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Linux Guru Alan Cox Takes A Year Off
An anonymous reader writes "Linux guru Alan Cox is taking a year off from RedHat and kernel development to get his MBA. For years, Alan Cox has maintained the extremely stable 2.2 Linux kernel, and more or less been Linux creator Linus Torvalds' right hand man. Now it sounds like the 2.2 kernel is up for grabs to someone who is 'good at refusing patches and being ignored'..."
He just got scared off by SCO!!
and I've been lobbying for the position for quite some time now, but so far no replies.
hmmm....
Before, the story read that he was taking a year off to get his MBNA. Sheesh, I get at least two offers a month from those bohos for instant credit. :)
What does a Linux kernel coding god need with an MBA?
... ready to take on any challenge. http://osrin.netfirms.com/files/second.htm
Liars!
The Truth is that Alan Cox has resigned from Linux development since he's not able to pay us the required development license (69,900$) we were asking to him. He preferred giving up instead of being sued to death as he deserves.
Cheers,
-- Darl MacBride
Ok, I thought that each previous version was "set in stone," so to speak, and all new development takes place on the current kernel?
Now I envision that each kernel steps through major revisions (2.2 -> 2.4 -> 2.6), but development continues on each revision. Is this right?
Summer job at SCO, reviewing code?
Seriously, I didn't even know he played basketball.
What is the process involved in getting someone to take over 2.2 kernel and who has the final say in who is selected? I have always been curious about the more politcal side of GNU/Linux and your answers would be much appreciated.
Cheers!
It's not 1965 anymore. IBM doesn't pull that crap, because they were righteously smacked down for it. However, considering the case of Microsoft, getting anyone in the U.S. government to firmly and fairly execute antitrust law in the past decade seems to be impossible!
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
As a relative newcomer to linux I was wondering what the big deal with Alan Cox leaving to study is? Are the major Linux developements completed by just a handful of people? (I know that the code is reviewed by millions and can be changed by anybody clever / able enough) This may be a stupid question to ask on /. but as my primary school teacher told me if you dont ask questions you may never know the answer... :o)
What team is he playing for?
I nominate Darl McBride. He has an intimate knowledge of the Linux kernel, intellectual property issues, and has a relationship with the Linux developer community.
Because we're idiots; and well, quite frankly, most of us would be scared by his last name.
I'm glad it's a MBA and not a MCSE 8)
That's where to future of Linux seems to be -- a court room.
The timing on this is incredible. The most stable kernal we've got that isn't under the SCO shadow is now effectively frozen, thereby preventing any potential code polution. Cox may have just provided the instant way out if SCO wins. I wonder if this is accidental or sheer genious?
Good luck Alan with the MBA, maybe you'll get paid what you're worth (finally).
It doesn't matter what you wrap your emotions around, Reality is a brick wall specifically designed to scramble eggs
Alan Cox is involved in discussions around (July XFree86 Open Discussion Mailing List), and is not ignored when speaking. I really liked what he did for the 2.2 to keep it strong, and when he comes back, the 2.4 might be waiting for him for the same task.
(yes this can be compared with sex)
First of all RMS Worshipper, this really IS "just the kernel", so it's a little uncalled for to call it "GNU/Linux"
It's just Linux...just the kernel. No GNU, well except for the toolchain, but then everyone would have to call their software GNU/Vim/Emacs/QT/KDE/blah/blah/blah if we all followed that convention.
Kinda ridiculous, don't ya think?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
i highly doubt that.. it takes AT LEAST 3, if lucky, years to get an MBA..
Maybe one day he wants to get a PHD and become a lecturer?
I think they mean getting ignored by Linus when he submits patches to him. Linus is world famous for ignoring patches multiple times and never replying to emails.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
I imagine he'd also be excellent at "refusing patches and being ignored"...
"You're taking a year off, do you want to be a loser or something?" Is Alan like, insecure about his job prospects, or just likes learning? I would err towards the latter.
I hate sigs.
I have an MBA but have been interested in linux kernel development. Alan, could we just swap jobs for a year?
