Slashdot Mirror
Geek Pride Hits Boston This Weekend
The Festival is free and brought to you by Andover.Net / VA Linux, Addison-Wesley and SwitcHouse.
Also in attendance will be the esteemed Cmdr. Taco himself, Rob Malda, and Christopher Locke and David Weinberger, authors of The ClueTrain Manifesto. Listen to them address the assembled throngs, and ask questions. In addition to speakers, there will be food, chair massages, a $500 cash-prize Quake III competition, an install fest with support from the Boston Linux Users Group, and booths representing groups like Perl Mongers, the Free Software Foundation and more.
Roblimo will be there, enjoying the street party he secretly believes is being thrown for his and lovely wife Debbie's wedding anniversary, and JonKatz may be there as well. The first person to ask Katz about his dog and the manhole, then transmit a recording of his reaction to hemos, will win an as-yet-undetermined fabulous prize. If you can't make it to Boston for April Fool's Day, you can vicariously experience the gathering via downloadable video and audio, available for the same price as the festival, less the cost of getting there.
I'm really tempted to go but I'm already going to be going to Boston later in the summer to visit my grandmother and cousins and old college friends.
- tokengeekgrrl
"The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions
- Natalie Portman will be within range for all the grit pouring you need. (She attends Harvard!)
- Boston baked beans make a good substitue for hot grits down the pants. As an added bonus, they taste the same even after festering in some AC's shorts all day.
- MIT might pull one of their pranks for the occasion.
What can YOU do, mere Anonymous Coward? When Rob speaks I think we should shower him with hot grits. The first person to write "First Post" on a bathroom wall will get the respect of AC's everywhere!Don't forget to bring hardware to swap!
As long as we're plugging events that are only of interest to the small fraction of Slashdot readers who live in or near a particular city, i'd like to announce that
Richard Stallman will be speaking in NYC next Monday.
--
--
Mod up a post Rob doesn't like and you'll never mod again
Not true. Geekpride Day is sponsered (i.e., corporate sponsership) by Andover, etc., but Geekpride Day was happening long before Andover was part of it. This isn't an Andover/VA/etc event.
Actually, I don't remember it, but searching for it in the archives did find it. So there was a whopping two weeks notice (it was posted 3/15). Still not exactly prime candidates for affordable airfare, is it?
Am I the only one afraid of what a thousand hackers will do when gathered into a small area on april fool's day?
Judge Pag, the Learned, Impartial, and Very Relaxed
kinds of geeks. You have computer
geeks, science geeks, hardware geeks, etc.
Geeks and nerds are
getting all this publicity,
but what about us space-cadets?
It's suddenly so cool to be a geek.
I suggest all you geeks remember
what it was like before you were
cool -- being a space-cadet still isn't
thought of as cool, even by the geek and
nerd populations, although its coolness does
happen to be on the rise.
A note to Rob -- please change "news for nerds"
to "news for nerds and space-cadets".
Amazing magic tricks
"Geek Pride" my ass. What a ridiculous crock of shit. Thousands of at-least-semi-intelligent young men, most of whom can't get laid, all standing around and telling themselves they're the master race because they know how to configure sendmail.
If geek pride didn't involve inventing bogus excuses to sneer at everybody else, I might be able to take it seriously.
Furthermore, the prospect of meeting Eric "You're Endangering My Tribe" Raymond is about as appealing as a headwound.
Even if I did want to play Professional Geek this weekend, I can't: I've got to be in the office. I've got code to write.
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
I used to work for Prof. Pentland, and he's definately a good guy to hang out with, not to mention having a packed head (as Ender would say).
However, when I first heard of this thing via the MediaLab mailing lists, I had to wonder about the sanity of those involved. Or, at least, the common sense.
I mean, the Lab has done some really strange stuff over the years (anyone remember the original "fashion-show-with-wearable-computers"?), but I have to say, getting a group of nationwide geeks together is kinda weird. I mean, when I used to work there, you already had the biggest bunch of geeks together in one place.
Oh well, I'll probably fly cross-country to get there just for giggle (and to see my friends).
Fight advice: Check out the specials from the various airlines starting today for flights leaving early Saturday morning and returning Sunday or Monday. I can usually catch a flight from SFO to BOS for about $300 or so. I got used to seeing $150 from most East Coast cities for such a jaunt. And, when you're there, buy a 3-day T pass. It's cheap, and Boston has excellent public transporation.
