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Torvalds the "5th Most-Powerful Man in Tech"
An anonymous reader writes "According to silicon.com, Linus Torvalds is the fifth most influential man in technology. The bio they have written for him isn't the most flattering to the open source community though. I quote: "If it wasn't for the presence of Lara Croft and Xena Warrior Princess, techies around the world would have posters of Torvalds on their walls."
It goes on to say: "In truth Torvalds best work is in the past"... which seems to negate their own argument for having him in there.
Also in the Top 5 is Steve Jobs (1) who comes out on top of Bill Gates (2).
As an interesting aside, the writer of the Sobig virus even makes it in at Number 42..."
That's it? Should be #2. Linux is the second best OS in the land!
Does this mean he now has a chance of obliterating Gates in "Celebrity Deathmatch" ?
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Linus Torvolds on the 4 tech gods who beat him out:
"They are smoking crack..."
And how do I get back to aol.com from this site? I just installed this Internet. HELP!!!
The bio they have written for him isn't the most flattering to the open source community though.
Whatya mean? the last line says "Rumour has it he's a Guinness man as well." Mmmmmmm...Guinness...
Trolling is a art,
If Linus had gigantic breasts and long flowing hair.....oh wait MB not.
You don't have a poster of Linus on your wall?
The ranking is the top Agenda setters, not the most powerful folks in tech as the poster states. For this reason I can easily see S. Jobs and Gates towards the top. This is slightly different than influence and worlds different that "Most Powerful".
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
If it wasn't for the presence of Lara Croft and Xena Warrior Princess, techies around the world would have posters of Torvalds on their walls. :(
But I DO have posters of Torvlads on my walls
I have over 70 freaks, do you?
Where's Darl McBride on the top 50? I'd say he's pretty influential right now. Look at him, he has the UNIX world groveling before him!
---- Move SIG...For great justice!
They are not the same! Influential people can be those who influence those with power but may have little or no power themselves. Think of advisors to POTUS.
DecafJedi
my weblog: apropos of something
Agenda setters, not most influential people in technology. The title of the article is misleading.
because what hunting rifle has a bayonet lug
Bernard Shifman?!?!?!?!!!111
... but you can reasonably expect to sit down and have a beer with him after work if you're in the right city. Can you say the same about numbers one through four?
It's nice having people in the upper-levels of Linux kernel development who actually read and post to mailing lists...
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Yet another random ranking that's supposed to make some kind of sense. Anybody that wants to believe that Steve Jobs is more powerful than Bill Gates will probably like it though. And even though Linus Torvalds does a great job with Linux, how do they figure he's powerful? Utter crap.
Cosmo for geeks?
How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life
So how do we know the anonomous writer of the SoBig virus isn't already near the top of the list?
I don't wanna look at those distended basketballs! NoSilicon.com is a much better choice for your most powerful tech erection!
SoBig author huh? What does that make VicodinES (the author of the Melissa worm long ago)?
Support Israeli punk bands. Man Alive.
Bill Gates is powerful, because he's so insanely wealthy. He then can influence all sorts of people with his power.
Linus Torvalds may be influential in tech circles, but whether that translates into any normal interpretation of "power" is another question.
"Obviously, I'm not an IBM computer any more than I'm an ashtray" (Bob Dylan)
Yay! Linux manages to take one step forward in the acceptance of it by PHB's and CTO's in large organisations and two steps back by making it sound like it's hacked by a bunch of teenage nerds with no understanding of the "real world" (let alone "real women").
Image might not be everything - but its a big something.
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
Stroking the ego of a virus writer, way to go. I'm sure that'll entice her to stop.
"If you're thinking what I'm thinking, you're right." -
IAALS.
And he's such a regular guy (seemingly) that it probably gives him a bit of a shudder to read that. I don't envy the position Linus is in though, I mean looking back, he didn't set out with the goal of being worshipped globally by computer nerds, he just had this re-write of Minix he was working on. Eesh!
Luck favors the prepared, darling.
Jobs' role is overrated. Some Mac "innovations" (like pinhole to eject media) no-one ever follows. He makes a colorful splash with his colorful consoles, which end up meaningless in the tech world (the candy-colored iMac look had more influence on staplers and George Foreman grills than computers).
Due to the locked-in relationship of the hardware and software, his influence is limited for the most part to the tiny Mac world. This could change as soon as his music store goes beyond its limited beta situation.
It goes on to say: "In truth Torvalds best work is in the past"... which seems to negate their own argument for having him in there.
Why does that negate their own argument?
Power doesn't mean "how much have you coded recently", it means "how much influence do you weild."
Bill Gates hasn't coded anything in over 10 years, but he's made the list - are you suggesting he's not a power either?
This list can't be right. No repo companies or real estate liquidators are to be found on this list.
I thought CowboyNeal would at least have ranked this year.
--"Sorry for the inconvience." Gods Last Words to his Creation
DNA, So Long and Thanks for all the Fish
Because I think Andrew Tannenbaum must be more influential and I know if I read it he won't even be mentioned. After all, Linux is obsolete...
On looking for her biography, I currently get a 'page cannot be found' message...
Cheers,
Ian
It seems we are the most influential people over silicon.com servers.
My neighbor's
Of course Linus wouldn't be the most "powerful" - he lets others make up their own damn minds. He doesn't own any companies, and he lets others use his ideas with only the agreement to give credit where credit is due, and use derrivative ideas in just the same way. The power is not in the man, but in the ideas. This "ranking" shouldn't be counted as an insult to open source in any way - powerful men are not a particularly valid way to rank ideas.
Ryan Fenton
Am I the only one that freaked out that there was a LINK named "sobig virus?"
Gad, I havent had my coffe yet and i am shaking!
Does anybody know where I might acquire a poster of Mr. Torvalds? I would seriously put up a poster of him, but I don't believe that I have ever seen a poster. I'd like to be able to get one, without having it shipped, the dimensions of a poster probably make them a lot of trouble to ship. Anyone know where I can get a Linus, or Linux poster In the Ottawa area?
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
I'd say John Carmack is badly missing there. He's been trendsetter since years.
Don't thank me all at once.
No 5. Linus Torvalds creator of Linux
Last year's position : 21
Hero of the open source movement, geek made good, thorn in Bill Gates' side - there are so many reasons why people vote for Linus Torvalds each year.
In a nutshell it's because he embodies the idea that there is always another way, an antidote to the Microsofts of this world, evidence that the idea of the 'community' within IT is still there. If it wasn't for the presence of Lara Croft and Xena Warrior Princess, techies around the world would have posters of Torvalds on their walls.
Torvalds started work on the Linux kernel while he was at university in Helsinki in 1991 and since then it has been taken up and developed as a serious alternative to proprietary software.
In truth Torvalds best work is in the past but he got the ball rolling and he continues to be an Agenda Setter because he is the very embodiment of the open source community. A vote for Torvalds is not a vote for the man but more a vote for what he represents.
Linux now poses a major threat to Windows and a series of adoptions in the past year, especially at governmental level (and there are more expected in the coming year) means that threat is only set to increase.
Rumour has it he's a Guinness man as well.
For that matter, does anyone actually care what Tim Berners-Lee has to say any more? I thought he was just someone they trot out to act like a father figure and talk up his latest unworkable, silly Big New Idea plea for attention, like Vint Cerf. Also, I thought John Malone was in jail...
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Anyone know where Cowboy Neal ranked?
Man, us techies are one good looking bunch.
Buffy, Faith and Willow? Sunnydale may be a big hole in the ground, but let's not forget it's finest (former) inhabitants.
"Bill Gates hasn't coded anything in over 10 years, but he's made the list - are you suggesting he's not a power either?"
Erase all words after No. 5 and this sentence makes sence.
johnboy
Yeah that's a funny header, don't think i'm gonna RTFA, i'm ROFL..
His agenda seem quite influential, much of Linux' success is due to his agenda (through the GPL and software).
He may not be at the top, but he should be on the list. And above the Sobig author...
What about RMS, he has done a lot of work for Free Software.
If Linus gets to #5 being the embodiment of Open Source, how can they neglect GNU ?
From Google's Cache: http://216.239.53.104/search?q=cache:-9shQSz6F5UJ: www.silicon.com/as2003/agenda_lists.html+&hl=en&ie =UTF-8
Is there a search on this site? I can't seem to find my name... =P
So here's the Google Cache
I have over 70 freaks, do you?
...welcome our new Scandinavian overlords!
The list has India's prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee at 8th.
India's boom - largely engineered by Vajpayee - means some analysts are predicting the country could face its own IT skills crisis over the next five years.
Nothing can be further from truth. Personally Vajpayee has had no effect on IT in India. He has no ideas or plans for the future, as far as IT is concerned. I think Narayana Murthy would have been a better choice.
