RMS Turns 50

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Posted by ryuzaki0 on Sunday March 16, 2003 @11:20AM from the but-a-young-50 dept.

gnuhead writes "RMS is turning 50 on the 16th, according to this post in the FSF India mailing list. Some of the members have decided to give a birthday gift to RMS by celebrating March 16th to April 15th as 'GNU/Linux' month, and having a 'It's GNU/Linux dammit!' email sig. for this month. Happy birthday RMS!!!"

36 of 516 comments (clear)

Had to say it.. by DaBj · 2003-03-16 11:22 · Score: 5, Funny

GNU/Happy birthday.

(Sorry)

--
"GNU's not Unix....it's Linux" / Kami "kokamomi" Petersen
1. Re:Had to say it.. by joe_bruin · 2003-03-16 11:50 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  50, wow. i hope he lives to see a GNU/Hurd release.
2. Re:Had to say it.. by rtscts · 2003-03-16 12:34 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Happy birthday to GNU, happy birthday to GNU...
  
  .
  .
  .
  
  youlooklikeamonkeyandsmelllikeonetoo.
  
  *SMACK*
  
  Doh.
Oh dear god... by Anonymous Coward · 2003-03-16 11:22 · Score: 4, Funny

Most... trollable... story... ever.
Now.. by MisterFancypants · 2003-03-16 11:22 · Score: 5, Funny

Now I can refer to him as "a cranky old man" instead of just "a cranky man".
Happy GNU/Birthday you smelly hippie.
Happy Birthday! by huhmz · 2003-03-16 11:24 · Score: 5, Funny

RMS 5.0 released!
Sorry that's GNU/RMS 5.0 of course...
1. Re:Happy Birthday! by Anonymous Coward · 2003-03-16 12:13 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  And true to Open Source form, the release took 10 years and even at release the project is still full of bugs.
Happy Birthday RMS by BroncoInCalifornia · 2003-03-16 11:24 · Score: 5, Funny

He can be a pain in the ass, but he is our pain in the ass.

--
Religion is the main cause of atheism.
1. Re:Happy Birthday RMS by Lieutenant_Dan · 2003-03-16 11:46 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  That is a bit of too much information for me.
  
  --
  Wearing pants should always be optional.
how about... by dh003i · 2003-03-16 11:27 · Score: 5, Funny

Jeez, he's 50 already? That last pictures I saw of him made him look relatively young.

Anyways, how about for his birthday, we try to get HURD done sometime before the guy dies? Huh?

Maybe we can actually add the whole 4 extra characters and call it GNU/Linux instead of just Linux. Btw, RMS, I'm going to pronounce it G N U Linux, not Geenoo Linux, which sounds wierd. Sorry bout that one. Since GNU stands for GNU's not Linux, I prefer to speak it like I speak many other 3-letter abbreviations which don't sound good when spoken out phonetically: as letters (DOS is an exception).

--
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
1. Re:how about... by Theodore+Logan · 2003-03-16 11:39 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  Jeez, he's 50 already? That last pictures I saw of him made him look relatively young.
  
  You're kidding, right? He's looked like 50 for 25 years at least.
  
  Anyways, how about for his birthday, we try to get HURD done sometime before the guy dies? Huh?
  
  After you, Sir.
  
  Btw, RMS, I'm going to pronounce it G N U Linux, not Geenoo Linux, which sounds wierd.
  
  How about making it Gentoo Linux instead? I can't recall anybody starting a flamewar about that.
  
  --
  "If you think education is expensive, try ignorance" - Derek Bok
Who cares about decimal? by exp(pi*sqrt(163)) · 2003-03-16 11:29 · Score: 4, Funny

Now 64th birthday, that might be interesting. But 50 has few interesting properties besides being half of 10^2.

--
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
1. Re:Who cares about decimal? by EvilNTUser · 2003-03-16 11:41 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  "Now 64th birthday, that might be interesting. But 50 has few interesting properties besides being half of 10^2."
  
  64? Damn, I didn't realize he was that old, it's a wonder he's alive... It feels like he was 31 just yesterday!
  
  --
  My Sig: SEGV
Record Breaking News by Mir322 · 2003-03-16 11:33 · Score: 5, Funny

The news of RMS 50.0 finally being released to public eyes stokes the hearts & minds of /. readers everywhere! Get in on the cyberspace street parties to be held all month! Look for free software and copies of free linux at your favorite FTP servers while supplies last!

--
"There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness."- Friedrich Nietzsche
wait a second.... by Mir322 · 2003-03-16 11:38 · Score: 2, Funny

You mean, RMS is a male ? *blinks, & slaps forehead* All these years .... *goes into shock*

--
"There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness."- Friedrich Nietzsche
We should all chip in by ShatteredDream · 2003-03-16 11:41 · Score: 5, Funny

and buy him a Dell PC running Windows XP, IIS, Microsoft Office, Visual Studio.NET and Internet Explorer!

