If any of combination of those turns bad, it will take a toll on you. It may not be when youre 15, or 20, or 25, but it will ultimately kick your ass.

Speaking from experience (I've had my share of extreme episodes of burn-out..) Human beings were not physiologically meant to intake egregious amounts of caffiene, engadge in countless hours of intense, non-stop stimulation and stress. The body simply isn't equipped to handle that sort of thing for extended periods of time.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Well, actually..If you look at a cross-section of the people who are involved with computers, a disproportionately large number of them are gay. I can't exactly speak for those people (silly me, i'm straight..heh) but there are quite a few.

Im not too particularly fond of that sort of "lifestyle" either, but, throwing God into the ring is just as boneheaded as Emmett introducing this sort of topic in the first place. Its fine if you believe in God. Just do us a favor and don't add to the problem.

Traditional, or non-traditional, your sexual orientation is your own business. Even if you're straight, making what you do in your own bedroom a matter of public record is as equally pointless as it is stupid.


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Lydon doesn't like disengenuine people. The instant you open your mouth and start asking him the same old and retarded questions about the Sex Pistols, like everyone else, he will grow bored with you immediately. From the sound of the post, that looks like the first turd that will fall out of your mouth. You know how the saying goes..Dont be "that guy".

If you want to get on his good side, thank him for being himself. :)



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

The important part is not that they comply with the GPL, but that they use the GPL voluntarily. All of the software they write and distribute (that's not subject to other people's licenses, like the RSA stuff), even when it contains no patches from people outside of Redhat, is under the GPL. They don't have to do that, and it is a positive contribution to the community.

True, Red Hat has given alot to the Linux community. But the vast majority of that _stuff_ was done while they were still a privately-held company. I dont think anyone at all had a problem with the old Red Hat. Its the new one people think smells funny.

Bleh, what do I care, i'm moving out of my apartment tomorrow. Wheeeeeee :)

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

I came back from vacation and discovered that I didnt recieve one of these letters, nor did about two dozen other people I felt should have deserved one but didn't recieve it. I emailed you and asked not for an invitation, but >why I wasn't sent one. You sent me one. I rejected it.


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Sorry to rain on your flame, but I never accepted any money, or any hardware from VA, or anyone at VA. Trae tried to give me a computer once "to be nice", but I had a long talk with my folks about that "gift" at that time..Ultimately, I decided that such a gift would have only obligated me to do similar work for him for free, so I rejected it.

The server that was provided for System 12 was only given to me so that I would have somewhere other than themes.org to house my project. It wasn't a "gift". Want some email for proof?

I should note, however, I did once change my mind; When System 12 rolled around in June of 99, I felt that the year or so's worth of work I would be putting into the project justified such a gift. I finally agreed to let him send me a computer.

No computer ever arrived.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Since you wrote your response as an Anonymous Coward, I cant address you directly, so..

Sorry you feel that way.. You might want to read VA's own press release announcing ColdStorage from Aug '99. I posted the link to it a few messages ago. It sounds absolutely nothing like SourceForge. While you're at it, you can go have a look at the interview I did for Linux.Com back in November, which _does_ sound alot like what later became SourceForge. I have a feeling VA canned ColdStorage when it became clear that they were going to buy Andover. It would have been stupid for them to continue with building ColdStorage in that case. Why ColdStorage never saw the light of day has never been established. Ask yourself why.

As for Trae, sorry, I dont talk to liars, nor do I keep them as friends. That rule applies both to my personal life and professional life. The scene is rife with people who by virtue of working with him, hold the same opinion of him as I have. You'de be surprised at the volume of email I've recieved from people who've had similar run-ins with him. I can't say I was too surprised at his effort at damage control, tho. Its typical of his style.

Him and Tony (the ColdStorage/SourceForge guy)are best friends in real life, I later found out. It wouldn't surprise me in the least that what I told Trae idea-wise for weeks on end last year may have ended up on Tony's desk as work orders.

So, you can go ahead and hate me for having an opinion. It doesn't really change the facts, unfortunately. Sometimes I wish it did.

Ciao,



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Well, lets see...What have I done for Linux.

I had a paper published in Linux Journal a few years ago, when InSight blew up. Our head coder (Hi Ben) had absolutely nothing to show for 6 months of work between late 97 and early 98.. I ended up donating my end of the workload to Gnome and Red Hat. A measly thousand icons, some music and a few icons. Anyway--back to the article in LJ.. I didnt have the money to afford a patent-filing fee, so, I let that idea (and others) go for free. Someone later built it, and added it to the Gnome CVS tree. A nice thing.