I doubt the list is a well researched list.
karma : former act as leading to inevitable results
Influential? Definitely. Powerful? Uhh, no. In reality, there are still many more people in the tech world who have considerably more power than he does. After all, exactly how much money have Linux companies actually made? It's a pittence compared to the other big players out there. I'd argue he has much more influence than he has actual power in the industry, especially since anyone can modify his product without giving him a second thought.
1. Steve Jobs
2. Bill Gates
3. Greg Dyke
4. Hu Jintao
5. Linus Torvalds
6. Roger Cole
7. Sam Palmisano
8. Atal Behari Vajpayee
9. Peter Gershon
10. Carly Fiorina
11. Rupert Murdoch
12. Michael Dell
13. Arun Sarin
14. Richard Granger
15. Fred von Lohmann
16. Eric Schmidt
17. David Levin
18. Stephen Carter
19. Steve Linford
20. Christian Ude
21. Greg Aharonian
22. Scott McNealy
23. Terry Semel
24. Sergey Brin
25. Ben Verwaayen
26. Rod Aldridge
27. Stelios Haji-Ioannou
28. Ian Foster
29. Dmitri Sklyarov
30. David Blunkett
31. Erich Gamma
32. Jeff Bezos
33. Donna Dubinsky
34. Donald E Knuth
35. Masayoshi Son
36. Michael Gough
37. Keiji Tachikawa
38. Marc Benioff
39. Sir John Sulston
40. Larry Ellison
41. Stephen Hill
42. SoBig author
43. Naomi Klein
44. Henning Kagermann
45. Mario Monti
46. Ulrich Schumacher
47. Tim Berners-Lee
48. Steve Ballmer
49. John Malone
50. Michael Moritz
As an interesting aside, the writer of the Sobig virus even makes it in at Number 42...
The answer, to the almighty question. Apparently, the reason we exist is to write viruses. You didn't actually believe it was 6 by 9, did you?
As of 10/06/03, I hate COBOL developers.
One of the biggest problems with a lot of people today is that they equate economic success with success in general. However, in the case of Apple and Steve Jobs, the success is in pushing new boundaries that other companies didn't want to touch. Apple has been VERY influential (and therefore Steve Jobs). They popularized the GUI, they brought a sense of style to computing (which is very important regardless of what anyone may think), they shifted the look of the box itself from the ugly beige box to the sleek designer models and now they are bringing Unix and 64 bit processing to the consumer (It could be argued that Sony did this with the Playstation).
The Linux crowd and Torvalds have been hugely successful in starting a movement away from proprietary OSes and again making this movement more visible. Of course *BSD was there first as well as GNU, but with Linux the concept was popularized among the clued in folks in the IT world. Whether you like Tovalds or not, you cannot refute that he has influenced the IT world tremendously with his work.
The best thing is that neither Jobs nor Torvalds needed to be the dominant market leader to influence anyone. There is more power in thought than money. That is the way things should be everywhere.
Un-news
The most influential are on wall street.
postscript
Actually I've found most members/users of open source (averaged) take the most respectful stance to women I've seen from any other group (including pro fem/left/right/religious agenda groups). All with little to no effort, it does seem quite natural.
I'm kind of curious what kind of carry over or representation there is to the larger population. Diversity is not something open source population lacks.
No 5. Linus Torvalds creator of Linux
Last year's position : 21
Hero of the open source movement, geek made good, thorn in Bill Gates' side - there are so many reasons why people vote for Linus Torvalds each year.
In a nutshell it's because he embodies the idea that there is always another way, an antidote to the Microsofts of this world, evidence that the idea of the 'community' within IT is still there. If it wasn't for the presence of Lara Croft and Xena Warrior Princess, techies around the world would have posters of Torvalds on their walls.
Torvalds started work on the Linux kernel while he was at university in Helsinki in 1991 and since then it has been taken up and developed as a serious alternative to proprietary software.
In truth Torvalds best work is in the past but he got the ball rolling and he continues to be an Agenda Setter because he is the very embodiment of the open source community. A vote for Torvalds is not a vote for the man but more a vote for what he represents.
Linux now poses a major threat to Windows and a series of adoptions in the past year, especially at governmental level (and there are more expected in the coming year) means that threat is only set to increase.
Rumour has it he's a Guinness man as well.
1. Steve Jobs 26. Rod Aldridge
2. Bill Gates 27. Stelios Haji-Ioannou
3. Greg Dyke 28. Ian Foster
4. Hu Jintao 29. Dmitri Sklyarov
5. Linus Torvalds 30. David Blunkett
6. Roger Cole 31. Erich Gamma
7. Sam Palmisano 32. Jeff Bezos
8. Atal Behari Vajpayee 33. Donna Dubinsky
9. Peter Gershon 34. Donald E Knuth
10. Carly Fiorina 35. Masayoshi Son
11. Rupert Murdoch 36. Michael Gough
12. Michael Dell 37. Keiji Tachikawa
13. Arun Sarin 38. Marc Benioff
14. Richard Granger 39. Sir John Sulston
15. Fred von Lohmann 40. Larry Ellison
16. Eric Schmidt 41. Stephen Hill
17. David Levin 42. SoBig author
18. Stephen Carter 43. Naomi Klein
19. Steve Linford 44. Henning Kagermann
20. Christian Ude 45. Mario Monti
21. Greg Aharonian 46. Ulrich Schumacher
22. Scott McNealy 47. Tim Berners-Lee
23. Terry Semel 48. Steve Ballmer
24. Sergey Brin 49. John Malone
25. Ben Verwaayen 50. Michael Moritz
Getting a poster shipped is no problem. The vendor rolls it up, puts it in a postal tube, and ships that.
Will I retire or break 10K?
"If it wasn't for the presence of Lara Croft and Xena Warrior Princess, techies around the world would have posters of Torvalds on their walls."
Are you sure it wouldn't be Ellen Feiss?
Stallman, Woz? These guy's missing from that list makes that list invalid. Whoever came up with it know not wherefore he speaks.
-eSmith.
For someone like me who started using Linux at approximately the same time as I started working in IT, Linus (through Linux) has been one of the most influential people in the technology related part of my life.
Linux has taught me more about computers than even my 3 1/2 years on a helpdesk(win98/NT). The free exchange of ideas, introduced to me through Linux, has shaped much more than my technology life and I can even see examples of it in other areas of my life.
In summary, Linus being one of the most influential men in technology sounds correct to me.
-the_crowbarHave you read the Moderator Guidelines
...no, he actually has the Unix world exercising the greatest self-restraint not to punch him in the nose.
As an interesting aside, the writer of the Sobig virus even makes it in at Number 42..."
Aha. So that's the question to which the answer is 42...
And more importantly, you might actually want to. I quote the article:
How many of the top 4 are closet Bud Light drinkers? =)You're right. Mac OS X is a perfect example of the merging of the two worlds: Apple and GNU. Mac OS X is a significant thing for GNU software because the basis of the OS is Unix, just like Linux. Ergo, GNU software can be easily ported to Mac OS X and vice versa. Which means that programs like OpenOffice.org and Evolution now have another OS that they will run under.
This is a Good Thing.
SCREW THE ADS! http://adblock.mozdev.org/ Proud user of teh Fox of Fire - Registered Linux User #289618
He's always at the bottom of the list, ya know.
As an interesting aside, the writer of the Sobig virus even makes it in at Number 42..."
So the answer to life the universe and everything is a Windows worm? Somehow it is all very clear to me now... :)
Oh, come on! Steve Jobs has him beat by a long shot - he hasn't coded anything since he worked for Atari!
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
Why do writers feel compelled to resort to ludicrous generalisations like this? Is it because they are rather poor writers and can't come up with anything more novel (or true) or does it make their target audience feel smuggly superior to the technical people that run their IT departments and office networks?
Yet another example of piss-poor writing that seems to typify most publications these days. People more concerned with meeting a word count and hitting a deadline than actual quality content.
Although it is not a poster, I do have a few pictures on the wall.
;-) ...and you call yourslves Geeks ?
A photo of a young Linus in a white sweater sits below a photo of RMS, between my 'Einstein on NBC radio' and Cultivate Understanding posters. Beneath them are "The Researcher's Dilemma" poster and an "Ignore Alien Orders" sticker.
Steve Jobs (1) who comes out on top of Bill Gates (2)
:-)
Not a nice picture created in my mind by that sentence...
Gotta stay off that net pr0n
My brother was burning incense, but my mom made him stop.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
If you're interested in any of the non-Torvalds agenda setters on the list, yes there are indeed many dead links. Carly Fiorina and a few others lead nowhere.
Who besides me noticed?
Sorry, but I see more posters of Xena in lesbian households than in nerd cubes.
