Open Source Developer Knighted

unixfan writes "Georg Greve, developer of Open Document Format and active FOSS developer, has received a knighthood in Germany for his work. From the article: 'Some weeks ago I received news that the embassy in Berne had unsuccessfully been trying to contact me under FSFE's old office address in Zurich. This was a bit odd and unexpected. So you can probably understand my surprise to be told by the embassy upon contacting them that on 18 December 2009 I had been awarded the Cross of Merit on ribbon (Verdienstkreuz am Bande) by the Federal Republic of Germany. As you might expect, my first reaction was one of disbelief. I was, in fact, rather shaken. You could also say shocked. Quick Wikipedia research revealed this to be part of the orders of knighthood, making this a Knight's Cross.'"

Comments

Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[eldavojohn]

So you can probably understand my surprise to be told by the embassy upon contacting them that on 18. December 2009 I had been awarded the Cross of Merit on ribbon ...

Your surprise (and assumption the rest of us are surprised) is a result of cultural conditioning. Open source developers are (in popular culture where I live) unshaven, smelly, poor, obese, socially awkward, annoying, nerdy, pimple ridden, inferior beasts dungeoned in their mother's basements because they are incapable of anything else.

Despite this being nothing further form the truth, it persists. We often take it in stride and joke about it but that's the conceptualization of a work force so damned important to the entire world it's almost a social injustice. Why, you'd probably have to travel to some "crazy European country" to find otherwise.

One of my friends became a volunteer firefighter because it was seen as dangerous and attracted females when he flaunted his credentials at bars. It was something he put on his resume to increase his pay. Open source should be along the same lines and I predict that in the distant future it will be when a more tech savvy generation realizes that something like ODF equates to billions of dollars in good will and stimulates their economy in the end.

Once a more accurate reflection of this or image is implanted in a generation of children, who knows what could happen?

Congratulations Sir Greve, you no doubt (in my mind) deserve this. Do not be uneasy, you are not alone.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[Fluffeh]

Your surprise (and assumption the rest of us are surprised) is a result of cultural conditioning. Open source developers are (in popular culture where I live) unshaven, smelly, poor, obese, socially awkward, annoying, nerdy, pimple ridden, inferior beasts dungeoned in their mother's basements because they are incapable of anything else.

While I hate to bag my fellow developers, sadly, the ones who really champion open source do tend to display more of those traits than my other developer friends. Actually, a good mate of mine, who does a bunch of work with .Net and for the most part loves MS has got to be one of the best dressed folks I know. Also, he is fit as a fiddle, goes surfing almost daily and has a lovely wife.

I hate stereotypes, but really, the one you describe is somehow apt for my exposure to this world :)

Yes m'lord for pimple popping developers?

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[bickerdyke]

One of my friends became a volunteer firefighter because it was seen as dangerous and attracted females when he flaunted his credentials at bars. It was something he put on his resume to increase his pay. Open source should be along the same lines and I predict that in the distant future it will be when a

That might change as soon as 6 years of open source development will free you from military service.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[FuckingNickName]

One of my friends became a volunteer firefighter because it was seen as dangerous and attracted females when he flaunted his credentials at bars. It was something he put on his resume to increase his pay.

Thank you - you've reminded me to take fireproofing the house even more seriously. I can't think of anything worse than to be saved by "a volunteer firefighter... because it was seen as dangerous and attracted females... to increase his pay."

Fortunately, a good number of firefighters seem to do it because they like saving lives. The admiration is good but from all sides rather than as merely a sexual kickstart; and "for indirect career advancement" never comes into it.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[tzot]

Open source developers, then, have at least three common traits with medieval knights: unshaven, smelly and annoying.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[shutdown -p now]

Your surprise (and assumption the rest of us are surprised) is a result of cultural conditioning. Open source developers are (in popular culture where I live) unshaven, smelly, poor, obese, socially awkward, annoying, nerdy, pimple ridden

It wold help if one of the most prominent organizations associated with Free Software didn't promote its stereotype through its founder and the most prolific public speaker...

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[shutdown -p now]

I assume you mean Richard M. Stallman. Granted, he does have a beard and looks like a mildly obese Jesus at times. However, the fact that most of general populace do not know who rms is, and furthermore, do not know what Free (as in FREEDOM) Software is, means that the majority of people don't notice rms. As a result, he cannot have a serious [ea]ffect* on that stereotype.