Only if you use a Windows 9x version. Linux has superior SMP support.
... I know what you mean about "being ignored", and I feel your pain. All the best, my man!
Signed,
Anonymous Coward
What happens when one of his professors asks for an electronic copy in Word format?
Slashdot is like Playboy: I read it for the articles
Apart from being 'funny', honestly why would Alan Cox need any degree or certification? He can go to any Linux development company and put his resume on the table:
All of Alan Cox's credentials as a kernel hacker can get him is a job as a coder (software developer, senior developer, development lead, etc). In some places it may be enough to get him a job as a software architect depending on the kind of company he tries to get work at.
However if Alan wants to break into upper management or start his own company then all his l337 kernel hacking skills aren't worth a hill of beans compared to the knowledge he could get from an MBA and the doors it opens.
Funnily enough, I was just thinking about going back to school for an MBA in a year or two but wondered if it would be a bad idea for a person so interested in technical pursuits. But if Alan Cox can do it I don't see why I can't.
Thanks for the inspiration Alan.
Alan: I'm back! Can I have my kernel now?
New Maintainer: Noooooooo! Mine!
Alan: but...
Possibly the willingness to give it back should be a quilification, unless Alan wants it back as his own personal branch.
"What do you mean you can't just GIVE stuff away if you want to make money? So THAT'S what I've been doing this wrong all these years!"
Is this the start of kernel patch micropayments???
Hey freaks: now you're ju
"Linux guru Alan Cox is taking a year off from RedHat and kernel development to get his MBA."
Obviously, RedHat figures they'll own SCO soon and need someone with an MBA to manage it for them. Alan Cox to the rescue!
Second that.
I guess he would also be good at refusing patches ("You haven't paid the license!") and we are all but ignoring him already.
Karma: Good! Napster: Baad!
No, not at all a dumb question. North American MBAs take two years on average.
Europe, on the other hand, offers a bucketload of one-year Master's programmes; it's not limited to just MBA programmes. (I did an MSc in London that was like this.) Generally 'taught' Masters are shorter than the 'research' Masters, the latter of which are considered the priming ground for PhD programmes (in both the UK and the US). Unlike the US, though, nonMBA Masters are considered pretty good in their own right.
Good luck to Cox, though. I'm looking into an MBA myself and it does not look nice. Pointy heads, here I come...
========================================
Death will come, and will have your eyes
-- Pavese
From his part time hobby?
I need to take a year off from playing playstation, it's hard work, I need to focus on my edumcation.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
"...The 2.2 tree needs a new maintainer, someone who can spend their entire life refusing patches, being ignored by the mainstream (because 2.2 is boring) and by vendors (who don't ship 2.2 any more)..." -Alan Cox
Emphasis mine.
Beware blue cats moving at
Sorry, bad joke. Ahem...
Dear Alan,
Thanks for the good work. We owe you one.
Sincerely,
Geeks of the World
Ceci n'est pas une signature
It takes as long as it takes - as I always tell my customers.
MBAs are pretty strange creatures - you dont tend to sit a set of exams on a rigid timetable - more you attend lectures, read material, submit views and papers - a whole stack of submersive learning. Kind of like a midpoint between a taught and research degree. When your school is happy with you - you pass - if they pass you too early you lower the overall standard of graduates cheapening their reputation. (and they lose another months fees!!)
He'll use Word. MBA's are about money not philosophy. One of the skills learned is not pissing off those above you.
No it doesn't.
Why would a Linux developer need a degree? Well they do need day jobs once Mom and Dad stop supporting them. ;-)
Also, once in academia (s)he might be able to stay there and have the tax payer subsidize their free software habit. Worked for RMS. ;-)
Masters of Business Administration -- Masters degree in the science of running a business -- used mainly for boss types
'Quantum materiae materietur marmota monax si marmota monax materiam possit materiari?'
if SCO wins in court. That's right the 2.2 kernel. And the 2.2 maintainer's gonna have to put up with all sorts of new feature requests, VM integration, iptables etc. to get it up to speed with 2.4's functionality. Not a lot of fun if you're used to stable kernel development.