;-)
Personally, I had posters of Samantha Fox and Apollonia Kotero on my walls when I was a teen, but I bet none of you know who they were.
https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
By the way, technically he is the POTUS*.
Don't forget the asterisk. History won't.
Why should I with my decision to use Linux make Linus Torwalds to one of the most influential persons on this planet?
Is it because he could turn Linux into something I would not want to use? Or into something that would not let me use my computer anymore or only on a very high cost?
Or is it because he is hard to convince of the necessity of a particular patch and appears to be the most annoyed person on the kernel mailing list?
Sven
I've got a poster of Michelangelo from the Ninja Turtles on my wall.
Predictive text is shiv!
David Crane is the author of Pitfall and many 8-bits clasic games. Lot of todays programmers are in this field because they were atracted by classic games.
DNA in your Linux: DNALinux
Well yeah, the best stuff I've done has been in the past, all of it in fact...
The point about Linus' work is that it is continual, focussed and an uphill struggle. Surely - with that in mind - the best is yet to come? I'd certainly hope so.
Not flattering? The main problem with this bio is that it is poorly written fluff by some hack with a lot of space to fill. There's substantially better journalism in People. Ignore this junk.
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
Isnt it distressing that there are only two women on this list? And that the highest ranked of the two isnt a developer/researcher but a corporate exec through and through?
Im not saying that they should be artificially promotoed in order to give fair treatment, but it seems that we are sort of only using half the resources availble to us, and that the female perspective could radically change(improve?) technical innovation if it were taken advantage of.
I know that industries like finance get a bad rap frequently for being centered around a "boys club" mentality. But I bet a survey of finance's top fifty would do better then 4% women.
the "dude, you're getting a Dell" guy. He has certainly helped bridge the generation gap between the PC populus. Too bad he can't accept the award because he's in the clink after trying to score another sack...
"Work" doesn't mean "coding" either. Torvald's current work is in coding and "herding cats".
> In truth Torvalds best work is in the past...
And Gates' best work is...oh nevermind.
I'd expect the headline to say "Steve Jobs Most Powerful Man in Tech" rather than focus on Linus being 5th most powerful.
Mmmm.. Donuts
I love the fact that Good old Rupert was knocked down to size by a pioneer in e-izing independent media, Greg Dyke. I have loved the BBC's style of reporting since living in Birmingham for a year. Since then Greg Dyke has moved the BBC to be one of the best news/tv sites on the net. Regardless of what you think of the BBC itself he has paved the way that other media giants are going to intigrate thier services onto the Net.
For the worlds worst example see FOX News.
--"Sorry for the inconvience." Gods Last Words to his Creation
DNA, So Long and Thanks for all the Fish
Where is the Cowboy ???!!! Neal wtf happened, how are you not here? Its a conspiracy I say....
In a world where you aren't judged not by what you have done, but what you have done lately... I have to say that this journalist is one of the few tech journalists out there that doesn't know what the fsck he is talking about.
I say that rarely these days because most tech journalists, nowadays, know what they are talking about and are quite savvy.
Not only because Linus is doing some real good stuff these days, managing the kernel itself, but because if he wasn't doing anything good currently, why would he be voted higher than last year?
This person not only doesn't know tech, they have no common sense.
I have to give this journalist the Anonymous Coward Weanie Journalist of the Week award.
l8,
AC
The most innovative hardware technology in computing today is coming from Sony. Everybody else has architectures from the past; Sony is actually selling new ones, in volume.
Incidentally, Motorola is about to bail out of the semiconductor business. They're trying to sell off their semiconductor operation. Sad.
they don't mention my name once. I mean, REALLY. Sooner or later I will force those fools to recognize my contributions. Ohhhhh, yesss, they laugh now, but someday... SOMEDAY...
muah. a. hah. ah.
Eviscerati.Org: All Hail the Eviscerati
Who's more pathetic, the fanboy geeks, or the loser trolls who spend time on slashdot making fun of them?
(Or the fanboy geeks making fun of the loser trolls making fun of the fanboy geeks?)
ah, offtopic...lovely to see a post about a computer company executive and agendas get marked offtopic on an article about computer leadership agendas...
Gates too. The Jan/Feb '99 cover of MIT's Technology Review with Torvalds and Gates face to face has been on my wall for years now. There is a devil mustache and horns on Bill, of course.
Strange. I just thought he was just a TV exec. For those not familiar he is the head of Newscorp, parent company of Fox and Sky.
I was also interested as to why Sobig made it and Blaster/Lovsan did not. Blaster forced people off the net because their systems were constantly rebooting. Sobig was just a clever e-mail that has been used before.
I don't know a single geek with Xena posters. Most geeks have Star Trek or X-Files posters, at least that is what I have in my office.
John Sulston won a well deserved Nobel prize in medicine for his work with Sydney Brenner on cell lineage fate in C. Elegans. He is also one of the few men for whom it can be rightly argued that the human genome project would not have happened, but for his contributions. There may be another Nobel coming his way for this too. However, Sulston's influence on Bioinformatics/Software/IT is FAR, FAR, FAR less obvious. Suggesting that he might be one of the 50 most influential people in the world in IT is a terribly difficult argument to make. It's not entirely clear he is among the ten most influential IT people at the Sanger, never mind in the world. Let's give credit where credit is due. Sulston is one of the great biologists/scientists/geneticist of his time. IT is but a small component of this man's work, and not one where his enormous powers have been most evident.
As an interesting aside, the writer of the Sobig virus even makes it in at Number 42...
SoBig virus - ranked Number 42...
Number 42 - The answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything.
Coincidence? Maybe...
And those aliens were just a figment of your imagination too.
No really...they were.
{Twitch}
I noticed that one group of people was not represented among the top 50 at all - people connected to video gaming. Don't tell me that companies like Sony are less important for the future of technology as virus writers or even 15-minutes of fame people like Dimitri Sklarov.
...is number 8 because he's prime minister of India? How did he even contribute to making India a software destination worth considering??
How many techies do in fact have a poster of Lara on their walls? I am yet to see/meet one..
Also in the Top 5 is Steve Jobs (1) who comes out on top of Bill Gates (2).
Well, if there ever was a good place to come out, it's got to be on top of Bill Gates.
They must have a very powerful crystal ball to be able to state categorically that he won't do something better in the future.
Seriously, I suspect they mean "most influential", not "best". After all, the pre-1.0 linux was probably the most influential stage of linux in terms of gathering a big bazaar of programmers to work on it; since then, in a way, it has just been evolving. But is it best? Well, I'm not planning to rush out to trade in my 2.4.20-gaming-r3 for 0.9.x...
So the big T. made the list. So RMS didn't. So Gates and Jobs rank well too. So what? This is just a journalist's opinion of who is influential anyway. Ordering is based on those he knows and how visible they are. The world has LOTS of opinions - at least as many as there are people.
English -- gotta love it! / The engineers refuse to refuse the rocket until the refuse is removed from the launch pad.
I've got news for you, he didn't do much coding at Atari, either!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
"...techies around the world would have posters of Torvalds on their walls."
Is this something we should expect to see at ThinkGeek in the near future? Or perhaps a deck of cards with faces of the Techno-Famous on them?
-h
--
"my other flamethrower is a Spaceballs flamethrower"
of the silicon.com web site, CmdrTaco has been added to the list.
/. which leads to...
Unfortunately, this leads to the revised list being posted on
Completely OT, but it struck me that I've never seen a Lara Croft or Xena poster displayed anywhere. Do you have such a poster? I don't have posters myself, but if I did it would be of Feynman, Torvalds or Aishwarya Rai.
They included the SoBig author, so they understand "most influential" could mean negative influence. Whatever you think of the sue-em-all campaign, the RIAA has had a huge impact on the development of p2p apps, distribution of music over the internet, and probably the growth of broadband as well.
Rank Presidents by th
> are you suggesting he's not a power either?
No, but it might be suggesting his "best work is in the past". OTOH, if what we have seen is his best....
http://disjointed.org/archives/000248.html
"Basically, he jumped out of his car in his outfit and said, `If anyone can, Angle-Grinder Man can,' " Ms. Tendai said in a telephone interview. "Then he just started sawing it off. It was wicked."
Otherwise, you might as well fit into the category of the people "out of their right mind"...
Oh, and kdevelop is a great tool. Don't mistake it for Visual C++.
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
looking at the list briefly, it's good to catch 2 or 3 hackers on it! (if you count the SoBig author) at least 2 or three names i recognize.
it's interesting also, with the arguably condescending remarks on the Open Source movement, that while the president of China is listed the 4th most influential man in technology they fail to mention China's official RED FLAG LINUX.
interesting, eh?
Never underestimate the value of that "regular guy" persona. Torvalds may be one of the "digeratti" (don't you just hate that expression?), but you sort of get the sense that he's a regular guy.
No napoleon complex, no "I'm bigger than all of you" attitude, no chip on his shoulder, no larger-than-life image, or an ego that you can't fit into a conference room. What's not to like about Linus? Never met him personally, but I've never heard of him acting like any sort of ass.
The best description I ever heard of Linus is that he's a "quiet revolutionary." I'd say that's perfectly put.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
Hu Jintao
Here is a household name for the free software crowd. To leave Stallman out of this list is unthinkable. Stallman is to Torvalds what Marx was to Lenin.
an ill wind that blows no good
They should do a study as to who the most influential religious figures are. Torvalds would get #2, just behind LRH.
From Silicon.com's Agenda Setters 2003:m l
http://www.silicon.com/as2003/analysis2.ht
===============
Someone who could well have fallen into this category this year but
didn't make the list at all is SCO CEO Darl McBride. He has led his
company's charge to get credit for what it claims is some of its code
turning up in Linux. So far the row has taken the form of a lawsuit
brought against IBM, headlines in the media and SCO invoicing some
users for Linux roll outs.
However, when asked what happened when his company was served with a
request to pay a SCO licence for Linux, panellist Ric Francis,
Safeway's CIO, said: "I told them to stick it. At the end of the day it
is never going to fly. It's the last dying breath of a company that is
never going to make money."
McBride - in the headlines yes, agenda setting no. There is a
difference.
===============
Somehow the idea of Linux with watermelon boobs and wearing leather tights is rather frightening to me.
changed to _what_?
I tried to read the article but just couldn't due to the obnoxious flashing skyscraper ad for... the same article I was trying to read.
I am surprised not to see the PERL GOD, Larry Wall up on that list. He might not be powerful, but he is influential.
Causing Chaos Everywhere,
Nik J.
The strange world of a loner, in a populous city, drowning in society
Where the hell is Esther Dyson? She is a top member of EFF, used to be the chairman of Icann and now sits on like the boards of 10 companies, as well as a being a trade show organizer and a VP capitalist, and to top it all off her dad is Freeman Dyson one of the pioneers that helped quantify Quantum Electro-Dynamics.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
frolicking in the reality distortion field...
"You mortals are so obtuse." -Q
Heck, that alone should have bumped him up at least a slot or two.
If any one of those guys admitted to drinking swill (like anything that comes in a 40oz bottle, or any wine that has a screw-on cap).... that should automatically drop them out of the top ten. Taste has to count for something.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
The CEOs of Intel and AMD aren't even on the list. I'd think they'd have something to do with setting the tech agenda.
Vote for Pedro
to say that "Linus' best work is behind him." In other words, Linux has evolved into a stable, robust operating system. It has emerged from the development stage (where his "best" work was done) to a level of stability and usability that Bill can only dream of.
To put it another way, "we've done what Microsoft has said they're going to do if you'll only hang on for the next release."
My name isn't on it!
I mean come on now! I know I'm a hot stick with a keyboard!
Or does it mean that we're all tied for 51st place?
(a legend in my own mind)
-Goran
Carpe Scrotum - The only way to deal with your competition.
Whether you like him or not, it seems like he should have made it in at least the top 50. I mean sheesh if the soBig guy gets in there, why not RMS?
He has lots of money and people listen to him, however I don't feel that anything that exciting ever comes out of his mouth.
I think it's also safe to say that Bill Gates' best work is in the past. How could he possibly top the coup of licensing MS-DOS to IBM? (Short of total world domination, anyway.)
With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter. -- William Lloyd
No 15. Fred von Lohmann senior staff attorney, Electronic Frontier Foundation
Last year's position : Not Placed
Some would say millions of consumers, in bedrooms and offices the world over, are doing a good job of dictating terms to the suits in music and film subsidiaries of the major entertainment conglomerates. But when the RIAA goes after a 12-year-old girl or confused pensioner, who are they going to call? Of course the answer could well be leading IP lawyer Fred von Lohmann from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, given his track record fighting the controversial US Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Can currently be found defending Streamcast in a case brought by 28 entertainment companies.
"Neque enim lex est aequior ulla, quam necis artifices arte perire sua."
The Chinese government is looking to develop its own 3G standard, while its support for the development of an open source alternative to Windows has already had Microsoft, somewhat ironically, complaining of anti-competitive practices.
I know most people on slashdot saw that as irony, but until PHB reads it, chances are he/she will not. So I am glad that at least silicone.com wrote it. It would be better if Wall Street Journal published similar assessment, but for now, I take this as a positive sign.
A religious war is an adult version of a fight over who has the best imaginary friend
The article mentions that Linus is a Guinness drinker, and the parent post is a Guinness joke.
RMS is not a zealot, at least no more a zealot than the "free enterprise" nutcases who think that it is reasonable that because of broken intellectual property laws and unethical business practices M$ should continue to be paid $30,000,000,000/year for ten programs it wrote ten years ago.
--
It's wrong that an IP creator should not be rewarded for their work.
It's equally wrong that an IP creator should be rewarded too many times for the one piece of work, for exactly the same reasons.
One would think that power and influence are synonymous. I don't think the day is too far off in IT-land when individual power is surpassed by the notion of communal power.
I mean, where is the Linux community itself on that list?
With no offense to dear Linus, but Linus!=The Linux Movement. Linus=Linus. He is a member of a greater organism, the Linux community. While he may (bless his soul) have a great deal of influence over us, we, the organism, dictate our own course, and our own movements.. For example, lately, the Linux community seems to be moving more and more in the direction of replacing X11..Hardly an edict handed down from Linus, right?
Surely we, the Linux community, should at least be ahead of Palmisano on that list. Our little community seems to have enough influence over other pieces on the chess board..enough to move them without even touching them directly---Regardless of what SCO says, it's not like the Linux community went to IBM and ordered them to modify their business plan.
Something to think about, at least.
Bowie J. Poag
What power does he have?
He can't hire or fire anyone.
He can't spend anyone's money.
He even quit his day job to slave over his open-source avocation.
He might break his version of the kernel by adding massive incompatibilities, but then he'd would merely marginalize himself.
Just what actual power does he have?
RMS is a big pusher for OSS and Free software. You all (those who are like no RMS???) keep referring to him as GNU. Yes, that is a term, it just says that its not unix. His idea are what have made him as big as he is, that and the whole BSD thing :)
I agree, he has been a very important force in the development of free/open source software. I dont think he has influenced the technology as much as we give him credit for. People say that without him, GNU wouldnt exist, true. Free/Open Source Software has been around since the 60'S!! I dont think RMS is 60 years old (had to be about 20 at the youngest to be involved in IT at the time). The ideas he promotes so loudly have been around before him, and they would be around without him still. He (I am not sure, so correct me if I am wrong) did give us the GPL ( or influenced its writing heavily). Linux very well could have been written without GNU as oss still. On the other hand, Linus has only made it because Linux is taking vast amounts of the market (even M$ uses linux load balencing servers like akaimi.net) in the recent years. Linux is starting to snowball in a way that Linus never could have expected, nor even really intended to. BSD has its loyal fans, I have never used it, but I have no doubt that it is a very solid os and is quite capable. BSD just isnt making the waves that Linux is.
* all references to Linux actually are for GNU/Linux.
Stop signs are only Suggestions
Please get on with your life*.
You, like W, must not read the newspapers or watch the news programs.
HP redefined the phrase "security through obscurity" You have to be f***ing joking. HP?!?!??! http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,54297,00.ht ml
actually, on the unhampered free market (in an anarcho-capitalist world), there would be .
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
Where aren't these people on their list?
Even the Slashdot editors might qualify.
The guy that invented the internet, Al Gore?
The big question that we need confirm here, "Is Linux a Guiness man?"
WURD!!
So, where do we get the Linus Torvalds posters?
Come on, you all know you want 'em.
An image I could have done without :-(
About 4 years ago during my first computer job. After work, I was sitting in a restraunt in Palo Alto having dinner. Steve Jobs came in with this group of people and took the large table in the corner. A couple of them slowly tricked out, and it was just Mr. Jobs and three others left. I was joking with my friends about having a beer with him. Nobody thought that it would happen, but I got up, walked over to him, and asked him if he and his friends would like to join us for a drink. He said sure. And for the next 20 minutes, I sat and chatted with him. Quite fantastic.
I think that's why he said it in the first place...oh well, we aren't all blessed with a sense of humour I suppose.
Angle Grinder Man = yes, he's great. Long live air poisoning and parking that blocks roads and endangers life.
I hope he gets sent down for a long time.
" Son, I've had bugs more influential than you ever will be."