I responded to a post which started with " Open source developers are ...", so it is specifically about "OSS developer" stereotype, not "geek stereotype". Someone who doesn't know what OSS is wouldn't have such a stereotype. Someone who does know what OSS is would more likely than not also know what Free Software is, or at least who Stallman is.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[AndrewBC]

One either has an effect, or one affects. Think of affects as the more active form, whereas an effect simply exists.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[Kelsey-GrammerNazi]

It's "effect", you affectation-ridden stereotypical sleepyhead.

Now go brush your teeth and get to bed!

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[Sulphur]

Open source developers, then, have at least three common traits with medieval knights: unshaven, smelly and annoying.

And if one kills you, your final expression is one of extreme annoyance?

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[the_womble]

I recently read a long discussion of the "smelly" bit on history blog (lots of arguments in the comments section) and it looks like the notorious lack of washing in Europe was a fairly late development, possibly a result to the belief that smell would ward off the black death, and for most of the medieval period people did wash, and, unlike the Romans, used soap.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[kobiashi maru]

Hey! The Anonymous Coward said only one grammar Nazi should help him!

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[KiloByte]

Uhm, what I heard is that the Church considered being physically clean a "pleasure of the body" and thus evil, praising ascets who were smelly instead.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[Interoperable]

Developers don't exactly put themselves in danger when they throw themselves between the public and segfaults.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[Ltap]

The right terminology (at least in English) would be Sir Georg (basically Sir ) or Sir Georg Greeve (Sir ). We had this same discussion when Patrick Stewart was knighted a few months ago.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[Ltap]

Ah, I unthinkingly used tags for that. I meant (Sir (first name)) and (Sir (full name)).

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[AthanasiusKircher]

One of my friends became a volunteer firefighter because it was seen as dangerous and attracted females when he flaunted his credentials at bars. It was something he put on his resume to increase his pay. Open source should be along the same lines

So, open source should be something you put on your resume, or something that "attracted females when he flaunted his credentials at bars"? If the latter, you're dreaming. If you want to pick up the type of women who hang out at most bars*, "manly" credentials will always get your further. That, and lots of money, though in that case the reason you have the money doesn't matter much.

There are plenty of intellectual occupations that have been around for generations that might have a significant impact on the world, but boasting about them at a bar will just get you beat up (and cause your drunk date to fall asleep)... unless you have make enough money to keep buying everyone drinks and essentially bribing people to listen to your tales.

and I predict that in the distant future it will be when a more tech savvy generation realizes that something like ODF equates to billions of dollars in good will and stimulates their economy in the end.

Yeah, perhaps open source is underappreciated on a resume now in some cases. But it doesn't matter how "tech-savvy" people are: the firefighter will still get the girl at the bar over the programmer. "I rescued two babies from a burning house!" 'Nuff said. End users, even if they use a lot of technology, simply won't care about how you killed seven evil bugs by fixing one floating point error.

*NB: I'm not putting forth a stereotype of all women. I'm referring specifically to the situation you bring up: slightly inebriated women who come out alone (or with some female friends) to the average bar and are looking to pick up a hot guy who tells cool stories. Some bars may have a specific kind of clientele, but I don't think that's what you're talking about.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[FuckingNickName]

That's the whole point: if your motivation isn't saving lives, you would, if you were the guy characterised above, "let me burn if I'm in a fire". Telling me may make you feel better about it, but it's nothing I don't already know. You're not there for the risk and goodness of saving lives, you're there for the career advancement and the cheap women.

Fortunately, many firemen don't think like you. They have a sense of duty, and guys like you just let the side down.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[FuckingNickName]

No, that's not the point. The point is that you claimed: I can't think of anything worse than to be saved

Imagine this isn't a geeky site where everyone claims faux Asperger's and uses that as an excuse to base their argument on an overly literal interpretation. IOW, and I'll try to make this explicit as I would to a slow child, turn on your sarcasm detector and put obnoxious air-quotes around "saved", because saving me is precisely what the fireman characterised above won't be so likely to do if they're in it for wine and women.

I made this quite clear in the next post, but you chose to skip over it, proving your wilful ignorance.

If a fire alert went out, everybody left what they were doing and came, with our own water tanks, our own pumps on our own trucks.

That's a primitive way to deal with fire and rescue, no more developed than pre-Victorian England. How many die during those extra minutes while you transition from what you were already doing and group together? Who's the trained medic? Who flies the helicopter?