Tourist Advice: go to RedBones in Davis Square (off the Red Line) for some tasty BBQ. Check out the MIT Museum for some randomly nerdy exhibits and a cool display of MIT hacks memorabilia. Go to E.L.I. computing on hampshire st in cambridge for a look at all the wonderful old recycled computer parts (they used to be the only place I could find PDP-11 parts). And, of course, go see the Boston Computer Museum (conveniently next to the Children's Museum).
Have fun!
-Erik
There are always four sides to every story: your side, their side, the truth, and what really happened.
Alex Pentland, academic head of the MIT Media Lab he is, and Eric S. Raymond (ESR), software evangelist and straight-shooting author of some of the Free sofware world's most influential essays he is, be there they will. If you zero dollars (or the equivalent in lire, persos, krugerands, galactic credits, ec.) can cough up and Boston on Friday (31st March) or Saturday (1st April) get to, well met at the 3rd annual Geek Pride Festival you will be. Free and brought to you by Andover.Net / VA Linux, Addision Wesley, and SwitcHouse the Festival is.
In attendance the esteemed Cmdr. Taco himself, Rob Malda he is, and Christopher Locke and David Weinberger, authors of The ClueTrain Manifesto they are, will be. The assembled throngs listen to them address, and questions ask. Food, chair massages, Quake II competition for $500 cash prize it is, support from the Boston Linux Users Group an install fest with, and booths groups like Perl Mongers, the Free Software Foundation, and more representing they are, in addition to speakers there will be.
Be there Roblimo will. The street party is thrown for his and his lovely wife Debbie's wedding anniversay believes he, and enjoy it he will. Be there Jon Katz may as well. The first person to about his dog and the manhole ask Katz and to hemos transmit a recording of his reaction win an as-yet-undertermined fabulous prize he will. For April Fool's make it to Boston. Do not make it and experience vicariously the gathering via downloadable video and audio -- for the same price as the festival less the cost of getting there, available it is. There is no try to make it.
Hey, I can get together the fee in zorkmids! Can I come?
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
You guys might want to point out that it's presented by Andover.Net and VA Linux, who are the owners of Slashdot. I know, in this case it's something they're sponsoring, not something they're trying to promote and make money from -- but now that Slashdot is sponsored by the big boys, you guys should start putting a disclosure statement in things involving Slashdot ownership.
Btw, for those of you like me who have no hope of making it on such short notice, I saw this on the site:
I highly recommend the use of public transportation during your stay in Boston. As a Massachusetts resident who lives 25 miles south of the city, I know that traffic in Boston can be horrendous, particularly on the Central Artery (I-93) in the morning and afternoon (especially when there is an event at the FleetCenter). Taking a taxi can be rather expensive, and driving around and finding places to park is quite a hassle.
Boston's public transportation system, the MBTA (known to us as "The T"), is reliable, clean, safe, and inexpensive (fare = $0.85, one of the few cities where you can take public transportation for less than a dollar). If you're coming from Logan Airport, take a Blue Line train inbound to Government Center and change over there to the Green Line. Take a southbound train to the Boylston Street stop. The Park Plaza castle is about two blocks away from the T station.
Hope that helps. If you've never visited the Commonwealth before, I wouldn't recommend driving here. We're notorious for road rage and poor driving skills.
Enjoy your stay in Boston!
awkwardone
www.tealeaves.org "All you need is love." -
Moderators, please moderate this up!
That's just for the Friday event. Saturday is an "All ages" event.
Why aren't you encrypting your e-mail?
I agree. Geeks being proud of their alleged intellectual superiority is just as repugnant as whites being proud of their alleged genetic superiority. Would Slashdot advertise "White Pride day"?
-- Religion is a major weapon in the war against reality.
The bad news: last year, the Computer Museum merged with the Museum of Science and moved out of Museum Wharf. The Children's Museum, I believe, has since expanded to take over the space.
The good news: I haven't been to the Museum of Science since the move, but I believe quite a few of the Computer Museum exhibits are now up and running in their new home. So it's a nice twofer when you go there. It's right on the Green Line. And the MoS is, I think, one of the better ones of it's kind in the country.
(not to mention the great parties Ingram used to throw there during Macworld back before they split for NYC)
Special Boston museum bonus: the penguins at the New England Aquarium. Go see them. For some strange reason, none of them really resemble Tux that much...
And there's a Franklin Covey store pretty close to the Castle (in the Prudential Center mall), where you can get all sorts of goodies and software for your Palm if the urge strikes you.
Finally, besides the excellent Redbones mentioned in the previous post, the Castle is also fairly close to Boston's Chinatown, where there is good eatin' to be had.
- -Josh Turiel
-- Josh Turiel
"2. Do not eat iPod Shuffle."
It's unrealistic to expect slashdot, a software-centric site to cover all stuff relating to nerds and geeks like us.
/.ers have set up geeky.org running Scoop (not slashcode) for the true range of geeky stuff. Get your early #'ed account now!
I don't know about geeky being cool; it seems cool here because we're all geeks! Out in RL it's really not as hot as hollywood makes it out to be. Yes, Jon Katz, we're still a persecuted minority! And what are YOU doing about it?
*slap*
Thanks, I needed that.
Anyhow, a couple of us
Not much there yet, but we plan to fix that in the next day or so. Feel free to submit something.
-JD
Boston geeks have known about it for weeks. :)
This is exciting in a geek kind of way. I'm not used to living somewhere with stuff actually going on.
;)
And to be honest, I'm kind of glad this wasn't posted two weeks ago on Slashdot -- there were limited tickets for the party Friday night and I might not have gotten any!
This ought to be even more interesting than IBM's Bar Code thing a few weeks ago that Michael De Icaza spoke at. Hmmmm... free food, free beer and legos. Doesn't get much better than that!
sarcasm=TRUE
Maybe they could give lessons on how to encrypt well.
sarcasm=FALSE
Fight Spammers!
Boston Geeks need to learn to communicate better. ;-) Well, maybe not BETTER, but SOONER. :)
You mean, something like:
The Festival is free and brought to you by Andover.Net / VA Linux, Addison-Wesley and SwitcHouse?
Emphasis mine.
--
how to invest, a novice's guide
Nor do I claim to get laid all that damn often :)
.. I'm talking Grade A, first-class betties. The hotties. "Show me the ropes, Mister Sendmail," they will beg. "I want to paint me like you do your French girls ...."
:-)
You should learn how to configure sendmail. Really. Then all you need to do is print out your sendmail.cf on some thermal-transfer paper and iron it onto a T-shirt. Wear it to the local shopping mall and the women won't leave you alone. Seriously. They'll flock around you. You'll have to beat 'em off with a fuckin' Louisville Slugger. And I'm not talking just the skanky hoes, here
huh?
What? Where am I? I must have dozed off again.
People like you said it's just your case, get on with your life.
People like you said, it's just your bitching.
A bully is a bully. They should not be rewarded for a bully. People should not forget what they have done.
I am not the first employee that Mattel abused! Read Barbie's Betrayal.
Fight Spammers!
Did you get the Y2K bug fixes completed?
Sorry, it just slipped out.
Fight Spammers!
--
I thought the purpose of being a geek is that you don't have to conform to everybody else. You don't have to fit a social stero-type. You are different. If this is you're definiton of "geek" then I am one. (no, computers don't make or not make you a geek, it's you.)
However, if we are just another social-stero-typable group, then, I am not a geek. I think we've lost the whole point of being a "geek", to me, at least, it was always that you did things _your_ way, not everybody elses. I guess not, it seems we now blindly follow ESR, RMS and, even TacoBoy himself.
I cannot support anything that would impose a stero-type upon myself. Therefore, I do not believe in, or support "geek-pride." I've got better things to do besides try to gain acceptence into a system similar to that I've fought for the greater part of my life.
Grades, Social Life, Sleep....Pick Two.
--Justin Mitchell
"2nd Place is a fancy word for losing" --Bender (Futurama)
Maybe Boston geeks know how hard it is to find parking down that way, and would rather keep it small!
Actually, I'm usually the last to know about these things, in this case a friend of a friend has something to do with organizing it, so I found out that way.
The "community" here in Boston, frankly sucks. Its pretty common that interesting tech-oriented social events are found out about by people after the fact. The Globe's new site (www.digitalmass.com) is probably the best resource here for this kind of thing going on, but I'm not even sure I saw this on there.
Someone please actually read the above and change the moderation to "funny".
Feel free to keep moderating down all the "grits" posts, though.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
It's just fun. What's wrong with that?
Obviously there's nothing wrong with fun. If it were billed as Geek Drinking Day I'd be there in a minute. But Raymond and Katz are involved and you know damn well they're not going to get up, say "get drunk, have fun" and then put down the mike.
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
And arguably a true geek would spend all night figuring them out.
When we start splitting hairs about who's a "geek" and who's not, that's where I draw the line. This is precisely what's annoying me about the whole thing.
The difference between "geek pride" and for example "gay pride" is that gays asserted "gay pride" at a time when they were defined as criminals just for living their lives; it took some balls to get out in the streets about it. "Geeks" invented "geek pride" after we got acceptance and stock options. BFD.
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
> Not that I have anything against gay's, but
> do you really want to equate "geek" with "gay"?
Well I dunno about you, but I am going to the
event, and I am secure enough in my own sexual
identity to not care if some people go making
paralells that have nothing to do with the event.
The whole point of such an event is to have
a "get together" of people who have something
in commone ie geeks. Its a time and a place where
we can come together and talk, discuss and
just BE geeks.
Its taking a little pride in who we are, getting
together and doing "geeky" things. Its just some
time to get together and have some fun.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
The Blue Line smells like peepee.
**>>BELCH
Perhaps it's just a kooky excuse to show off and have a bit of fun. No. It must have some weird and mysterious socio-political undertones. Then again, wait--
Remember the Undertones? Great band!
**>>BELCH
Do you think they would try to explain to people who had a clue?
Fight Spammers!
...but only because I have to find a home.
I don't give a damn about this stupid little event. It's a Linux-centric bullshit marketing toy. Now, in case people didn't know, I've been using Linux for a little over 5 years. Maybe closer to 6. And I'm totally disillusioned with Linux at this point. Kernel bugs aren't getting fixed for many versions - critical ones in the NCR 53c8xx driver, mind you - and people don't seem to care.
I have to be in Boston to find a home. I'm going to be there later tonight. And on Friday, I'm going to be all over the damn Cambridge suburbs looking for a home. And then on Saturday, I'm going to be looking all over as well.
The ONLY chance you have of finding me at this Geek Pride crap is so that I can manage to get in and ask ESR when he's going to give Microsoft his "seal of approval," since it's always seemed to be available to the highest bidder. Maybe he'll be a little less cocky, seeing as VA Linux's stock price is pretty much FREEFALLING. (Fairly surprising, seeing as their financials are doing fairly well, and they just signed up some major customers.)
BAH! Geek Pride? Maybe I'll stop by just to see how many lusers show up...
=RISCy Business
your company here.
shelby != ford
Ok, how is a comment on one of the alpha Geeks at a Geek Pride festival offtopic?
/more/ against firearms. I mean, if a rather high-level and self-proclaimed gun nut is explaining how thrilled he is at his potential and skill to shoot people with his gun, as a neutral party, what impression does that make about gun owners in general? Good job.
It seems to me that any "gun nut" attempting to sway over people with bad preconceptions would talk about Constitutional rights, about sporting, about responsibility, about self defense. Instead his site lauds over his ability to perform street-combat firearms maneouvers, and how good he is at blasting bullets into human figures. HUH!?? That would be exactly the WRONG impression I would want to give people. That would just make me feel
Oh, I guess you can continue and mark this as "redundant" or something...
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
> Sorry, that is a Mainer saying, used in the 60's
> comedy routine Bert & I by
> Marshall Dodge and Robert Bryan. Close, but not
> quite.
That may be the origin....however Here in boston
is where it is litterally true...and its certainly
popular around here.
> Though I agree driving around Boston can be
> painful -- especially if you are
> looking for a place to park under $8/hr.
Depends where you are. I used to work for MGH so
if I need a parking garage I sometimes go to
the Navy Yard garage (right across from building
149 in the Charlestown Navey yard). Nice MGH
shuttle goes from there to North Station (orange
line & green line, fleet center (why anyone would
go there beats the hell out of me), lots o bars).
Or continue on the shuttle to the main hospital
(take sabout 15 mins and is free btw) and you
can jump on the red line.
Used to be a maximum of $7/day to park there..
tho...I think they raised prices. Course...if
your actually driving into boston itself...well..
I avoid that at all costs. I fi am downtown in
boston it either means I have snapped and lost the
last threads of sanity I have left, or I took a
wrong turn in cambridge into one of those trap
areas that forces you away from your destination.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"