Slashdot Mirror
Final Call for Voting in Slashdot's Beanie Awards
With LinuxWorldExpo just around the corner, and thus the time that we'll actually give these awards away, I wanted to tell everyone to go out and vote for who you like. You can check out the initial story for more information on the awards. Vote early, and vote often...er. Scratch that last one. Anyway, voting goes until 8 PM EST tonight.
And you are wrong because...
... the issues you brought up matter little to a newbie. A clear, helpful, get-things-working explanation is what newbies need. Regardless of arrogance or stupidity or impatience, all people need the short answers that work even if there's a better long answer. LinuxNewbie.org does a fine job of giving short answers, and it's perfect for the first time Linux home user. As a business or experienced Linux user, I'd be reluctant to rely on only one website or source for information anyway, which makes all of your "They're wrong about this and that" points on advanced topics kind of moot. LinuxNewbie.org gets you up and running, and it's your job to take the next step but at least they help A LOT in getting to that point...
And for the most part, HOWTOs are very easily available. Just because they're not an LDP mirror or something doesn't mean that their own information is useless. It's original and it's easy to fill the holes yourself, so why chastise them for spending more time on original content rather than messing around with all of the other easily available documentation (most of which are anti-newbie anyway)...
Damn, that was a hard choice.
:-(
I couldn't decide - I checked hemos, then i decided he's not worthy, since hemos is much better.
So naturally i changed my vote to hemos, but hell - hemos was still a better choice!
So again i rechecked the hemos box,
but then I understood that the best hemos isn't hemos nor is it hemos, so i checked hemos instead.
Then I doubted my choices and decided to go back to Hemos.
After an hour or so I realized that such a desicion can take me days!
So eventualy I absained.
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The day Microsoft makes something that doesn't suck,
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I'm going to live forever, or die in the attempt.
OpenBSD, for example, was left out of the "most improved" category, despite the security audit that made them the most secure OS in existence. Tim O'Reilly was left out of the advocacy category. Brian Behlendorf, whose Apache project has the distinction of achieving the largest market share of any open source project, was left out of the "unsung hero" category. And what's this about Richard Stallman for "Best dressed?" Unless the intent is to make a sarcastic joke at his expense, this is silly. The FreeBSD Daemon Girl (see http://www.gci-net.com/~u sers/f/fluke/comdex/bsdgirl1.jpg) got my nomination. But she wasn't included on the ballot, even though I both mentioned her in the discussion and entered her into the form.
When I e-mailed Rob Malda asking why none of these folks appeared on the ballot, he said that nominations had been closed and that it was "too late." However, I did mention these candidates in plenty of time in the nomination discussions, and entered all of them on the nomination Web form! Other people also recommended them in the discussions.
I certainly hope that these folks were not excluded from the ballot because the awards were actually intended to go to specific people or only people from certain organizations. (With only one or two exceptions, only people involved with Linux or FSF projects appear on the ballot.) Since Andover is spending enough to buy a house on these awards ($100,000 for the awards themselves and probably about $50,000 on space at the convention, advertising, etc.), they should include candidates such as these. Currently, my ballot mostly says "Abstain" -- and I bet I'm not the only one!
Since this is the Web, it's never too late to add candidates or allow write-ins. How about it, guys? It's sure better than winding up with people who aren't the readers' choices.
--Brett Glass