Don't tell me these questions are unreasonable in a rural area: they've been answered with a dedicated state-provided service in rural Scottish islands which coordinates part-time, full-time and on-call trained firemen and paramedics who do it because they like to, not because they're scared their shack will crumble.

We didn't need people with some idealised purity of motive, we needed people who would turn up and help.

"As long as you think you're doing it, but don't question motive and resultant performance, efficiency and development." Yep, sounds like US business on the shop floor to a tee, and explains why their manufacturing and service industries are nothing compared to the Far East's. "We just need people" like the government which "just needs more taxes".

I'm AFK.

Re:Right Direction--More Money and Sex Appeal

[FuckingNickName]

Some of those Scottish islands would probably be smaller than some of the properties around our area.

Why is some of America so proud of having everything so big, even while it exposes all the problems with huge unmanaged expanses?

when the closest town is a half hour drive away and a fire starts

Not that rural, then. Where I was in Scotland the closest town was about a 45 minute drive away.

you don't wait for the pros,

Well, yes you do. Because they're on call or on stand-by, in a hamlet 5 minutes away. Occasionally first responders might be doing something else, like you kids with your frontier macho nonsense, but they're professionally trained, paid and supplied with equipment. While you're doing initial work, the helicopter's flying in to take people to the island hospital, or the nearest mainland hospital if necessary.

I don't know what you have in Scotland but here we have industrialised farms, some of them with water pumping capacity that many fire departments could only dream about.

Rural farms with their own water sources? Well, I'm fairly sure the island has had them before America was even colonised by Europe. I don't really care to do a penis size comparison of how many gallons and hour a random site can pump, but you can be assured that private supplies would be used by the fire crews if necessary.

You judge the motivations of the people doing the work but you haven't stepped up to the plate yourself.

Really? Or is it just that you're so keen to advertise what little you have done, whereas I am arguing on principle, and wouldn't want to fill the conversation with irrelevant anecdotes about how much of a hero I am.

one of the lowest forms of life, below even politicians.

Does your rural farm have a statue of Ron Paul?

A knighthood?

[Lars T.]

Nope. Really shoddy research there. Or reach-search:

Orders of merit which still confer privileges of knighthood are sometimes referred to as orders of knighthood. As a consequence of being not an order of chivalry but orders of merit or decorations, some republican honours have thus avoided the traditional structure found in medieval orders of chivalry and created new ones instead, e.g. the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany

You see, it says "knighthood" right there.

Proper.

[unity100]

this will refer some more respectability to open source. it is very important.

also i wonder which fool tagged this 'idle'. it is something which will create more clout for os, and also advertise it in the eyes of government level bureaucrats. yet some of you were short sighted enough to think this was an 'idle' affair to be tagged as idle.

Who is he?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, the summary is written very poorly. Who is this chap, and what exactly has he done? I've used FOSS for decades and I've never heard of him until now.

Re:Who is he?

[icebraining]

Especially since they forgot to mention is the founder (and president) of the FSF Europe.

Re:Who is he?

[chilvence]

I've watched television for decades and funnily enough I don't even know half of the people responsible for it. Oh well, I guess that means that they aren't important then!

http://fsfe.org/

Re:Who is he?

[TheRaven64]

I hadn't heard of him either, and considering that I am quite familiar with several of his achievements that probably means he deserves the honour. It's good to see more attention given to the people who quietly do a good job and contribute to society rather than to the self-publicists.

Re:Who is he?

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Especially since they forgot to mention is the founder (and president) of the FSF Europe.

President? Hasn't he upgraded to a monarch with this?

Quick! Someone send him a copy of the Dragon Book

[syousef]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_Book_(computer_science)

British

[caluml]

You know, I just assumed that it was a British knighthood. I had no idea other countries gave knighthoods. Live and learn.
C'mon, Dott. :)

Re:British

[Thanatos81]

Well, at least we Germans don't give knighthoods, it just is on the same scale. See mce's comment.

Ob link

[mrsam]

The ceremony must've went down something like this.

Why do I suddenly

[Iamthecheese]

want to find an open source project to help with?

maintain a tradition

[roman_mir]

Now, that you are a knight, which Trojan horse will you be riding on?

Congratulations though!

Re:maintain a tradition

[TheRaven64]

I'm not sure where you learned history, but knights and the Trojan siege were separated by quite a few hundred years...

Re:maintain a tradition

[roman_mir]

I am not sure where you learned your humor, but you and it are also quite distant it seems.