...what uni is he going to? Moreover..how many geeks would apply there just to be near him? :o)
You know, search engines still work in whatever backwards ass country you're posting from. Unless you're from China, of course.
Unfortunately he isn't good at refusing patches (think about all the Linux code they stole) nor at being ignored (just look at slashdot).
Prescriptive grammar:linguistics
Anybody know? Just curious.
ceci n'est pas un sig.
Yes
Educational institutes for the most part give you a piece of paper and not much else.
I've always been impressed with how much Alan Cox does for the Linux kernel.
He's technically very sharp and handles an incredible amount of incoming patches, very professionally.
For his talents, he ought to be paid handsomely, but for a number of years he's simply been a trusted chief lieutenant in charge of operations for the Linux kernel. Linus gets his mug on the magazines, while Alan Cox is pretty much known only in the geek community.
I hope Alan's MBA brings him the money he deserves. However, Linux kernel development will hiccough a bit more without him releasing all these 2.6.x-ac? kernels.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Go do some research before you throw a hissy fit.
trying to smash all teh little communist mushroom housing that is fsf/opensource
as for a relationship
he certainly provides plenty of motivation for change =)
Given his talents, I expect he feels he can better achieve his goals by working at the political layer, rather than hacking code at the coalface.
Either that, or Red Hat have said something like "y'know, we'd like to make you VP of ... but it won't look good if we do that and you don't have any demonstrable business qualifications". ;-)
Good luck to him - we need more technically clued folks in the former group!
--
If SCO somehow manages to pull off a win in court (Which is highly unlikely, especially considering that they've based their latest case on a misreading of copyright law), all the developers would have to do is remove the "infringing" code from the 2.4 kernel and replace it with new code. People who absolutely need a working Linux system the day after the case might switch to 2.2, but this won't really affect most users.
That is, if SCO ever plans on showing the code to the public.
Alan is VERY smart. Is his quote above the real reason, why he seeks an alternative career opportunity? Tech as a profession is dead if you're living in the first world.
Well good luck to Alan.
No doubt he will breeze throught the MBA, but learning welsh is another matter, its a really really hard language to learn.
For example in most languages you have to learn how the verbs change in the sentance, but in welsh the nouns change too! For example the welsh word for Wales is Cymru, but when you say Welcome to Wales, "Croeso i Gymru", the C changes to a G. My patents both tried to learn and found it very hard. But then Alan may be like a lot of Welsh people who learnt welsh at school and has forgotten it since in which case picking it up again might not be too bad.
Tom.
Again I must tell you that you are AMERICA CENTRIC
It amuses me that the very first hit on google from the query "What is an MBA" just happens to be a web site in New Zealand
Here it is: The New Zealand MBA Association
Clearly, MBA is not an America-centric term. I suspect your definition of America Centric is "anything I haven't heard of" though.
(for the utterly clueless -> New Jersey Devil's (BSD) vs. Pittsburg Penguins (Linux))
What?
According to a guy I work with (Stephen Waldie), who used to be Alun's sysadmin in Uni "back in the day" Alun used to be a bit of a lazy bum and didn't generally do any work in Uni.
It will be interesting to see how he copes this time around. And whether he will make it to the 8:30 lectures on a monday morning (I have been told they used to have them but i am not old enough to remember).
I do suppose he has Telsa to kick him out of bed now though. LOL
"I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by."
What country do you live in anyway? You can get an MBA in America, Canada, China, Japan, Australia, Singapore, Korea, India, Mexico, Spain, France, Britain, Norway, Germany, Russia, South Africa, Chile, Argentina, Israel, Brazil, Panama, and I'm not even searching google to find out more.. If you're over the age of 16, have gone to school, in a country with enough tech to have libraries and internet access, and unless you live in a hut or an adobe somewhere in a bombed out country, you should be able to find out what an MBA is pretty easily..
What?.. adding code without looking at the link provided?
i would suggest law school instead...
But Word actually is the most useful document exchange format today...
No, Word is the worst possible exchange format. It is proprietary to one corporation, it is a vector for script-based viruses, the tools that read it (other than Microsoft's products) cannot do so reliabily and predictably, and much of the world's population cannot and should not be expected to afford the MS Office software.
Given, also, the recent revival of awareness about hidden information exchanged in Word documents, Word is not only a terrible format in principle, but it is a threat to privacy and security in a most fundamental way.
So, Anonymous Astroturfer, you should go back to your cube and rethink your strategy for spreading lies into the public consciousness.
For basic exhange of information, the best formats are plain text (for text, obviously) or PDF (for type-set documents). Other formats are just asking for trouble.
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
In case you are reading /. - just wanted to say thanks for all your work. Good luck and have fun with the MBA.
CSV = Comma Seperated Values
CVS = Concurrent Version System
But I think the grandparent post was confusing BitTorrent with BitKeeper - the verion control program Linus uses.
I will disagree with you on a small point.
Many web hosting companies run on 2.4 kernel, to switch back would be the nightmare of hell.
So you would see the public reaction and this might effect most users.
if you see me, smile and say hello.
What business is he going to start?
There are really two reasons to get one of these...you either want to climb the corporate ladder or you need to study the things needed to become an entrepreneur.
I suppose "personal edification" could be a third...but naaaah...it's an MBA after all!
Generally 'taught' Masters are shorter than the 'research' Masters,
taught or one-year Masters are also known as "terminal" Masters, meaning you cannot use them towards getting a Ph.D.
Now this sounds pretty well-rehearsed.
That's because it is true.
When will people start realizing that there are free tools to handle Word format...
Where are they? Are they 100% compatible with Microsoft's undocumented, proprietary, and volatile document format? It is impossible for these tools to live up to their promises when there is a 100% likelihood their reverse-engineering efforts came up short.
Word is the format of choice even in the free-software-world
Only when Microsoft releases a 100% complete and comprehensible document explaining every aspect of the Word formats (yes there are more than one). Given that it is not in their financial interest to do so, I can guarantee that Word will basically never become the format of choice outside of the Microsoft micro-universe.
The most likely outcome is that one of the emerging XML formats, such as that for OpenOffice.org, will become the de-facto standard for editable document exchange. By then, I hope that Microsoft will be little more than a niche figment of their former selves (not unlike SCO, soon).
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
I'm curious as to which B-school Alan will be attending. Will it be in the Raleigh/Durham area? Full time? Part time/evenings/weekends?
Available local options for the MBA degree are:
I just started the evening program at UNC myself (the wife is one year into it). It'll be a very intense two years, but it'll also be worth every last dollar and minute.
Oh well. If you're in Chapel Hill, Alan, show up and say Hi to the evening class of 2005. Once we meet, I'll gladly introduce you once I recover from all the fainting.
--- The American Way of Life is not a birthright. Hell, it's not even sustainable.
I understand there is a small group of people (4-10) who are the highest level developers of Linux kernel. They are maintainers of the particular version trees, large areas of the kernel, etc.
This group is very small. What will happen when significant percentage of them loses interest in further kernel development? What will happen if Linus himself moves on?
And how does Linux situation compare to other OSS projects - Apache, BSD?
the majority of the world uses Microsoft software
Must I remind you that they no longer do so by choice? Microsoft made the choices for them back in the late 1980s and early 1990s through strong-arming OEMs and killing competition. They did so so masterfully that they are nearly untouched by litigation and only now, after a decade, are real untainted competitors, such as Sun and Wal-Mart, giving Microsoft the finger and threatening the monopoly. And, necessarily, these competitors are able to compete using only Free software, which was able to evolve independently of corporate interests until it was good enough to be widely adopted.
Microsoft's days are numbered, and I won't be sorry for them when "the majority" excercises their new-found options.
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
Not that I blame you. Your argument is pretty good, but he does raise a valid point. Plain text is too simplistic, PDF is too much write-only - the only thing that realistically sits in the middle at the moment is Word.
Unless you can think of another file format that copes with tables, images, headers, footers, embedded documents, version control and all the other things that most of us use on a regular basis.
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
Unless you can think of another file format that copes with tables, images, headers, footers, embedded documents, version control and all the other things that most of us use on a regular basis.
Perhaps the Docbook editor being added to OpenOffice.org will provide some relief. HTML isn't totally out of question, either (except that Word screws up HTML, too). And, once OpenOffice.org picks up more steam, its own plain-text XML file format should be widely understood, too.
Non-trivial documents should be done in LaTeX or Docbook, anyway, because they are much more robust and capable than Word. Word is really only appropriate for memos or reports, at most. Textbooks and standards documents done in Word are pretty sad.
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
Was he paid to maintain the 2.2 kernel? And if so, by who? OSDN?
But, I'd not want the thankless job Alan's been doing unless someone like Red Hat hired me to do it and paid me well. (Hint...Hint... :-)
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
In the same sense that lions have a relationship to zebra...
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
that's why he's going for a Business degree. If he went for a CS degree, he'd be mobbed on a daily business. But in the business program, he's pretty much anonymous. "Who is that geeky looking misfit, anyway?" "Cocks... what kind of a name is 'Cocks'?"
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
LaTeX and friends do not even come close.
When crafting a large textbook, for example, LaTeX really does blow the pants off of Word. It allows a very clear structure to be employed through includes and a structured tagging scheme. It allows EPS graphics from charting applications to be imported. There is long-standing support for indexing and bibliographies. LaTeX can also be managed by version control software, such as CVS, and can be controlled by Makefiles for well-defined and repeatable configuration management. LaTeX's open nature also guarantees that work poured into the textbook won't get lost as the proprietary Word file formats mutate or when Microsoft drops off the face of the planet.
MS Word is just a bad bet for large documents.
Daily memos are better as plain text. Data-entry forms are done better in HTML. For everything else...well, there is StarOffice or OpenOffice.org or AbiWord, etc. Quite honestly, there is little reason, anymore, to give Microsoft any money for Word any longer.
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
> Alan Cox wrote: [..] No I didnt. Someone else wrote that. Please keep attributions straight. -- From linux-kernel
/. editors?
Coincidence? or one of the
I've got a fever and the only prescription is more COBOL.
Is that related to Lisp?
an ill wind that blows no good
>>Maintaining an older kernel is boring...
Maintaining software does not need to be boring. I think it is quite challenging to enhance, fix things up and make it even more stable. Sure, it's not the same as developing some new hyper cool wireless network driver or application. It's just a different job.
I used to quite ritually read his Diary online at http://www.linux.org.uk/diary/ until he started writing it in Welsh! Did anyone else suffer from a similar fate?
>> you're shipping money to overseas economies
Wake up. This is capitalism, not mercantilism. Shipping money is a necessity. Your capital can do wonders in that country which will provide you with resources cheaper than the ones you can get at home.
>> and you're training a workforce to compete against you once it returns home (which most do).
Yes. And if you care to read about economy, you'll learn that some sectors exist which are dogs -- basically doing that business is never going to get you nowhere.
>> using H1B workers and/or outsourcing is moronic in the long run
In some instances yes, in some cases not. BTW, if you really think so, try to hire a genuine wasp, masters degree and all, to do your laundry. And when you pay him, be generous, after all your dirty clothes are a national matter.
>> against the best interests of the United States and it's citizens
I take you're not the average American. I suppose the average US citizen is a good fellow concerned about our troubled problems and wants peace, just like me and other non-US citizens.
And stop that "us and them" bullshit: we're in the same boat, jerk. 10 generations into the future, who is gonna marry your descendent? Maybe the ones you call enemy now!
>> Those are the facts, Jack.
No, they are not. It's only your biased misinterpretation of reality. Open your eyes, I warn you again.
I asked. The SCO Group won't even clear the BSD variants. Not that they have the right to "clear" anything since it seems they're the ones who've been stealing stuff (even the BSD stuff they included, they haven't acknowledged as per the rules. We respect IP, and the tooth fairy.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
"MS Word is just a bad bet for large documents"
As someone stuck at work with MS stuff - do not let a MS Word doc get much over 100 pages. Split it up or risk losing everything with internal corruption.
