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CNN Sits Down With Linus Torvalds
just_another_sean writes "Calling him 'reclusive' and the 'leader of the Open Source Revolution' CNN has an interview with Linus Torvalds. From the article: "I actually only work with a few handfuls so I tend to directly interact with maybe 10 - 20 people and they in turn interact with other people. So depending on how you count, if you count just the core people, 20 -50 people. If you count everybody who's involved; five thousand people -- and you can really put the number anywhere in between... Almost, pretty much all, real work is done over e-mail so it doesn't matter where people are."
Travelling all over the world, I wish I was a hermit!
He is just working on Linux kernel, there are thousands of other open source projects. I wouldn't call him OSS leader :)
Pixel image editor - http://www.kanzelsberger.com
That's kinda odd that it would take them so long to interview Linus. How long after Microsoft made it's day did they interview Bill? or Steve? It is definately due, and kudos to Linus!
Zhrodague.net - I do projects and stuff too.
Seeking or preferring seclusion or isolation.
Does this describe Linus?
Linus looks more and more like a penguin as he gets older?
Stallman: I'm going to f***ing kill CNN. It's GNU/Linux damn it!
*Chair goes flying across room*
All it takes to throw the entire open source revolution into chaos and disarray is one well aimed chair-throw.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
The maddening crowd seems to be too intellectually limited to understand that their need for heroes, saints and sinners is about as interesting as reading a popularization of a first year anthropology text book.
Not to mention the hours lost mugging for CNN that could have been spent productively.
just my loose change
"Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
Cohen
Seems like he would be a perfect candidate
The revolution is called Open Source. And its leader? Linus Torvalds
RMS rolls in his... beard.
I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of killer sig, which this margin is too narrow to contain.
...how many degrees is he from Kevin Bacon?
KLS: I understand, but let's say your mom or my mom, they're surfing the Internet but maybe they're not surfing with Firefox just yet or they don't really know what Linux is just yet.
This went unchallenged... you would have thought that she would be one of the first people to know about linux (even if she never will understand it and proabably still needs him to install a printer - as all mothers do)
*''I can't believe it's not a hyperlink.''
I believe the proper term would be "icon."
Developers: We can use your help.
Sounds like it to me:
To where science took this whole notion of developing ideas in the open and improving on other peoples' ideas and making it into what science is today, and the incredible advances that we have had. And I compare that to witchcraft and alchemy, where openness was something you didn't do.
Zing!
Steve Jobs is Admiral Akbar, Linus is Obi Wan, they can't learn much from each other. Yes, RMS is Yoda.
shin phantomflanflinger
But... does he run Linux?
(Sorry, someone had to say it.)
Developers: We can use your help.
For example I long ago decided I will never go to meetings again because I think face to face meetings are the biggest waste of time you can ever have.
Amen to that.
"Normally I am not recognized, people don't throw their panties at me."
Nice to know he thinks like the rest of us guys.
Holy s-, it's Jesus!
My son, who is a Star Wars Expert Extraordinaire, blames the fall of the Jedi on Yoda. He remade the Jedi in his own image and caused the Jedi to miss the clues to the rise of the Dark Side.
I sometimes think RMS matches Yoda in thiw way too!
Never trust a man wearing a coat and tie!
Talking about a t-shirt which showed Linus as a sword-wielding leader:
"It's ironic," says Stallman mournfully. "Picking up that sword is exactly what Linus refuses to do. He gets everybody focusing on him as the symbol of the movement, and then he won't fight. What good is it?"
From Chapter 13 of the biography of Stallman.
Please help publicise swpat.org - the software patents wiki
LT: Absolutely. There was a bit of bragging, there was also a bit of, hey, I still, the way I do my work is I sit these days downstairs in my basement alone. And it's nice to just talk to people and a lot of it was probably just social, just saying, hey this is a way to interact with other geeks who are probably also socially inadequate in many ways.
Pretty good insight - it's a way for geeks to socialize other than Star Trek conventions!
(Ducks)
On science and software development:
LT: We shouldn't give credit to Linux per se. There were open source projects and free software before Linux was there. Linux in many ways is one of the more visible and one of the bigger technical projects in this area and it changed how people looked at it because Linux took both the practical and ideological approach. At the same time I don't think this whole "openness" notion is new. In fact I often compare open source to science. To where science took this whole notion of developing ideas in the open and improving on other peoples' ideas and making it into what science is today, and the incredible advances that we have had. And I compare that to witchcraft and alchemy, where openness was something you didn't do. So openness is not something new, it is something that actually has worked for a long time.
Great comparison between open software and science, both of which a lot of people don't get.
On the uselessness of meetings:
KLS: So the face to face thing is a little bit overrated?