Re:Quick! Someone send him a copy of the Dragon Bo

[jhoegl]

Oh.... your.... god....

That is perhaps the nerdiest thing I have ever seen.

Re:knighthood my ass

[Anonymous Coward]

No offense to Brits, it's just that we've got a lot of Brit dick suckers out this way.

Well at least they're not at risk of choking on anything.

Re:knighthood my ass

[Gordonjcp]

No offense to Brits

Ah, an American. Do I detect a tinge of jealousy there? Don't worry, in a couple of hundred years you won't be the new boys any more. I'll still have trees in my garden older than your whole country, though.

Because your title

[jhoegl]

is half your sentence.

US Citizens restrictions on receving nobility

[gavron]

First, my congratulations on your honor. Assuming you're a US citizen, and assuming you're NOT an elected government official nor employed by the government, enjoy said honor! Ehud http://topics.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articlei "No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States: and no person holding any office of profit or trust under them, shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any king, prince, or foreign state."

Re:US Citizens restrictions on receving nobility

[Anonymous Coward]

I would just get the consent of Congress and be done with it. How hard can *that* be, anyway. They consent to all kinds of crazy s**t.

Re:US Citizens restrictions on receving nobility

[mce]

For starters, he's a German national and hence the US Constitution is not relevant.

Next, he was not granted a title of nobility. He was given a medal that in other certain countries would rank equivalent to the knight level in a typical order of chivalry.

On top of that, being a member of an order of chivalry is not equivalent to being a member of the nobility. I should know, as I'm myself a knight in a Belgian order of chivalry. Just about any Belgian army officer (reserves included) who has been active for long enough is a knight in one or more such orders. That does not make them nobility.

If you consider unknown Belgian awards to be too obscure to be a reference, look at the famous "Knights Cross of the Iron Cross", so well known that it is often just referred to as "The Knights Cross". This award - in its various gradations - is very well known for being the most desirable award anyone in the WWII German armed forces could receive. But rest assured that winning one did not imply any title of nobility being granted by mr. H. who, in fact, despised the old German nobility. Besides, from a legal point of view nobility was abolished in Germany in 1919.

Re:US Citizens restrictions on receving nobility

[warGod3]

As for US citizens receiving "titles of nobility", granted that persons working for the government cannot receive a "title of nobility", however you need to define "nobility."

Our armed forces are eligible for medals issued by other countries. Which include Belgium's Order of the Crown, the Netherland's Order of the Gold Lion of the House of Nassau, and the UK's Order of the Bath. Those are just some examples.

So a "title of nobility" may confer an honor of knighthood, however, it is an honorary title, not the swearing of allegience to a foreign power as the conferrment of knighthood had previously entailed.

Re:US Citizens restrictions on receving nobility

[ErikZ]

Assuming that this was relevant, I'd have to say "Or what?"

Right now the US Congress is overstepping the limits put in the Constitution, because there is no way to enforce them.

So if tomorrow they start designating "Titles of Nobility", what will you do about it?

Re:US Citizens restrictions on receving nobility

[mce]

Actually, the Belgian Order of the Crown is a nice example of what I meant. I'm a knight in that order myself, but that does not imply a "title of nobility".

For clarity for those who do not get it yet: The word "knight" has a double meaning. When used on its own, it is indeed a title of nobility and in some countries - such as Belgium - each year a few people are still made knights or higher (mostly with a non-hereditary title) as a sign of recognition for exceptional services. When used in an expression such as "Knight of ", it is nothing more than one of several ranks that exist withing that order, but does not imply nobility. And as I mentioned in my earlier mail, these "knight of ..." awards are much easier to get than real nobility titles.

Our turn

[highacnumber]

The US should give Richard Stallman the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Re:knighthood my ass

[gbjbaanb]

oh, don't worry. To be fair the country was there before those Europeans who had such poor social skills they couldn't get on with the locals left. Strangely enough, they had such poor social skills they pissed off the natives who tried to help them. And now, well, you can guess that nothing much has changed. :)

Re:knighthood my ass

[Gordonjcp]

I didn't plant those ones, but there are about 75,000 others I *have* planted. In about ten years time the softwood will be ready to cut down (mostly sitka, some lodge pole pine) but the hardwood trees will still be there long after I'm gone.

What have you done that's likely to last a hundred years?

Re:knighthood my ass

[karlwilson]

We've got trees in our backyard that are older than your country as well. Actually, they're older than every country still around today.