The Singularity is closer than you think
Quant
It's true. It happened to me!
I, too, decided to take a year off my big geeky life to go to an MBA, and I immediately started to get hot girls - can't get them off me. And I was single for 5 years as a UNIX geek before getting the MBA.
I truely believe that it's how we geeks treat women that makes them dislike us. Isolation from females make us treat them like Godesses/Aliens instead of humans, and it's evidently a big turn off.
Daily memos are better as plain text. Data-entry forms are done better in HTML. You are not doing either. That's not a question, but a statement.
For all my affection for such tools as LaTeX, reality of life shows that they are NOT comparable to MS Office, Framemaker and Quark.
The is nothing like inline changes control in word in LaTeX, and CVS diff is big pile of steaming poo for collaborative work.
Seamless integration with life Excel charts, and to PowerPoint is not duplicated anywhere. I use it often. Ironically, I have to run Windows under VMware to do that quite often (my code development is 90% Linux).
Word still quite happy with most ancient word files, and frnakly I would expect OpenOffice to be forgotten before Microsoft (or whoever inherits Office after it is split) goes through its pile of cash. Let's be realistic. For the future generations, there is always the archival code for Office and i386 emulator.
On another point: 99.9% of documents are not large. When they are, there are other tools for that indeed.
Even with that - I had no problems with 200+ pages documents in Office XP.
And yes, I submit ApJ papers in LaTeX. Appropriate tool for the job.
ANdno, I do not think the Office is an end all golden standard. I wish they are forced to publish the format and start useing public XML schema. It would be an even better tool then.
<^>_<(ô ô)>_<^>
Depends on what you mean. The taught/terminal Masters are perfectly valid as groundwork or preliminary studies towards a PhD, it's just that you have to be a bit careful about how the work in both degrees is actually done. If I am interpreting what you are saying correctly, study Masters in the UK are more like the booby prizes awarded in America (in that failed PhD candidates often get Masters as a consolation prize). I don't really think this is the case.
My taught Masters in London was explicitly oriented to getting candidates in the mindset of PhD students, and one of my tutors suggested I turn my dissertation into a full PhD. Not what I was into, so nothing happened,though I was grateful for the compliment.
========================================
Death will come, and will have your eyes
-- Pavese
So, Anonymous Astroturfer, you should go back to your cube and rethink your strategy for spreading lies into the public consciousness.
See, you might as well have said "I'm an asshole who will assume the worst of people - that they're malicious instead of just misinformed." This is why I hate slashdot sometimes. Is basic civility so hard?
Let's be realistic. For the future generations, there is always the archival code for Office and i386 emulator.
So it would be better to continue using archived closed and opaque programs under emulators than migrate to an open-source open-file-format program that no one could take away from anyone at any time? GPL software will be around long after Microsoft Office exists only in history books. As long as it compiles, OpenOffice.org will be there.
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
You missed my point completly - it is not about what is desirable, but about what is the reality of the day. Second point was - there is nothing seriously wrong with it, iti s all solvable.
BTW - you always can print your Office document into PDF. Ghostscript driver does it just fine.
<^>_<(ô ô)>_<^>
In good old USA ligislative climate - I am honestly not so sure about it. They always will get another DMCA on our asses.
For the next 20 years it will work, for archival, there is RTF and PDF.
Instead of bragging - better work on making a better OpenOffice standard.
BTW, as a member of one of the OASIS XML standardtization committee (I work in security), i do not keep my hopes high for the standard to be extremely practical and useful.
<^>_<(ô ô)>_<^>
Not to nitpick, Ace, but this America you are referring to may perhaps be the country also known as the United States of America, or USA for short?
I happen to live in one of the other countries in your list, and we thought we were in America too.
Cheers,
RedHat will receive 5000 resumes for Cox's job ...
Well, considering I was speaking of countries, and considering the post I replied to.. As well as what dictionary.com says 'America' is.. You're just being silly =P
I sent an email to Bill Gates.
It read "Hey Bill! You Suck! Ha Ha."
I haven't received a reply yet.