--
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
why? by mekkab · 2003-03-16 11:45 · Score: 5, Funny

are you trying to ensure that he doesn't see 51?! ;)

--
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
St. Patrick's Day by kurosawdust · 2003-03-16 11:58 · Score: 3, Funny

In dual honor of RMS's birthday today and St. Patty's Day tomorrow, should we write some GNU/Limericks??
/dodges green tomatoes
1. Re:St. Patrick's Day by Anonymous Coward · 2003-03-16 12:13 · Score: 1, Funny
  
  Ohhhhhhhh
  My get-rich scheme is felled,
  The copyright's unheld,
  I acted too flippant
  And used a code snippet
  Now this limerick is GPL'ed!
2. Re:St. Patrick's Day by DTC · 2003-03-16 12:56 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  *gives it a shot:*
  
  There was a young man named Stallman
  whose political views some find apallin'
  he wrote some free code
  and on his coattails more rode
  now there's tons of free software for all men!
  
  *ducks*
Does this mean... by Shuh · 2003-03-16 11:59 · Score: 5, Funny

he's going to start voting Republican?
Re:Why not the FSF/Emacs/GCC/GDB month? by GnuVince · 2003-03-16 12:06 · Score: 5, Funny

- no Emacs
Imagine no GNU/Emacs
I wonder if you can
No need for more ram
A brotherhood if vi
Imagine all the people
Editing with Vim
License on Gifts by evilviper · 2003-03-16 12:08 · Score: 5, Funny

Okay Stallman... You can have this gift I bought for you, but you must allow everyone else that right as well. If anything prevents others from using it, you cannot make use of it either.

Maybe I should have gone for the LGPLed version, where you don't have to share, but you have to tell everyone everything they need to make one just like it.

--
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
Re:Gosh.. by Prowl · 2003-03-16 12:16 · Score: 4, Funny

Where would we be now if I had deleted RMS's gcc master!

i thinks its fair to say you probably wouldn't have been alive to post this.

--
That man tried to kill mah Daddy
Re:Gosh.. by tuxedo-steve · 2003-03-16 12:24 · Score: 4, Funny

It was late at night and I had typed 'rm gcc-1.17' instead of 'cd gcc-1.17'..
rm: setiathome: is a directory

Thank god that cd doesn't have a recursive switch.

--
- SMJ - (It's not just a name: it's a bad aftertaste.)
Re:GNU/Linux, fah! by Anonymous Coward · 2003-03-16 12:41 · Score: 1, Funny

Just remember, Linus (the roof making Finnish kid you talk about) didn't even originally brand the kernel as Linux. He named it Freax. Get your facts right.

On the other hand, GNU/Freax sounds more appropriate.
Google to become Gnuugle? by jerryasher · 2003-03-16 12:48 · Score: 2, Funny

Google to become Gnuugle?
Slashdot to become GNUSlashdot?
Re:But his biography says his b-day is the 18th by Erris · 2003-03-16 13:10 · Score: 2, Funny

Shhh, don't tell anyone and we can have a surprise party.

--
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
I hope... by mcmay · 2003-03-16 13:23 · Score: 2, Funny

he uses the power of the most powerful lobby in the country, composed of people of similarly advanced, uh, stature, and gets them to push for free software.

Come on. Picture it. GNU/Raging Grannies. You know you want to.
Happy 50th Anniversary of RMS Release 1.0 by iggymanz · 2003-03-16 13:24 · Score: 3, Funny

Hey, let's call it LinGNUx...that really rolls off the tongue. Happy Birthday Richard! You're whacky , but we love you! Your compiler liberated software for everyone! Much thanks for that & all the utilities! Ralph -- Let's call it LinGNUx
Best way to celebrate RMS by Anonymous Coward · 2003-03-16 13:52 · Score: 1, Funny

Today would make a great day to join the "GNU Full-Name Project". Following in the footsteps of distributed computing projects like "seti@home", the goal of the GNUFNP is to calculate the full recursive name of the GNU project.

Right now we're at:

((((((((((((((((((((GNU's Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux) Not Linux)

Okay, so we're not very far... it's our first day!
Can't you people finish the name? by enos · 2003-03-16 14:26 · Score: 1, Funny

Which Royal Mail Ship are you talking about?

--
boldly going forward, 'cause we can't find reverse
Gift by Samus · 2003-03-16 15:43 · Score: 2, Funny

I think I'll send him a copy of windows for his birthday.

--
In Republican America phones tap you.
Re:GNU/Linux, fah! by einhverfr · 2003-03-16 17:04 · Score: 3, Funny

Personally, I don't care what other people call it - I call it "unix", and everybody seems to get the idea :)

But GNU's Not UNIX!!!!!

Sorry, had to say it ;)

--

LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Re:The best present you can give, to him and yours by Anonymous Coward · 2003-03-16 23:10 · Score: 1, Funny

No, for the creation of Emacs he should pay his users for all the RAM they have had to buy over the years.
it's my party by Ender+Ryan · 2003-03-17 03:05 · Score: 2, Funny

It's my party
and I'll politic if I want to
politic if I want to...

--
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden