Interview with Linus Torvalds from NYT Magazine

aelfric35 writes "David Diamond drills Linus on topics from filesharing (sharing is good) to SCO (trying to claim paternity on his child) to his rivalry with Bill Gates (doesn't care enough to be a nemesis) in next week's New York Times Magazine."

Comments

Funny

[KrispyKringle]

He's not stupid, but he really does come across as only interested in the technology. He admits it, of course, and far be it for me to hold that against someone. But it strikes me as funny that someone who really seems to be limited, by choice, to the technology, would be looked to as a ideological leader, as well.

This isn't criticism. But I think to some degree, there are those who are ideological leaders--Lessig springs to mind; his philosophical and legal insight is incredible--and there are technological visionaries. But the two aren't necessarily the same.

Re:Funny

[taion]

Hmph. He comes across as being somewhat arrogant, too, with comments like, "Really, I'm not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect."

Oh well. I'll probably be modded down into oblivion for this.

Re:Funny

[The Kow]

Sure, but so does the President.. .. ..okay, point taken.

Re:Funny

[kfg]

I thought it was pretty well understood that RMS is the "Free Software" ideological leader ( who as it happens is also a technological visionary ), ESR is the "Open Source(tm)" spokesperson for pragmatism (and also a technological visionary), and that Linus' rallying cry is, was and likely always shall be:

"Show me the code."

To the extent that he is the "ideological" leader of anyone I know it's always for his basic folksy refusal to be anyone's ideological leader. We like him. We don't "follow" him.

Did I miss a meeting or a memo or something?

KFG

Sounds like a bad episode of Springer

[dankdirk77]

SCO you little slut! So many people have had your code you ain't never gonna get custody (picks up a chair and hurles it downstage).

Ah, you have love Linus ...

[petabyte]

Really, I'm not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect.

Just reading that made me smile. Everybody takes this whole MS vs. the world thing so seriously its great someone can sit back and still have fun with it.

Linus is cool - Linux users aren't

[Anonymous Coward]

Linus is really cool. He is just a geek engineer interested in technology. This is _good news_.

However, I read over here that peolpe don't want to believe that Linus is only interested in the technology! They WANT to see only what they want to see: A HERO who will take down MS.

Linus is not that. He is an engineer. But people just want their hero... and then they get dissapointed when Linus adds bitkeeper or adds DRM to the kernel. Because these Linux users only see what they want to see.

Re:Linus is cool - Linux users aren't

[SaXisT4LiF]

But people just want their hero... and then they get dissapointed when Linus adds bitkeeper or adds DRM to the kernel. Because these Linux users only see what they want to see.

Possibly flamebait, but whatever...

I'm sorry, but the only thing linux users want to see is the source. If bitkeeper or DRM gets added to the kernel, it's completely within your right under the GPL to go into the source and remove it. That's the beauty of open source development.

People use Linux because (A) it works and (B) it gives them the assurance that if they want to change the way their system works they can.

End of line

Oh, GOD!

[PurpleFloyd]

When asked about SCO, Linus likens it to a paternity case and has this to say:

Even though SCO has refused to undergo the technical equivalent of DNA testing, and even though my (and other people's) DNA is probably all over Linux [emphasis mine].

I feel so... dirty.

Linus quote:

[bersl2]

So either we should make it a law that all geeks have dates -- I'd have supported such a law when I was a teenager -- or the blame is really on the companies who sell and install the systems that are quite that fragile.

I second that.

Both parts.

i knew it

[b17bmbr]

Really, I'm not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect.

actually, he is right. you don't start out with the goal of destroying anyone. you just do it better and viola', world domination. of course that doesn't apply to microsoft. they didn't do it better, just marketed it better.

Here is the text...

[AmigaAvenger]

what is the purpose of having registration on the NYT site anyway?? here is the text...

You gave Linux, the operating system, to the world free, in effect jump-starting the open-source movement. Now this previously obscure company, SCO Group, claims ownership of some of the code and threatens to close the door on open source and Linux. I suppose it's to be expected that when you send your offspring out into the world, you have to be prepared for your kid to run with a crowd you don't approve of.

Oh, Linux has grown up, and it's running with a crowd that I certainly never expected, like I.B.M. and Hewlett-Packard. That's not the issue. SCO is claiming parenthood of that child and now wants to make money off the earnings of that child. Even though SCO has refused to undergo the technical equivalent of DNA testing, and even though my (and other people's) DNA is probably all over Linux.

So does this issue matter to you personally?

I've tried to stay away from distractions. But especially since they have started threatening to send invoices to Linux users, it may eventually escalate to the point where I have to start taking legal steps.

Is file-sharing, which has the recording industry so up in arms, the ''dark side'' of open-source attitudes?

Sharing is certainly not bad in itself. In open source, we feel strongly that to really do something well, you have to get a lot of people involved. What the recording industry is so worried about is obviously something totally different -- the ''sharing'' of stuff that isn't yours to share in the first place.

O.K. So what are your views on sharing music files?

I don't actually think about it much; I listen to the radio if I listen to music. What I do find interesting is how the file-sharing thing ends up changing how people think about computers and copyright law. Some of it is a bit scary: just the fact that your question equated sharing with something bad is a pretty scary statement in itself. What also bothers me is the apparent dishonesty of especially the R.I.A.A., claiming that file-sharing is destroying their business and that they are losing billions of dollars on it. There's been a number of studies done, and it looks like the major reason for the dip in CD sales ends up being lack of interest in the music produced. And let's face it -- how many boy bands can you try to sell before your revenues start dipping?

We've been getting hit with a lot of viruses and worms lately. What's your idea for ending the attacks?

When you have people who hook up these machines that weren't designed for the Internet, and they don't even want to know about all the intricacies of network security, what can you expect? We get what we have now: a system that can be brought down by a teenager with too much time on his hands. Should we blame the teenager? Sure, we can point the finger at him and say, ''Bad boy!'' and slap him for it. Will that actually fix anything? No. The next geeky kid frustrated about not getting a date on Saturday night will come along and do the same thing without really understanding the consequences. So either we should make it a law that all geeks have dates -- I'd have supported such a law when I was a teenager -- or the blame is really on the companies who sell and install the systems that are quite that fragile.

Since you moved to Silicon Valley from Finland in 1997, how has the region's aggressive approach to money-making affected you?

Oh, how I hate that question. I've actually found the image of Silicon Valley as a hotbed of money-grubbing tech people to be pretty false, but maybe that's because the people I hang out with are all really engineers. They came here because this is where the action is. You go out for dinner, and all the tables are filled with engineers talking about things that won't be available to ''normal people'' for a few years. If ever.

People position you as the nemesis to Bill Gates. He started Microsoft and you started Lin

Re:Here is the text...

[Anonymous Coward]

I've notified NYT that you've posted their copyrighted works illegally. I'm sure ./ will have to remove your post after they receive a cease and desist order. The registration is in place to protect the NYT's property, not for you to smile at while you circumvent it.

Re:Here is the text...

[Bored Huge Krill]

can somebody please explain to me why this was modded down? The post makes a perfectly correct, and fair point. I don't see any redundancy in pointing it out *each* and *every* time somebody pulls this crap.

Please, people, you're giving us a bad name. I wince every time I hear somebody say something like "Linux people don't respect copyrights". I do. Please don't give anybody reasons to think otherwise. Posting copyrighted material here just because "registrations suck" is utterly, completely, inexcusable, and you should be ashamed of yourself if you think it's ok

Krill

Re:Here is the text...

[mcrbids]

what is the purpose of having registration on the NYT site anyway??

By requiring a login/pw, NYT gets a "copyright protection device" and therefore gives them the additional weight of the DMCA against anybody who copies their material.

You sir, are in fact of law, providing a "Copyright Protection Circumvention Device" actionable under the DMCA by posting this on /. - did you think of that?

Re:Article unavaliable, here is the text

[tetrahedrassface]

exactly but only 3% us even read the article in first place. The rest are blathering fools and psychopaths intent on destroying the fabric of the universe by mindlessly blathering incomprehensible mantras like GNU-STALLMAN over and over and over again.

yeah but

[commodoresloat]

how many MSCE's does it take to screw in a light bulb?

None. MS simply declares darkness the new standard.

Open source Dating....

[nlinecomputers]

So either we should make it a law that all geeks have dates -- I'd have supported such a law when I was a teenager

So Linus supports open source dating. Well I can support that but the putting up a girlfriend on CVS for anyone to "contribute" to is just sleezy. On the other hand back in high school there was this girl that might have been the open source poster child...

Diamond Dave

[isny]

For a minute, I thought David Lee Roth, a.k.a. Diamond Dave, was giving the interview.
So?? Linus? About this kernel thing? Yow! Are all those distributions guar-ar-ra-ra-ra-ran-teeeeedd... to satisfy?

Look Man

[Greyfox]

Technology is a fickle mistress. The minute you lose your focus on it, it starts to leave you. Most people just take what they want from it (A lot of money, usually) and then move on to focus on other things. I see a lot of aging programmers with families, content to do the least they can do without getting fired, until such time as their skills are no longer marketable.

Some people want more from technology than a one night stand, more than the brief two or three year period where youthful enthusiasm overcomes the need for comfort in a lonely world. Sure the people who choose that road will mostly die cold and alone in a gutter somewhere, but by god they'll have ridden the lady technology for all she was worth! And, ultimately, isn't that as valid a path as anything else you could choose?

Re:Look Man

[kfg]

"I see a lot of aging programmers with families, content to do the least they can do without getting fired, until such time as their skills are no longer marketable."

To be at least somewhat fair to at least some of these aging programers they have been taught to act like this by the companies they work for.

Remember, most of older guys got into it for technology and the joy of it. There was no money in particular "back in the day." If you didn't do it for the love it there was no reason to do it all.

Get kicked around, treated like shit, turned into a code monkey and generally be made to understand you're a disposable cog in the machine and it's easy to go through the motions, take the checks as long as they last and cover your own ass.

As they say, no one else will.

Most of these guys had young wives, young children and young mortgages before they learned the score and then got stuck.

There are a few of us who have decided it's better to walk the razor's edge, and there is often a price to pay. Fabian Pascal even has trouble just writing and talking about technology these days, let alone getting "a good job" because of his absolute dedication to the technology, rather than buzzword compliant commercial products. RMS is, well. . .RMS. Thompson, Ritchie, Stroustop et al have given us Plan 9. . .and nobody seems to care.

It ain't easy being gree. . .er, a geek.

Although it isn't exactly the path I've chosen for myself I'm not inclined to over criticise those older guys just trying to make it to retirement in one piece.

KFG

Re:Look Man

[TheOldFart]

Ha! I guess if nothing else, this is a field I AM an expert on. My name above is what it is for a reason. See... I still have the drive, I still work long hours all night long but I do it because this is what keeps me going. I have no problems working with young engineers. They are mostly enthusiastic and that is mutually contagious. I have a special disdain for the marketing types who come and go like flies over a pile of shit. Those who don't have a clue what we produce but are responsible for selling it, transforming all you do into "numbers Wall Street will like" (completely disregarding the merits or what the people who will ultimately buy it want).

My love for technology is an alternative to how I see the world. A world no different than any other point in time. People still kill people because of religion and greed. What's the difference between the Taliban and those radicals Christian coalition types? In other words, I see the world as mostly utterly fucked with very few exceptions. When we specialize in certain aspects of science, we focus our attention into a different world away from the ugly reality out there.

Linus is an ideological leader no matter how you look at it. Even if he doesn't think that way or want it, he has no choice. In a funny way it reminds me of "Life of Brian". I can see him waking up one morning and opening the windows naked to a crowd of crazed followers clamoring for his words.

The problem with this crowd or any other is that there will always be those who want to use it for their own agendas and end up tainting the whole thing in the process (see "Fucked up world with exceptions" above).

What is even funnier is that we, more than any other group on the planet, control every aspect of everyone's life. The power we have as a group is greater than anything else. Nonetheless, we have no cohesion or goals. Just happy little shits doing whatever they tell us... A hear a lot of complain about jobs going out to India for instance. A recent interview with Scott McNeally was quite open (and extremely insulting in the process) about it. But what do we, as a group do? Sit with our collective thumbs stuck up our collective asses.

Blah... I'm mumbling...

Mod parent up, mod moderator down

[jerryasher]

The registration is there because the NYTimes wants it there. The copyright is theirs.

The GPL depends on copyright.

Don't infringe on copyright. Fair use is not the reposting of the entire article, especially when the registration makes it plain the NYTimes does not want it reposted.

And what is with the moderators modding that down?

Re:Mod parent up, mod moderator down

[Bored Huge Krill]

Wow.. your ability to mix concepts is truly frightening. Ford sells cars. You must pay Ford to purchase a car. To take a car and deny Ford the compensation is a crime. NYT sells newspapers. You can either purchase a paper for 25 cents (or whatever their daily costs) in order to personally dispose of your copy, or you can read a shared copy of it in a library for free. NEITHER of these mediums require a registration, nor should they. The library is not guilty of stealing (or conversion) by making a copy of the newspaper available for all readers. If you take the NYT article and pass it off as your own work, *THAT* is stealing. Re-posting is not (think library). No one has the right to demand your personal information as recompense for a service or product.

bullshit. They have the right to ask whatever they want in return for your being able to read that which they produce at a non-zero cost.

You have the right to refuse to accept their terms, should you so choose.

You absolutely, positively, definitely, do not have the right to refuse their terms but think it is ok to read it anyway

Krill

It's voila

[SysKoll]

you just do it better and viola', world domination.

It's voila, you insensitive clod! Viola is a music instrument. Or an admission you viola-te spelling.

Re:*sigh*

[Z4rd0Z]

When I see things like this:

You gave Linux, the operating system, to the world free, in effect jump-starting the open-source movement.

I'm reminded how clueless 'journalists' are.

What kind of 'ra ra Linux' fanboy would think the above and ignore the history of gcc, alt/comp.*.source.* et la?

Precisely. I'm sending you to report this to Lord Stallman personally. And take this bottle of patchouli to him as a token of respect.

Re:Linus has a great bottom line

[EvilTwinSkippy]

Sages do not display themselves, therefore they are illuminated.
They do not define themselves, therefore they are distinguished.
They do not make claims, therefore they are credited.
They do not boast, therefore they advance.
Since, indeed, they do not compete, the world cannot compete with them.

Loa Tsu, Chapter 22, The Tao Te Ching

Re:Microsoft/Technology...

[code_echelon]

"People over-simplify and say .NET is Java, for example. It's really not - it's much more. But it's not a completely unique idea."

Please explain how .NET is much more than Java. As a programmer they are two different architectures and .NET is different than Java, the statement .NET is more or better is false and quite honestly comes from asking a pointless question that has no relevance. They are different and both have different advantages over the other.

"What gets me is that this guy has the sheer _balls_ to write a Unix clone"

Linux is definately more than a UNIX clone and has shown to be so in the last few years. Linus, including others, also wrote much of the code from scratch. Most clones are direct copies of the original. Tell all the distros out there that there nothing more than Unix clones and that all there work has been for nothing as it is nothing but a Unix clone.

Lastly he never said they were incomptent or that they were stupid, he said that he was not interested in what they are currently working on. He works with the Linux Kernel and has not set out to destroy Microsoft, he has no need to be interested in what they are doing. Frankly most people are tired of hearing about M$, the majority of the news you here about them is how they are behind in security updates and new viruses are out using vulnerabilitis in the OS that a twelve year old learned to exploit before they did.

Re:Linus to World:

[wasabii]

You forget though, he wrote a unix clone FROM SCRATCH! Think of the innovative things inside Linux and the Unix world. Massive effecient clustering. Multiple types of clustering. 4 different schedulers for the kernel. Heck, just look at OpenMosix!

Linux is a hot bed of new ideas and technology. But, being open, it tends to attact that.

EXACTLY!

[0x0d0a]

The solution is not to steal links, not to screw over users, but simply to *disallow links to sites that require registration*. It's really simple. Slashdot editors do that as a matter of policy, with a *single* exception -- the NYT and NYT-related resources. The rationale is that they started linking to the NYT before their "no registration" policy came into place. I could never figure that out, and find it incredibly frusterating. I'd like to see a poll -- "Should we allow NYT links?" without a CowboyNeal option.

Re:Downfall of MS

[fredrik70]

um, probably not, MS will go the same way as IBM, maybe a bit further down since they do not have the service bit to fall back on as IBM did. MS will be much less imortant in the future, but not extinct. Heck, maybe they even turn over to be part of the 'Good Guys' just as IBM did!

Re:Downfall of MS

[Spackler]

Bill and Steve have never shown much ability running a business.

Ummm, wow. Dude, I'm not crazy about them either. However, if you think that becoming the richest guy in America, and your company has 40 Billion in the bank indicates someone without "ability running a business", you are an idiot. You don't have to like him, and you don't have to like his tactics. However, the end results are EXACTLY what running a business is about. Grow up.

Re:Downfall of MS

[snilloc]

I've sampled OOo in it's 1.x and 1.1pre versions, and I have to say I'm disappointed.

It doesn't even perform as well as MSOffice 97. I tried to make some charts with the Spreadsheet program and found it totally inadequate for my needs. I was originally looking for a free alternative to Office97 (the version I happen to own). I find the Excel97 graphics to be pretty shitty, but OOo's were worse, and less customizable. Playing with the defaults for 15 minutes in Excel got me reasonably close to what I want. OOo just can't do it.

Oh yeah, and It's much slower.

OOo probably does a lot of stuff well, but until I can make a kick-ass presentation from its components like I can with MS, OOo won't fly in Big Offices everywhere.

(Does anybody know of a free program or suite that can make good charts? Something along the lines of Harvard Graphics98 for windows would be super, but I haven't even found anything as good as Office 97.)