LT: I think so. For example I long ago decided I will never go to meetings again because I think face to face meetings are the biggest waste of time you can ever have. I think most people who work at offices must share my opinion on meetings. Nothing ever gets done. When things get done, you usually have someone come into your office to talk about it. But a lot of the time the real work gets done by people sitting, especially in programming, alone in front of their computers doing what they do best.
Dilbert freed from the pointy-haired boss type - Pretty cool. Interesting interview, I may and try and watch it rather than read it.
reclusive (adj): Not having a publicist lobbying to get onto CNN.
If by "dominate the gadgets market" you mean selling lots of iPods, maybe you are right. But "home base for open source"? The Apple operating system isn't open source, for chrissake! There's no intersection between Linux and Apple, Linux is an open source operating system, Apple is a system which has some open source elements, but the OS isn't one of them. It used to be but, thanks to the BSD license, that detail has been fixed.
As for this "cutting edge development", could you be so kind and point us to any big OSS project whose development began in Apple and was later adopted by others? I mean, like Konqueror was the basis for Safari, only the other way round?
Oh, sorry, I forgot, don't feed the trolls, or maybe that big "whooosh" was the joke going over my head?
It seemed that CNN were trying to ask very pointed questions, trying to make Linus out to be some warrior against Microsoft. I like this part:
KLS: Another reason, because it's an alternative to Microsoft?
LT: Well that is, I think, played up more than it necessarily needs to be. Because there is a very vocal side to this which is the whole anti Microsoft thing. I think it makes a better story than is necessarily true in real life.
For a techie guy who doesn't have reams of PR guys behind him and telling him what he should say, he handled the press pretty well.
I thought CNN were supposed to be respectable, like the US version of the BBC or something? It seemed like they were just looking for some big scoop with regards to people being Anti-Microsoft rather than trying to have an interesting interview with a major contributor to an alternative OS.
"hey, I still, the way I do my work is I sit these days downstairs in my basement alone"
He may be rich and famous, but Linus keeps it real
Trout's epitaph: Life is no way to treat an animal.
If you ask me, the biggest contribution of Linux was turning the OSS movement from a "niche" to a "community". Linux got a recognition from the mainstream software world that GNU never came even close to obtaining.
Call me when the text editor can handle new lines consistently.
The headline: Reclusive Linux founder opens up
The first Torvalds quote in the article: "Well today what I do mostly is actually communication."
And working directly with 10-20 people counts as being part of a farily large team. If you spent an average of an hour a week discussing issues with those individuals, then that amounts to half your work time.
Note that headlines and articles are usually written by different people, and often different viewpoints and motivations are evident.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
If I had to choose between Linux and the Pope, I'd choose Linus.
I always enjoy reading interviews with Linus. They are rare which makes them more enjoyable. Linus is an interesting guy and probably a model for a significant number of geeks in the world. So thanks for granting an interview and making my life better.
S.
PS. someone should tell him that people DO HATE microsoft.
I am intrigued by your son's theory, and would like to know more. (No, seriously, I'm really curious. For some reason debating Star Wars is great fun.)
What if the entire Universe were a chrooted environment with everything symlinked from the host?
The headline asks the question if he is the leader, its not a statement but since you brought it up, whom would you declare the OSS leader? Al Gore?
Maybe, but only if he picks Feingold as his running mate.
But seriously, it would have to be RMS. Linus pointedly isn't trying to lead a movement (at a conference he reportedly said "I really don't like the idea of thousands of people following me. (pause) But I'd appreciate it if someone could tell me where the men's room is.").
RMS, on the otherhand, has been pointently "leading" for going on three decades now.
--MarkusQ
P.S. And what Gore actually said was: "During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet. I took the initiative in moving forward a whole range of initiatives that have proven to be important to our country's economic growth and environmental protection, improvements in our educational system." Which was true.
As Vincent Cerf, said "The Internet would not be where it is in the United States without the strong support given to it and related research areas by the Vice President [Gore] in his current role and in his earlier role as Senator."
And Dave Ferber said without Gore the Internet "would not be where it is today."
And Marc Andreesen said "Gore made [Mosaic] possible with the High Performance Computing Act."
And Joseph E. Traub said "[Gore] was perhaps the first political leader to grasp the importance of networking the country. Could we perhaps see an end to cheap shots from politicians and pundits about inventing the Internet?"
See Seth's page.
Christ, Linus has porked out... he's approaching blimp size.
Nuts. Saying you took the initiative in doing something does not mean that you accomplished it single handedly, or even that you cause it to happen. It means that you got off your butt and started working towards a goal before others joined in, and that is obviously true in this case.
RMS, for example, clearly took the initiative in creating the free software movement, even though Linux got done long before the Hurd.
-- MarkusQ
P.S. If a statement like Gore's, that can be misread to imply something that is (harmlessly) false sets your blood boiling, I'll bet you are fuming mad when you hear politicians say more outrageous stuff, like: