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Inside The Search For Jim Gray

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the gone-but-not-forgotten dept.

An anonymous reader writes "InformationWeek adds some interesting new details to the story of unprecedented grass-roots search for Jim Gray, the Turing Award-winning database guru who helped set up Microsoft Research's San Francisco lab. Gray disappeared Jan. 26 after sailing out of San Francisco Bay to scatter his mother's ashes at the Farallon Islands, 27 miles offshore. Once the Coast Guard had given up its massive search, Gray's friends rallied the tech community — including people like Google co-founder Sergey Brin — into action. 12,000 volunteers spent 3 days examining 1.6 million hi-res images of ocean gathered by a NASA pilot who flew a U2 low over the area where Gray was thought to have disappeared. But it was all for naught. As Sendmail creator Eric Allman notes, Gray was expert at 'stripping away mystery by making things simple. It's an irony to me that he should end in a mystery.'"

6 of 115 comments (clear)

  1. Colour me apathetic. by Caspian · · Score: -1, Troll

    This guy, despite brilliant mental gifts, went to work for a convicted monopolist. Why should we care that he's probably now dead? There are plenty of innocent people who deserve more sympathy than this sellout who willingly joined forces with a criminal organisation.

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    With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
    1. Re:Colour me apathetic. by LingNoi · · Score: 0, Troll

      HE IS A FUCKING PERSON!!!

      What the hell is wrong with you? I mean seriously how deluded can one get it..

    2. Re:Colour me apathetic. by Caspian · · Score: -1, Troll

      It's possible for a 'fucking person' to be mean and nasty, or just to work for people who are mean and nasty. Some 'fucking people' are more innocent than others. This guy could have worked for just about any high-tech company, but he chose to work for Microsoft. That speaks volumes.

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      With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
    3. Re:Colour me apathetic. by Caspian · · Score: -1, Troll

      There's a significant difference between 'deserves to die' and 'worth me giving a damn about when they do die'.

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      With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
    4. Re:Colour me apathetic. by Caspian · · Score: -1, Troll

      So you're saying 'no company is perfect; therefore, all companies are equally bad'?

      That sounds more like a theological argument than a rational one.

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      With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
    5. Re:Colour me apathetic. by cyborg_monkey · · Score: -1, Troll

      and you are a moron.