I've been thinking of sending a similar email to Fearless Leader. He was in town today.
This signature used to contain a cute kitty virus with ansii art. Please set the slashdot editors on fire. Thank you
No, you're in South America or North America, but America on its own refers to the United States thereof.
Precisely because you were speaking of counties, you should've used the correct name.
If you don't know the name of your own country, you've a lot of catching up to do.
HINT: the name of your country is not "America".
Does the fact that is also referred to as "U.S.A." ring a bell?
Cheers,
You may think so, the rest of the world differs.
Cheers,
If you want to refer to the continents, they're North America and South America. Collectively, they're the Americas. Allow some reason:
America ( P ) Pronunciation Key (-mr-k)
1. The United States.
2. also the Americas (-kz). The landmasses and islands of North America, Central America, and South America.
--dictionary.com
Even the friggin' dictionary says "America" is the United States, and "the Americas" refers to the continents. The rest of the world can differ if they like, but I have the authority on the English Language on my side, so I don't give a rat's ass.
400 posts and nothing intelligent written at all..
Dear GenSolo:
You can give a rat's ass to the opinion if the rest of the world, but you're going to find it's very lonely out there.
We (the rest of the world) are always amazed by the insularity of you Usians, and have a laugh at your expense ( a good natured one, because we find you, individually, rather good guys ).
You are just 5% of the world's population, and take my word for it, you're missing a lot. Even more, most of us speak English as a second or third language, so you don't even have to learn something ( God forbids! ).
Best wishes,
HINT: the name of your country is not "America".
No shit, Sherlock. However, it's commonly referred to as America. We in the United States of America are referred to as Americans, and there's a reason for that. I mean you don't honestly call yourself an american do you? You may be a north american, south american, or central american, but to be precise you are not what is commonly referred to as just plan american. I don't have any beef with you or your country, so what's the deal with bringing up a petty difference like that? The fact that I was talking about countries is precisely why I am able to say just America. The USA's founding fathers were saying just plain old 'America' before a large part of the world could even tell you what a continent is. Guess what? I hate to be an average american asshole, but we made the country, we live in it, and we can call it whatever we please because it's ours. You can complain if I ever screw up the name of YOUR country, but until then.. I'm following precedence and calling the country America.
*sigh* Why did I have to get involved in this offtopic/troll conversation anyway..
I was just curious as to what you call the country on the USA's southern border. I know I call it Mexico, and everyone I've ever spoken to from there has called it Mexico, and everyone I've ever spoken to when I've been down there has called it Mexico, so I'm guessing you also call it Mexico. Do you know it's proper name? It's Los Estados Unidos Mexicanos. As they refer to my country as Los Estados Unidos Americanos (the American United States or the United American States), I'm going to translate it as the United States of Mexico. Since the United States of Mexico is known as Mexico, it therefore follows logically that the United Statse of America could be known as America, which it is. Actually, if you say "the United States", you're being ambiguous because there are United States other than the USA. Anyway, I don't see why you got so offended anyway. Nobody said we're the only Americans, just that our country is called America. American can easily refer to anyone on either continent, but America cannot (as shown in previous posts, it has to be qualified). I don't have anything against South Americans or my non-central fellow North Americans. I speak semi-fluent Spanish and am planning to minor in it at my University to get better, so don't go implying that I'm afraid, or too lazy, or whatever, to learn something. But please, if you want to call us something more specific than Americans, "central North Americans" is a lot less insulting than "Usians".
Dear GenSolo:
I didn't mean to piss you piss you off, so let's call it quits.
By the way, I'm not from Mexico. If you think Mexicans are the only people that don't like you (as a country, individually we find you to be rather OK guys), you're sorely misguided.
Do you central North Americans ever wonder why everybody else hates you so much?
Best wishes (no I'm not being sarcasic, really mean it)
I didn't say you were from Mexico. As a matter of fact, I don't think Mexicans hate us as a country, generally speaking. I just happen to know the formal name of the country as well as the name it goes by, which I think that you should be terribly offended by if you're going to be offended by my use of America to refer to the United States thereof.
No, thanks for participating.