Bristlecone Pines

Re:knighthood my ass

[Cryacin]

What have you done that's likely to last a hundred years?

There's plenty of recursive functions and while loops that spring to mind.

Idle? I digress

[arielCo]

I know we get dozens of stories every week that deserve filing in idle.slashdot.org because of their relative irrelevance as "news for nerds". Now, this is about one FOSS developer who actually receives some official recognition for his efforts. It has an impact (even if minor) on the prestige of FOSS including this Linux-thing and these Open-somethings. In his own words:

By awarding this Cross of Merit, the Federal Republic of Germany recognises the importance of both Free Software and Open Standards.

As for what the chap did, he summarized for us the reason given in the mention:

According to the rationale, the Cross of Merit was awarded for my work for Free Software and Open Standards, starting from my being speaker of the GNU Project, including my very first speech, my work on the Brave GNU World, over driving the creation of Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE), to the work done around the Open Document Format (ODF) and the work for Open Standards in general with a variety of hats.

So, all things considered, attaboy!

Re:Idle? I digress

[arielCo]

As a helpful AC noted, s/digress/beg to differ/. I'll crawl back under my rock and stay there for the day.

Germany loves F/OSS

[Kenz0r]

This isn't the first time the German government shows respect to F/OSS:
Matthias Ettrich, founder of KDE was knighted late 2009.

Some German cities announced in 2003 that they'd be moving away from Microsoft, towards Linux. (source)
Munich is one city that I know of that has actively been moving their infrastructure towards F/OSS. (source)

(Disclaimer: I'm not German, I'm just going by what I read on the internet.)

Re:Germany loves F/OSS

[Thanatos81]

Since police affairs are not nationwide over here in Germany, some german federal lands also have switched their main working OS to Linux. In Lower Saxony the year of the Linux Desktop has been 2003/2004, at least for police officers.

Me too..

[hokusai]

I too once received a knighthood: "Dear Sir.... I am writing you on behalf of the exile king of ........ Our kingdom would like to reward you the golden cross, our highest recommendations, a knighthood. In exchange for this great honor, we would like you to help with releasing the frozen accounts of the king, by allowing a small sum to pass through your account ....."

Re:Me too..

[anarche]

I too once received a knighthood:

"Dear Sir....

I am writing you on behalf of the exile king of ........ Our kingdom would like to reward you the golden cross, our highest recommendations, a knighthood.

In exchange for this great honor, we would like you to help with releasing the frozen accounts of the king, by allowing a small sum to pass through your account ....."

Hey, I've got one of those too!

We should find some peasants and start a crusade!

Sir Terry Pratchett on benefits of knighthood

[billstewart]

Apparently after you get knighted, it's standard form to make self-deprecating humourous remarks about it. Sir Terry Pratchett was talking about it at the DiscWorld Con last fall in Arizona, and said that one thing he really enjoys about it is that when he's dealing with bureaucrats who used to bully him, now that he's *Sir* Terry, he's able to bully them back, so dealing with bureaucracy has become much less onerous.

Re:Sir Terry Pratchett on benefits of knighthood

[Hognoxious]

You must be right. I mean irony - from Terry Pratchett - not very likely, is it?

Wake me up when he has these to go with it

[justthinkit]

Wake me up when he has these to go with it: Golden Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds. Awesome book, by the way. 2,700+ sorties during WWII -- the mind boggles. Pity it is out of print and thus ridiculously priced...

Re:knighthood my ass

[Gordonjcp]

Yeah, actually, that *is* cool. Don't think I'll plant one of those, I doubt I'll see the the thing even start to take.

Re:knighthood my ass

[TheRaven64]

If you lived in Oregon, you might also have a mushroom in your garden that's older than his country, and bigger than some cities. It's not quite so impressive when you're not comparing man-made artefacts though - the stones in both places are much older than all human life - and I will admit that it's quite entertaining when Americans walk through the church yard across the road from my house and notice that there are gravestones older than their country.

It seems that, in the U.S....

[stakovahflow]

It seems that, in the U.S., there are one of three things that one will receive for writing FOSS software...
1. A mid-range paying job,
2. Jail time for imposing on someone else's patent,
3. A hearty *virtual* slap on the back from one's peers.

Notice that I did not mention Knighthood.

Cheers!
--Stak

AOE FOSS Edition

[RealErmine]

Awesome. Everyone knows that Teutonic Knights are one of the best melee units. Once he upgrades to Elite status he'll be nigh invulnerable. Just be wary of elephants.