Then theres TFUG, my local Linux users group here in Tucson. I've given more than a few talks there over the yeas, and have spent virtually every other Sunday of my life since 1996 there helping people enjoy Linux, both new and old.

Then there was the little matter of the Gnome Style Guide in summer of 98. 3 or 4 months of my spare time went into that until it dissolved into a convoluted mess of bickering and flame. It got people thinking about the UI, at least. Oh well, can't win em all. ;)

Oh, then theres that little thing with VA called Themes.org where I busted my ass as a volunteer for nearly two years. Was on staff at t.o for a while, and was even asked by Trae McCombs at one point to be site manager of the whole damn thing. (I declined it. I was too busy with school, running Propaganda, and working simultaneously.)

Then theres Propaganda. a year and a half worth of work, all of it in your lap, and everyone elses lap, for free. Now you and about 2-3 million other people have a pretty desktop. You're welcome.

Then there's System 12.

Nowadays, theres MetaLab/UNC, Spindletop and other little things i'm quietly up to. Sure, plenty of people have done more than me. Written drivers, applications and whatnot..But an awful lot more have done less than me, too.

So..What have you done lately?

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

Call up Red Hat. Tell them you're trying to get a job, and ask them if you may list someone within their company as a job reference, since your work is included in their distrib. They wont even know who you are.

Lets suppose you did some work for VA instead. Call em up and ask if you may list someone within their company as a job reference on your resume'. The answer will be an equally flat "No." because they dont know who the hell you are either.

They dont know who you and I are. They don't know who you and I are because they dont care who you and I are. They dont care who you and I are because they dont have to care. They dont make any money by caring. See how it works yet?


Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

If you go back and read my response carefully, you'll see that I didnt say "Anyone who makes money off Linux is evil."

I said, anyone who makes money off Linux -at the expense- of the community, is evil. Theres nothing at all wrong with making money off Linux. Good examples of this care Copyleft, Cheapbytes, LinuxMall and others.

Try to read what I write a little more carefully next time. Its all too easy to fly off the handle with an opposing point of view.

Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

1) Red Hat isn't a good company because they comply with the GPL. If they didn't comply with the GPL, their company would be sacked, and their employees burnt at the stake. Not to mention, their company would be sitting beneath 6 miles of lawsuits from the x-number of thousands of people who give them a product to sell. Myself included. I may not have any mission critical code in Red Hat's distrib, but my contribution to the distribution itself is fairly large -- 11 MB.

2) Slashdot was doing fine (some would argue, better) without support from Andover, or VA. They arent necessary to Slashdot's existance, and never were.

3) Before VA got smart and decided to purchase Andover, they were planning on building a Freshmeat clone, to compete with it for community mindshare, and ultimately push Patrick and his project out of existance by sheer force. Rather than allow or encourage Freshmeat to prosper, they wanted it to destroy it and replace it with something they had direct control over. Don't believe me? Read this press release from August '99. Don't be surprised if its gone by the time you read this. By August '99, Freshmeat was already the established watering hole for new software in the Linux community. What reason, other than greed, would VA want to reproduce what already existed?

ColdStorage never saw the light of day. Think about it---why pay your employees to build a site from scratch and spend alot of time and effort trying to compete when you can just buy your competition outright? Sound familliar?

4) Making money in the Linux community does make you evil, if you have to answer to anyone but the community. VA answers to a board of directors, now. Not the community. Same story with Red Hat. Their job is to turn a profit however they can--and thats their only job. Thats the only thing they need to care about, and consequently, that is the only thing they care about.

It is a fundemental betrayl of the very principles which made Linux even possible in the first place. Cooperation, mutual respect, and community effort. Not competition, hidden motivations, and monopolization of utilities. When one company owns what you read, what you download, and what you use, its time to ask questions. If you dont, you are doing a grave disservice to yourself. If VA truly is a good-natured company, they will stand the test of time.

I don't see that as being the case, here.



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)

There's one good thing about all this..Theres a growing awareness among the real Linux community that we are in the middle of a pool of sharks--People who care less about the people involved than they do about turning a goddamn profit. Now you're seeing what happens to these people. They begin to fail, because their intentions are anything but pure and innocent.

We didn't need them before to be happy and successful, and we sure as hell don't need them now. Companies like Red Hat, VA, and LinuxCare have only made the game more interesting..The total sum of what they've done for us is negative, not positive. Whatever they have "provided" for us, was not made by them. It was was made by us. For free, without hidden motivations.

We don't need them.



Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)