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Open Source on NPR?
anhinga asks: "I have recently talked my way into an assitant producer's position with the national public radio show 'City Visions,' a talk show on political issues from the s.f. bay area's perspective. For my first show, the producer i'm working with and i are putting together a show on the Open Source movement, working title: 'The Politics of Nerd.' The question is: which vocal, intelligent, bay area and vicinity OS insiders should be on the show?"
did you look into your local Linux user group for local people??
http://www.balug.org/
...working title: 'The Politics of Nerd.' The question is: which vocal, intelligent, bay area and vicinity OS insiders should be on the show?"
With a title like that, I'd prefer to see nobody get on your show. Can't we please get past the stupid horn-rimmed-glasses and pocket protector stereotypes? Software is everywhere and making good software available to everyone is a critical issue. Stop turning it into a joke by marginalizing people who could actually make a difference.
. . . that says the show will only be available in a streaming-only, proprietary format like Real, Quicktime, or WMA and that they won't see the irony of that.
The Politics of Nerd.
If you are looking to send the message that OpenSource is for everyone, I really don't think that including Nerd in the title is a good idea. Why not something that lets non-nerds know that OpenSource is for them. Like 'Open Your Mind' or 'Open Politics' or something else, your the producer. I would just want to shy away from titles that make OpenSource a nerd exclusive realm.
THIS SPACE FOR RENT
How about Politics of l33t h4x0rs?
--jdp Maintainer of VisEmacs
everyone from the TechTV studios. Sorry couldn't resist.
fly me in.
illegitimii non ingravare
Many of the NPR interviews we hear are over the phone or some similar technology. Why limit it to the bay area when the stuff the bay area is working on provides so many wonderful alternatives:).
"as plurdled gabbleblotchits on a lurgid bee" - Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz. (One man's humorous is another mans flamebait)
Transmeta in Santa Clara has a certain employee who would probably do at a push. Linus Torvalds. O'Reilly publishing in Sebastapool has an owner who might be intersted. Tim O'Reilly. If you're going to get a talking head choose ESR over RMS. Better still get John 'MadDog' Hall.
It all depends on what type of show you are planning, an intelligent discussion or a FOX special? With your emphasis on 'vocal' I guess a slanging match is the best we can hope for?
IMHO, a better approach would be to get people who use Open Source products, get them to explain what they do and then how OS helps them and lastly how much it's benefited their respective company.
Title? how about, "Boring Computer Stuff...Again!" Not that many people outside of techs are going to be interested in people talking about software, yawn.
Lastly, if you really want to do NPR a favour get Michael Moore, Bill O'Reilly, Larry Ellison & Scott McNealy on the same show.
Last I heard, Bruce Perens was up that way.
Of course, I stopped putting radio tracking devices on people back in high school, so I have no real idea where he is at the moment.
-- MarkusQ
I live in San Francisco, I'm vocal, I can rant just like the rest of em, and sometimes I even make sense (50 karma, baay, for years) Pick me! Pick me!
"Your superior intellect is no match for our puny weapons!"
Your title is odd, bordering on insulting. As for the content of your report, I wonder which movement you are focusing on—the older, ethics-based Free Software movement that speaks to all computer users, or the freedom-dismissing, development methodology-centered Open Source movement which speaks primarily to businesses? Were you aware of the difference between the two movements? Some people use the term "Open Source" without understanding the ramifications of that term. You simply cannot understand what's going on with the Open Source movement until you first understand what drove RMS to make the Free Software movement and what the Free Software movement advocates.
A better question to ask is "Who can speak well on the topic we're looking to make our radio show about?" without limiting it to a particular region. There is so much valuable insight to be had from everywhere, it seems silly to limit it to just the SF bay area. A cursory analysis of the Free Software community (which is the same community you're referring to as "Open Source") shows that where people are physically located is irrelevant. RMS would be a good person to include on a discussion of Free Software since he founded the movement (which predates all work done on the Open Source movement by roughly 13 years) and (as far as I know) he lives in or near Boston. If you asked him he might be willing to talk to you.
If you haven't already, please read Congressman Villanueva's letter to Microsoft for some guidance about what you should be talking about on this program (including terminology—notice he talks only of Free Software because that is the movement that jibes with his ethical approach to making sure the government doesn't force its citizens into a single-source software provider by the data formats it chooses). The same issues affect the USA. His analysis is a brilliant denial of Microsoft's lies, so well-worded many have noted it should be required reading. Congressman Villanueva is from Peru. Again I stress: there are all sorts of people all over the world you need to talk to and learn from in order to really understand the Free Software community enough to do a good report.
Have you also considered that many people who talk about "Open Source" don't understand what that means? If you think it's all about seeing the source code, you're wrong. Some of the licenses the Open Source movement advocates support allow proprietary derivatives to be made. This is a major issue for the two movements. But members of the two movements get along too: they work on software projects together and the Open Source movement proponents create a lot of valuable software that are genuinely worthwhile Free Software contributions.
Your post doesn't indicate how much research you've done to understand what's going on, so forgive me if this seems like a repeat of what you already know. I hope you understand the community of developers and users that started in 1984 has more to say than just "don't believe everything Microsoft tells you".
Digital Citizen
He's a typical nerd.
If we were ants living on a Rubik's cube, differential geometry would be a little more confusing.
Please educate that "Open Source != Linux" for fucks sakes.
'The Politics of Nerd.' The question is: which vocal, intelligent, bay area and vicinity OS insiders should be on the show?"
With that title, none.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
No one else has seemed to pick up on it but I guarentee the reaction would have been totally different had the word "Geek" been replaced with "Nerd" in the title.
To programmers (and most computer people), geek is a term of endearment whereas nerd is an insult. Understand that many now self-proclaimed "geeks" were insulted quite a bit in the past with terms like "nerd" but the community has come back and taken back the word "geek" in a similiar manner to how African Americans have adopted the word "Nigga."
While I admit this would be a much more controversal title, its similiar to having a show called "The Politics of Colored People" verses "The Politics of Niggas." One could maybe get away with the later but could never get away with the former.
If you made such a slip, then perhaps you should investigate the geek culture a bit more before having an guest on your show. Geek's aren't exactly the most socialable or well-spoken individuals and you might have quite a few problems if you insult one of the more sensitive geeks. Remember, we are very passionate about this stuff even though the masses are almost indifferent to it all.
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For the Jerry Springer version of the show, I'd have Bruce Perens, Eric Raymond, Brett Glass, and Richard Stallman.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist