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Open Source Gets Its Own TV Show

Posted by samzenpus on from the must-see dept.

ChocLinux writes "A South African organisation has produced what it claims is the first television series dedicated to promoting open source software. The first episode of the show included an interview with Richard Stallman, who founded the GNU project, and Robin Rowe, who runs the Linux Movies Group, which promotes the use of Linux in Hollywood."

5 of 143 comments (clear)

  1. Interesting Fact by zerman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Most FOSS advocates don't need to watch a TV show promoting FOSS, they already use FOSS as much as they can. People who are not FOSS advocates won't bother to watch. Even if FOSS advocates did want to watch, they would probably rather do something on the computer than watch this TV show.

    1. Re:Interesting Fact by sik0fewl · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You're kinda skipping out on the people who are sort of interested in the topic of FOSS but aren't advocates.

      For example, I watch all sorts of shows on the Outdoor Life Network or Discovery, including shows like Killer Instinct and Crocodile Hunter, but I don't go out looking for wild animals.

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      I remember when legal used to mean lawful, now it means some kind of loophole. - Leo Kessler
    2. Re:Interesting Fact by Quino · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I dunno ... personally I came across Richard Stallman, read and understood the basics of the GNU movement before even having heard of Linux. I, of course, decided to then try out Linux.

      A bunch of nerds (basically) putting together an OS for fun (well, for deeper reasons as well, but as likely to be driven to tinker as any other reason), and not minding if someone else used it, was too tantalizing to not try (what the #$^&, right?)

      I expected it to suck (I hadn't read The Cathedral and the Bazaar yet), since I fully expected the "too many cooks" syndrome. I was surprised to find that it worked well -- in some ways actually better than Windows (anger at MS started the search for an "alternative"), and in some ways not so well (several aborted attempts before I had both X and the net working out-of-the-box, using Mandrake many years ago).

      Anyways, my intro to Linux as a non-programmer, and PC-computer-illiterate started with something similar to this TV show. It may or may not be a terribly effective advocacy program for the-OS-known-as-Linux, but I wouldn't discount the fact that there are many people that haven't heard or understand the open source movement, but would still be interested in tinkering, learning a little bit more how computers work, and maybe just running Linux. Not all nerds interested in computers are trained as computer nerds! :)

  2. Re:Wow by generic-man · · Score: 2, Insightful

    "McEnroe" has twice recorded a 0.0 rating. At least the Open Source show couldn't get any worse; not even the XFL got negative ratings...

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  3. Creative Commons would probably more appropriate by MCRocker · · Score: 2, Insightful

    A Creative Commons license would probably be more appropriate for a T.V. show, even if the show is mostly about GPL.

    Don't forget to install your mozcc extension in your Mozilla based browser so you can determine the creative commons license status of the web page that the T.V. show is on ;)

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