Coming from a Microsoft Windows security team programmer, that is an understatement!
Linus is influential because he has given very few people cause to dislike him. He avoids taking part in political arguments, he avoids making himself anyone's enemy.
RMS is a zealot, and for every person he brings into his way, he alienates two others. RMS's influence is limited becaue of the numbers of people that he alienates.
In other words: "Influence is like money in the bank, the less you use it, the more you have."
Exigo spamos et dona ferentes
How on earth did Jobs get on the list? His last cutting edge moment involved NeXTstep (which failed and had minimal influence). Apple today? Again, minimal or no influence. I think Torvalds should be number 1 or 2 as his work is radically destabilizing the industry. Bill Gates should be 1 or 2 (depending on where Torvalds is ranked) based on his ongoing influence and the repurcussions of Microsoft's battle with Linux.
Strange - when I saw the number 42 my brain instantly made the connection "Level 42" (80s pop band) Could they see the future? Is there some relevance to the "lessons in love" lyrics to a computer virus author? Hmmm...
I'm not proud, I was wrong
and the truth is hard to take
I felt sure we had enough
but our love went overboard
lifeboat lies lost at sea
I've been trying to reach your shore
waves of doubt keep drowning me
All the dreams that we were building
we never fulfilled them
could be better, should be better
for lessons in love
For restless eyes egos burn
and the mold is hard to break
now we've waded in too deep
and love is overboard
heavy hearts token words
all the hopes I ever had
fade like footprints in the sand
etc...I mean, love could refer to a computer virus - love refers to the atomic bomb in that (in)famous 80s Underworld track - and this song talks about dreams and ego and the virus was called SoBig?
Author and activist Naomi Klein has been working for the anti-globalisation, anti-corporate movement for some years but shot to fame with her first book, No Logo, examining the politics of big business, among other things.
The book provided a rallying call for those disenchanted with huge brands and, although Klein has no specific beef with the world of technology as such (despite her open criticism of Microsoft), her stance against the big corporations has struck a cord with - and mobilised - previously apolitical youth which is sure to have repercussions for the industry at large.
I almost bought this list until I came across Naomi Klein at 43rd. Let me summarize why she's on the list.
"Naomi Klein doesn't really write about technology per se and doesn't enjoy any real currency with most segments of the population. If she does write about technology then she will suddenly become more influential then Steve Ballmer and Tim Berners-Lee as unwashed teenagers throw rocks in windows with Microsoft and Gateway products."
Ummm, okay. As much as he's a toad, Jeremy Rifkin is far more influential in terms of criticizing aspects of technology then Klein and I wouldn't even place him on the list.
You want to know who isn't running Firefox 2.x? They spell it "definately" and "rediculous".
In fact, most of the guys would go out of their way to help the women.
Translation: All the guys were trying to sleep with the small percentage of women. I know I was.
Bill Gates hasn't coded anything in over 10 years
And his best work is certainly in the past - it's been downhill all the way since Altair BASIC.
Seriously, though, when do we think Bill last wrote some code?
It's an interesting contrast between the world's of FOSS and commercial software. Given that Linus is still involved at the code face that must make him the most powerful (and it is power and not just influence) programmer in the world.
Go Fred!
...the end user of a DRM-enabled operating system.
And that's below luddites.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
Another notable to the /. crowd
"But when the RIAA goes after a 12-year-old girl or confused pensioner, who are they going to call? Of course the answer could well be leading IP lawyer Fred von Lohmann from the Electronic Frontier Foundation"
Funny how Al Gore, the inventor of the Internet isn't on this list...
It's no troll: Bill Gates probably has even less influence!
"Those fruity iMacs you mention not only changed the way we "look" at computers, but also consumables as well.
They did, for a brief time. This was years ago. The fruit revolution died even in Apple, and the fruity foremans and staplers are quickly vanishing. "I caused George Foreman grills to come out with translucent lids" is no big deal.
"How many web sites not only outright copy the look of Apple's own site?"
How about... hardly any? I visit many many web sites, and visit the Apple one occasionally, and am always struck by how different it looks.
"Or products that mimic the Aqua goodness? "
I've seen no products, and I avoid websites that use the Aqua badness: the slow-loading pale hard-to-read low-contrast buttons violate principles of good site design.
"What about OS X?"
What about it? It runs on Macintoshes, that's what! That is all it does. Maybe Gates will copy the hell out of it, but that has not happened yet.
"Maybe sites like Macromedia or desktop environments like KDE"
Products like Flash and Shockwave make the web browsing experience all the more miserable: why would anyone want to go to the source of it? As for KDE, yes Apple influences it, but it is still one small niche player influencing a much smaller one. I did, however, visit the Macromedia site as per your request and I saw how the site was degraded with unreadable black-on-dark-blue icons).
"Big deal, right? What else has he done?"
You didn't name much of anything of consqeuence. What has he really done? The iPod has some impact, for sure.
"His Macintosh gave us a GUI, mouse and pointers."
Only if you were an Apple user. Xerox gave the world the mouse and pointer. (and Microsoft, Apple, Amiga, and Atari then gave it to their users) The GUI has been around in one form or another for longer than you realize: I saw GUI's on software for Commodore PET and Atari back in the late 1970s. It is a common misconception that Jobs (or Apple) invented these.
"His NeXT machine gave us the World Wide Web."
That, sir, is true alternate history. Berners-Lee, Andressson, and even Al Gore had more to do with "us" getting the Web than NeXT (which was nothing at all).
"His iMac gave us a simple network appliance."
As did many others.(and it was too simple: being intentionally crippled which ended up making it complicated to use and expand) But at least it influenced the color of a kitchen grill!
"His OS X now gives us a UNIX environment grandparents, moms and teenagers can use."
Except that most grandparents, moms, and teenagers prefer to use something else. Granny CAN use OS-X, just as she can use a TRS-80. She chooses not to. Jobs is still a niche player, with great influence in his niche but not much outside of it.
"Quite a set of lifetime achievements."
I think there will be a replica of a translucent pink staple-remover on his tombstone: that was the extent of the influence of his innovation (at least so far).
Most of you tools mindlessly agree with his opinions, believe he can do no wrong, and viciously attack anyone who hints that he might be fallable. You do this every day in your posts to this website.
Sure sounds like a cult to me - you might as well go ahead and order your messiah's mugshot to hang over your shrine.
p.s. Being a geek isn't cool anymore, sorry.
I thought it was interesting that number 4 was the President of China. Note that he is an advocate of Open Source alternative to Windows...
No 4. Hu Jintaopresident, China
Last year's position : Not Placed
With China, size is everything and a population of some 1.3 billion people means the modernisation of Chinese society will turn the country into the most lucrative technology market in the world. The country already has 300 million mobile phone users - twice that of the US.
Panellist Ajay Chowdhury, managing partner at IDG Ventures Europe, said: "It will influence the world of technology in many different ways. First as a market and second as a lot of technology comes out of China. It is motoring ahead at a rate of knots."
But it is clear already that new president Jintao, the man charged with guiding China to its new superpower status, is not just going to throw its doors open to the usual western technology giants. The Chinese government is looking to develop its own 3G standard, while its support for the development of an open source alternative to Windows has already had Microsoft, somewhat ironically, complaining of anti-competitive practices.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Don't forget the asterisk.
History won't.
I dont see Cowboy Neal in the top 50.. what's with this shit.
I didn't realize they were naming men Donna and Naomi now.
There had already been recounts. The SC just let the actual election results stand and they cancelled a requested recount that would have allowed vote-tampering and counting voteless ballots as Gore votes.
The voters decided as always, and the voters choose him in enough states to win the Electoral College vote.
The SC had nothing to do with this: they refused to take seriously a frivolous attempt to tamper with the ballots.
"And incidentally, I seem to remember Clinton firing cruise missiles at Osama"
Yet, at another time, the Sudanese government offered to hand over Osama for free. Clinton refused. In this, he got a lot closer than Bush did to getting Osama, and he deliberately let him go.
"The [moderates and conservatives need] to get past this whole Clinton thing"
We're still reeling from the recession that started in Clinton's time. We can move passt Clinton once we can shake free of the great damage of his policies. Clinton' still running around the country lying about things in an effort to block economic recovery.
Did you point out the reason we are still in recession? Tom Daschle, the Democrat leader, has successfully managed to block all attempts to get the economy going again. This includes fighting to get the tax-cuts-for-all-taxpayers reduced to the point where they have helped little.
The reasons for Daschle encouraging economic misery are very clear: a bad economy and lots of people out of work in November 2004 could help Democrats at the polls.
What is up with all those obscure British officals?
"Long live air poisoning and parking that blocks roads and endangers life."
If a car is parked in such a way that it blocks a road, you'd be daft to boot it now wouldn't you?
Daft bugger.
MM
--
By including this sig, the copyright holders of this work or collection unreservedly place it in the public domain.
"That's just funny, considering this sub-thread started with yet another whine about the 2000 election."
Talk about refusing to move on! Gore lost the election: get over it.
By the way, have you noticed the rich irony about moveon.org?
Moveon.org was started on the idea that a politician should be able to get away with sexual harassment and other crimes if he has "good" policies.
Yet, last week, they joined the effort to, you guess it, attack Arnold Schwarzenegger for his sexual harassment problem.
I should not condemn too much. Moveon.org's fundraising could bring to reality the Dean candidacy and the resulting huge Bush landslide in November.
Here in most of the US (except maybe NY, and some of the more metropolitan areas), Guiness is just about the only stout you can find on tap. I like it, and I do like other darker beers... I just can't find them on tap.
"but you can get them in some stores." Feh. Don't even get me started on buying bottled beers... many of them, guiness included, are horrible out of the bottle (guiness in cans is much better... you actually get a decent head).
That's not to say I haven't had some damned good beers overseas... I have... they just aren't available here.
I'm not a beer snob; different strokes for different folks... you should drink what you like. For my own part, I'd have to say that I like guiness.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
The legacy-free machines are a bad idea. All of them, including the iMac which did not work with standard Apple peripherals, are coming out at the wrong time.
Legacy machines that don't have CGA adaptors and don't run 5.25" floppies? Good idea. Those two technologies are dead.
Legacy machines that don't use floppies or don't interface with the standard Centronics printer interface? Bad idea. These may be on the way out, but they are still used a lot, still sold a lot, and are still of use.
The PC industry took so long because the "crippled and less useful is good" idea is of dubious merit.
It takes an especially bad President * to have every major financial measure he's ever sent passed (all massive tax cuts, of course), control both Congress and the Senate and have an net loss of jobs (the first time in 70 years!).
The asterisk refers to the fact that W was selected by the SC, bypassing the Constitution (and the majority of citizens who didn't vote for him, including the majority in Florida which had the necessary electoral college votes to elect the correct President.
"Jobs brought us firewire, no-floppy computers, usb "
He brought us firewire. yes. (read on)
No-floppy computers? Sorry, he did not. IBM sold crippled floppy-less PC's at the beginning. This is not a good idea: it is bad one that few copy. It is not a good thing to sell something without a useful feature. That's why most PC's have floppies (along with the DVD or CDRW burner).
USB? He did not bring us this. It would all over the place before the iMac.
" the Aqua look and feel"
These unreadable icons will die a quick death. Thankfully, few are following the lead. Look for Apple to ditch it when the paradigm of "make icons readable" returns.
"All of these are things that other companies have since adopted or tried to copy"
No, you listed either bad ideas that few copy (like crippled machines without removable storage) or ideas that you are mistaken on and Jobs joined in later (like USB). We could also mention an old Job's favorite: "eject the disk with a bent paperclip in a hole. It is so much better than an eject button". No one copied this. Eventually, Jobs had to follow the leaders: there are now eject buttons on Macs.
"What has any one person at Sony done that compares to that list (and is copied by others in the industry)?"
Actually, the one innovation you did name that finds favor outside of Apple's niche that Jobs was involved with was Firewire, which he did.... alongside Sony.
I found it amusing that when I clicked on the web site for the company hiring Linux/C++ developers, I got:
This site is best viewed with Internet Explorer 4 or higher.
Since you are not using Internet Explorer 4 or higher,
you are being redirected to the no-frills version of this site.
If this page does not refresh by itself, click here to continue
"We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." -- Albert Einstein
Today, we had the US Special Envoy to Afghanistan warn of "spectacular attacks" by the Taliban against US forces. On Sept. 22, we had news about Mullah Omar (you remember how W missed him as well as Osama) having a big meeting with the reformed Taliban in Pakistan. And even the CIA doesn't actually think Osama is dead yet. And liberating the country and handing control of most of it to rival warlords isn't what W said the fight was all about.
As for your "we're recovering from nicely; I know how that must disappoint you" comment on the recession, a jobless recovery with a fundamentals this weak, not to mention the first net loss of jobs in over 70 years, doesn't constitute recovering OR nicely as far as I'm concerned.
Worse yet, someone seems to have switched Bill Gates with Steve Ballmer - seems not many notice who's truely calling the shots at MS these days. It's Steve with his bullyness, not Bill with his nerdy curiosity.
As for Linus, I note that he's up from 21 last year. Things are going well.
The remark that his best work is in the past is just silly - his best work is not his coding (which is fine), but in his social skills which are phenomenal. If RMS would discover this, he might make it to the list one day, too :)
I'm in a Unix state of mind.
If it's not Consolidated Lint, it's just fuzz!
"The fruit color sensation didn't last, but the transformation of the computer from a simple beige box to a fashion statement has not. Dell's computers are sleek black machines;"
You are forgetting that Toshiba, a PC manufacturer, had swoopy black computers long before the iMac came out.
"Up until the Mac was released (and its predecssor the Apple Lisa) the computing world was green on black text with DOS like prompts."
"Jobs also did a great deal to further the "personal computer""
IBM actually invented the PC around 1981.
"Up until the Apple I was released, personal computers were not popular, let alone affordable."
You have the history wrong (and these were microcomputers, not personal computers). The "Apple 1" is a historic footnote (in 1976 actually. It was never popular. The Apple ][ in 1977 was one of several popular machines to come out in that year, including the TRS-80 and PET, which were popular and much more affordable than the Apple ][.
"No Apple didn't event the GUI. But they popularized it."
No, they never did. You can never popularize anything if it only sells to a tiny niche market. They were just one of many small niche players with a GUI OS.
"Hmm you don't see any kind of resemblance between Aqua and Luna (aka Windows XP)? Get your eyes checked.
Get your eyes checked indeed. The horrid washed-out look of XP is an eye killer: a step down from the previous versions. The first thing to do in XP is to restore it to "readable icons"
" Up until the Mac was released... the computing world was green on black text with DOS like prompts.
The first Mac came out at a time when Atari and colorful others were still around. Only the PC's had the green on black. Color by that time was pretty much a standard, even on the lowly VIC-20. The monochrome first Mac was a step backwards.
"Once Jobs saw the GUI he pushed his team to re-envision the Macintosh as a personal computer with a GUI,"
Except it wasn't a PC. It was a non-PC microcomputer. Apple has yet to make PC's.
"as a great bit of foresight on Jobs to think that the market would accept such a big change from their traditional computer."
The market never did accept it from Apple, really. Others went on to adopt the Xerox ideas. Apple never again gained the influence and dominance it had around 1979.
"Let's face it, people are tired of Bush's "kill all the foreigners for Jesus" policies"
Except he does not have anything like a policy. It is more like "save the lives of foreigners"; he headed off the Taliban-induced famine, and even if you count in the Iraqis Saddam killed during the bombings by using them as human shields, the death rate is going down in Iraq very fast (Saddam used to execute on average 10,000 - 20,000 civilians a year).
Yes, it is saving lives. Jesus? Perhaps. But the real reason is that it is sensible policy.
"and the resurrection of Reaganomics has reminded everybody why they voted George Sr. out in the first place."
Reaganomics was excellent, and popular. (what else can you say about the idea of letting the people keep more of what they earn) The reason George H. W. Bush was voted out is because he forgot this and broke his tax pledge (which caused a recession).
"If it wasn't for the presence of Lara Croft and Xena Warrior Princess, techies around the world would have posters of Torvalds on their wall."
It's times like this, I'm proud to be a Windows user.
"Derp de derp."
"The asterisk refers to the fact that W was selected by the SC, bypassing the Constitution "
That is not a fact. Actually, it is a lie.
Bush was elected the exact same way that his predecessors were: he got enough votes in enough states to get the electoral votes. All the SC did was shut off an attempt to tamper with the ballots.
"including the majority in Florida which had the necessary electoral college votes to elect the correct President."
The majority in Florida did indeed vote for the man was elected President and now is in the White House. The only way you can get more Gore votes is by counting ballots that had no Gore votes on them at all.
The asterisk you place there merely means "I don't like his politics, so I refuse to recognize the fact that he was elected".
You are exactly like the right-wing boobs I know who said the same thing about Clinton, with theories (just as silly as the Florida claims) about Chinese campaign money and buying off Perot).
You kooks are all the same.
"I wish I could insert the picture of that cover of Time magazine of a man looking at a vote card by holding it up to the light and checking to see if the right hole was punched."
You should have seen the other photos of the rooms where they were "counting" (voting is more like it): the floors were covered with chads.
"Besides, the Gorebot couldn't have beaten Bozo the Clown with his campaign strategies."
Yes. Lie to people, promise to tax the hell out of the overtaxed public, intone in a synthesized voice "there is no controlling legal authority [beep]", commit massive campaign finance crimes,and take credit for the creation of the Internet. What a way to run a campaign.
Al Gore invented the Internet. He said so on CNN.
LEt the silly objections roll in:
"He never said he invented it" - wrong: look in a dictionary. Create = invent.
"This came from Limbaugh" - wrong: it was on CNN, still archived on CNN pages.
"He really did invent it when in Congress" - wrong: the Internet was started a few years before Gore's election.
"Important Internet inventors defend him" - irrelevant: they liked that he helped the Internet long after it was created. They do not claim that he invented it.
"But he created totay's commercial Internet" - wrong. He didn't, and that was not his claim. Trying to alter Gore's comment into a true one still leaves his actual words as a falsehood. Putting word into his mouth do not change the public record.
"But he did so much good in Congress for the Internet" - Irrelevant. That does not make his claim of creating it any more true.
It's more important to be a successful entrepreneur than a successful technician or technologist. The same probably applies in other fields of industry or services.
I think it's time those involved with education start giving as much or even more attention to entrepreneurial, economic, or financial literacy than they currently do to technology, computing or information literacy.
Err, no. Because you clamp it before it gets towed off. Otherwise you could park any car in a way that blocks a road and know you'd never get punished. Fool.
Also, I'm married, not an idiot, and naturally cute, so I could give a fuck about appearing sensitive to women on an anonymous geek forum.
Krikey! Are you sensitive to anonymous urinal hole-in-wall poop sex in bathrooms too?
Of course it is left to you to figure out my gender. You get 2 guesses.
You are SHE-MAN, masturbator of GaySkull! I always dreamt my whole life to meet you in person! I loved your cartoons, you are my hero!
Just noticed silicon.com has done this every year for a few years - interesting to see how previous predictions worked out... Check out http://www.silicon.com/as2002 ...for last year's predictions.
He heads up a small outfit called the BBC. They do a bit of reporting every now and again. You might have seen some of their articles linked from slashdot sometime - it happens occasionally.
Anyway, you clearly haven't been following the Hutton enquiry into the death of Dr. David Kelly (the affair that should be toppling the British government any time now). Grey Dyke has been a prominent witness. Let me guess, you're not from this side of the Atlantic, are you?
The fact that I dislike his politics doesn't change the fact that he was selected not elected. Even Rutherford B. Hayes doesn't have an asterisk. He wasn't handed the election by the SC.
"He didn't have enough votes by the citizens of Florida. An inaccurate vote count was accepted by W's state campaign "
He had more votes than the other guys, which is how you win. The accurate count was accepted by W's state campaign. It only counted actual votes.
"and that any recount will cast doubt on their decision that W won."
No, there were recounts before. Bush won them all. He would have also won the recount that the Gore team asked for.
"The fact that I dislike his politics doesn't change the fact that he was selected not elected"
In Bush's case, the two are the same. Same with any president. Election is the method for selection. That's how we choose our President.
"Even Rutherford B. Hayes doesn't have an asterisk"
No, but Clinton does. He and another guy were impeached. (Bush only has an asterisk according to a few extremists who would not accept the fact of his election even if he had 90% popular vote and 100% electoral vote: they are so twisted with hate)
"He wasn't handed the election by the SC."
Nor was Bush. He won the election fair and square.
By the way, I note you've avoided that whole 3 years of recession, passed every finance measure he wanted (all tax cuts), his party controls both houses and has the first net loss of jobs in 70 years thing. Hasn't the RNC given you the spin sheet on that one yet?
Heck, I didn't even mention budget surplus to largest budget deficit in history!
I don't honestly think that he even deserves a top 50 place. Sure, he was influential in the past, but if you are talking about now...let's just say that people running Anti-RIAA sites are probably more influential.
Ellison deserves to be top 5.
Stallman and Raymond should be in the 50.
Darl McBride (for all the wrong reasons) should be in the 50.
The only reason why screw-cap wine is generally worse is that people don't put good wine in it as a rule (although this is changing).
Flamebait? WTF is up with these stupid /. editors?
Surprised Al hasn't come up yet lmao. Good one!
"Mike, I'm married to my unattractive wife who is terrible in bed, so I have to sleep with her. But why you?"
"It takes three (_____) to change the lightbulb: one of the (_____) holds the lightbulb while the other two rotate the ladder. Afterwards they throw the used lightbulb away."
"windows didin't suport it, the motherboards did have it, but there where no compatible devices"
My Windows box has USB, it was supported, and there were devices before the iMac ever came out.
"the iMac made USB what it is today by only having THAT tipe of conection."
No, it did not. USB growth started from when it was introduced before the iMac, and it grew as it would have whether or not the iMac existed.
You can make your Jobs case for firewire, but you can't make it for USB.
"but it was YEARS before pc come with a sound card and all of the multimedia stuf, he made the fist mac ship with integrated sound."
He was also followere here. When the first mac came out, the PC did not have sound, but there were plenty of other machines out there that had more sophisisticated sound than the Apple 2 did for years.
"Steve was also, a very importan driving force in all of the "TrueType" fonts development"
That is true. So you were able to claim 3 Jobs innovations, and only one was true. To help you out, I cam up with one you forgot.
"Apple didn't "invent" the GUI- they were only the first company to actually sell it to customers and make it usable"
No, they were not first. Not by years. Plenty of other software had GUI. Apple was first, as far as I know with selling a GUI OS, but they were not first with a GUI period.
"And OS X does lots, lots, lots that Linux doesn't do. Like run useful and well designed applications"
The amount of applications for OS-X are quite meager and threadbare compared to what you have for *NIX and the pc.
"Bush had less votes. The Supreme Court handed him the election anyway"
No, he had more votes.They were counted several times. The Florida voters handed him the election (the SC did nothing except ignore it when Gore's lawyers lied to them)
"By the way, I note you've avoided that whole 3 years of recession"
This has been addressed. Tom Daschle has been able to get the votes to keep the recession going.
"passed every finance measure he wanted (all tax cuts)"
No, he did not. The Democrats in Congress were abel to reduce the tax cuts so they would be much less helpful.
"Hasn't the RNC given you the spin sheet on that one yet"
I'm not a republican.I'm interested in truth, not spin.
"Hasn't the RNC given you the spin sheet on that one yet"
There was no surplus. Clinton left the country deeper in debt than it was when he started (check the facts: he added trillions to the debt).
* The asterisk means that yes, the American people can elect presidents who are not left-wing extremists. It is allowed.
silicon.com that ran the "Torvalds for Governor" story? They've removed the original from their site and replaced it with this apology but both they and zdnet were fooled.
"But for now Murdoch still sits on the throne of the largest media empire in the world and arguably holds more influence over the way we think, work, spend and live than any other person on the planet"
And he ranks 11? Last years number 1? Sure the stock has been a bit shakey but this is the man that inspired a Bond villan!! This is the guy who wrote the book that Bill Gates read on running a monopoly and world domination. In soviet Russia you may be able to control Murdoch, but here Murdoch controls you!!
Vajpayee ranks above god?
Sobig writer is bigger than the CEO of Microsoft? Come on please...
...the guy who invented patents? Is he on the list?
"So acording to the dictionary definition, Apple computers qualify as "PC's". "
Not according to anyone else, however. You've got your MacMall, and you've got your PCMall. I dare you to buy mac software from the PC Mall site.
You've got PC Magazine. I guess they must give a lot of Mac coverage.
You've even got Apple, which has advertisement comparing Macintoshes to PC's.
"personal computer" was one of a few terms being bounced around before the IBM "PC". Home computer and microcomputer were more common terms.
I'm sorry, but I can't see Hu Jintao's name without thinking of Hu's on First
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
Apple did not invent USB, but it was the first company which promoted it. In 1998-1999 most third party USB devices available were designed for macs.
It is strange, firewire is apple's baby, they introduced it in 1989-89 but they started using USB long before firewire
Rioters paid by Bush
Time makes more converts than reason
Well, what a lame fuck you are. Some people have a life.
I'm kind of surprised that he didn't make the list.
Tp.
That's one hell of a list. Nice to see Torvalds at the 5th place...More surprising is to see the prime minister of India on 8th place :-)
Happy Hacking!!!
Huh??? How does Jobs even make the top 10 in the 20th century??? To rank him above Bill Gates is an absudity??? Jobs is a Bill Gates wannabe!!!
HenryJamesFeltus.com
I dont see Kats from Zero Wing there.
All your top50s are belong to us!
You have 5 Moderator Points!
Which Helpless Linux zealot/MS basher do you want to mod down today?
tech, 5th removed, overlord!
..
Perhaps like the American congress, if the guys ahead of them are wiped out he'll become number one? Go, Linus, Go! We're number one! We're number one!
Darl is a number two on my list.
Don't forget, Christmas is coming, and I check my list twice!
Look at it: Sobig is 42 the meaning of life is to be so big you jiggle like a bowl full of jelly! HoHOho
Don't forget, Christmas is coming, and I check my list twice!
you mean 0-31 however, 0 - 61 would have been acceptable. 110001 would have been tring to hard, so it wouldn't count. hohoho, I love a good pun.
Don't forget, Christmas is coming, and I check my list twice!
..The consumer. I don't care what anybody on that list has on there agenda, it will change if the consumer doesn't buy into it.
Don't forget, Christmas is coming, and I check my list twice!
Obviously they aren't up on things. Everyone knows CowboyNeal has all the power around here ...
pretty simple really ... the article makes an assumption of P == $ (power/influence is directly proportional to money). The writers are only looking at people who are financially influential. And totally miss RMS who engineered a paradigm shift in software
(btw read *Free as in Freedom* it's freely availiable online by oreilly).
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
I wish I'd saved a screen shot.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
His distribution is one of the most powerful in terms of automated hardware detection; it is also very attractive for people who are willing to try a Linux distribution, but without having to touch their hard disks; and it has generated a flurry of derivatives for all needs and tastes.
Kudos to Klaus Knopper and all the Knoppix-based distros !
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
I see three reasons why Linux won the battle of the minds:
1. Linus had working code out before Jolitz (who released the first free working BSD distribution, 386BSD).
2. Jolitz really didn't get how you could be working with the net. He didn't participate much in the public forums, but came with some weird announcements. And he tended to ignore the patches from the community promising something "much better" would be released later. And that meant the the community splintered as first the NetBSD people and later the patchkit people (FreeBSD) gave up on Jolitz, and rolled their own distributions.
3. The leading BSD developers saw themselves as "computer science profesionals who through great personal sacrifices contributed to the BSD cause". They tended to come from a strong Unix background. The leading Linux developers saw themselves as a bunch of nerds having fun. They tended to come from a MSDOS background, or at most Unix-user-level background. Basically, the Linux people were a lot more fun to hang out with, and had a background more similar to most young nerds looking for a project had.
At the time AT&T sued BSDI, Linux had already won heart and mind of the young nerds. The lawsuit might have delayed the technical development of some of the free BSD's a bit, but the battle was never one of technical strength.
He is the current Emacs maintainer, so he has gobe back to his roots, so to speak.
The kernel really doesn't matter a lot.
But it is possible that the FSF would not have dropped funding Hurd development, which mean Hurd would have finished long ago. Given that a prefectly good GPL'ed kernel existed (Linux), development of Hurd was no longer important.
The GPL is more or less a legal expression of RMS's political agenda, and it has been quite influential.
"Give some credit to Bush. His massive tax cuts were actually reduced quite a bit. Instead of having a $500b deficit, USA could have ended up with an even greater deficit--not to mention the wealthy receiving even greater of the taxes back
No, if Bush had his way, the defecit would have been much smaller, since the tax cuts he wanted would have caused economic growth and resulted in more tax revenues.
And, more non-wealthy people would have been able to keep more of their own money (the wealthy were a minority of those who kept more of their own money under his plan)
"Gore took credit for the funding of the Internet because he took the initiative to get funding for it"
There is a lie there. The creation of the Internet was funded before he got into Congress.
"He never claimed that he invented it"
Yes he did. Create = invent. Look in the dictionary. His claim did not mention funding, by the way.
"...only that he was a major factor in its creation"
which is a lie, as it was created before he was involved. Check the facts before you try again.
"The AP did a detailed study of the vote and concluded that Gore won the vote no matter how you counted it"
This is false, as the votes were counted several times and Gore lost each time.
"They decided it was more important to install Bush as President"
No, the voters installed Bush as President. Of course it is "more important" to let an elected president serve than it is to give in to lawyers who lie to the court in an effort to overthrow the election.
"The Republicans bussed in people from other states to cause riots and stop the recounts"
Those stupid innefectual Republicans. The votes were recounted anyway and Gore lost.
"Newer Macs do not have accessible eject buttons on them, relying on the keyboard button instead. What does this have to do with your point?"
I'll have to take your word on it, since I know no-one with a Mac and they aren't sold in the stores. They are STILL keeping with this design blunder where there is a pinhole instead of an eject button?
"Computers without floppy drives are not crippled, unless you need to use a floppy to interact with an old computer "
You can probably say this in 2003, but you could not say this in the year the iMac was introduced: when floppies were much more useful. this was a design flaw.
No, he did not bring us USB at all. The peripherals would have been introduced regardless of the iMac.
"Apple did not invent USB, but it was the first company which promoted it"
No, they were a latecomer. Toshiba and others had USB on their machines and were promoting it long before the iMac.
I'd imagine the inventer of the internet would be pretty influencial!
-- Karma Karma Karma Karma, Karma Chameleon - Boy George
"The bubble burst when George took over.
Please see this BBC page from early in 2000
This is all well-documented all over, and is pretty much incontrovertable. The bubble burst well before Bush was elected, and even longer before he took office, and yet longer before he started to influence economic policy.
You can't change history.
Never heard of them.
Anyone know why they should deserve a place next to my Linus posters?The site where: "I'm right, as long as you ignore the things that prove me wrong", became a valid method of debate.
They can't read!!!
Y'know, this explains how they can go around calling Clinton a "draft-dodger" while giving Bush (dodger+deserter) and Quayle (dodger) a free pass.
Contribute to Laura Bush's reading charities, and help these poor souls learn to function in modern America!
"Contrary to your supply-side capitalist fantasy, nothing of that sort would have happened."
Except it works whenever it is tried in the United States, lower taxes have contributed to defecit reduction every time (since they result in increased tax revenue). However, you get defecits if you increase spending of money even beyond the level of the increased revenue.
"Even when the capitalists, such as the CATO institute and the Wall Street Journal, starts questioning the massive deficit, you know you are on thin ice. "
Of course, as they should. Bush should use the veto pen and cut spending a lot more. However, if you blame Bush for this part, blame the Democrats even more: they want to waste money more than Bush does: Bush is wasting less money than the Dems would like him to waste.
"What you are saying is in contrast to what the media and most politicians indicated...
Only the left-wing media (which does dominate) and left-wing politicians. It is a fact that the tax cut plan gives proportionate tax relief to all taxpayers. The rich are minority of the group of all taxpayers. "Tax cuts for the rich" is a deceptively small part of the picture, but boy it sounds good as a sound bite to ignorant media consumers.
Torvalds is GOD..
And the mighty hand of GOD smote the evil empire with kernel 2.6!
Well if that disqualifies him then I should be on the list then, because my best work is in the future. Probably.
"It's pretty shaky how he won. Click on the link in my sig then shush"
Not shaky at all. Rants by partisan hacks should not be taken as serious research. He won fair and square, now you shush and get over it.
"Ummmmmmmmmmmmmm, going AWOL for a year is desertion as far as this soldier is concerned"
Except he did not. Just an urban legend. Go ahead, show me the military court records where he was charged with AWOL.
" Dubya "
Dubya? Isn't that an Arab city or country? No, by using this Molly Ivens insult you are no more "conservative" than Limbaugh was for calling Clinton "Slick Willy" all the time.
"It doesn't change the fact the election was stolen"
Winning enough states to get enough electoral votes may be theft to you, but that is how all elections go in the United States.
" is a piss poor President.
The moderates and the conservatives approve of him. It is the left-wingers which fall into the disapproval column.
"Not all us conservatives are fucking blind."
Us conservatives? No, you are one of "us liberals" who reject the legitimacy of the President just because you do not agree with him.
" wow, what a blind motherfucker. Just because I'm a REAL conservative and don't automatically agree with everything the bush regime says about things does not make me a fucking tree hugging liberal"
I agree with them when they are right, disagree when they are wrong.
"You have issues. I'm very sorry"
Keeping the issues in mind is nothing to apologize for.
"The nerve this illiterate moron had going fucking AWOL"
He can read quite well, thank you. And he never went AWOL. This nonsense sentence is like attacking Clinton for being Cambodian and for bombing Nigeria.
"Until you pick up a gun LIKE I HAVE and defend this country in two wars and 3 "conflicts", you don't know SHIT"
Huh? What does that have to do with anything? I think you hit the hash pipe one too many times in one of those "conflicts".
"Quit listening to fucking morons like hannity and rush and coutier and grow the fuck up"
Who is illiterate? You cannot even spell Coulter's name.
"blind mother.......fucking tree hugging liberal.
That other AC is correct. That really IS a convincing logical argument!