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Debian Founder Ian Murdock Has Died (docker.com)

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the rest-in-peace dept.

Unknown Lamer writes: It has been confirmed that Debian founder Ian Murdock has died. From the Docker blog: "It is with great sadness that we inform you that Ian Murdock passed away on Monday night. This is a tragic loss for his family, for the Docker community, and the broader open source world; we all mourn his passing. ... Ian helped pioneer the notion of a truly open project and community, embracing open design and open contribution; in fact the formative document of the open source movement itself (the Open Source Definition) was originally a Debian position statement. It is a testament to Ian's commitment to openness and community that there are now more than 1,000 people currently involved in Debian development."

7 of 464 comments (clear)

  1. Whoa by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So all the race baiting about police brutality and how nobody believed him because he was white (and not a "n*gger" - his words) leading to a massively publicized suicide-note-rant-against-the-police on his twitter, that was actually covered on a similar website to this one, was legit? And nobody stepped in or did a gd*** thing?

  2. Rest In Peace by LocutusOfBorg1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Goodbye from a Debian Developer. Thanks for all the fish

    1. Re:Rest In Peace by godrik · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Just a Debian user. But thanks Ian. That's a great thing you did with Debian!

      So long. And thank you for the fish.

    2. Re:Rest In Peace by unixisc · · Score: 5, Insightful

      RIP, Ian

      Thanks. This is the first decent post I read on this thread about someone's death. Everybody before this just trolled about either racism, or the circumstances of his death. Can't people be more civilized in paying homage to him, regardless of what they think regarding Debian, systemd, Wayland or anything else?

  3. Re:Dat's racist by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And what great parting words he left for us:

    Maybe my suicide at this, you now, a successful business man, not a NIGGER, will finally bring some attention to this very serious issue.

    There are very few situations under which I'd condone the use of that word. This is in the grey area. What he meant in the context of his suicide (on which he blames, in large part, his mistreatment by the SFPD) was that we're a sufficiently fucked-up society that we ignore police brutality against poors and minorities, and maybe now we'll start paying attention when we realize that even the wealthy have something to fear.

    That's not an endorsement of privilege, it's a refutation of it. Niemoller wasn't fascist or anti-semitic for saying "First they came for the Socialists / Trade Unionists / Jews ..." his point was that sooner or later, they'll come for you.

    Ian chose his words poorly and under great emotional strain. But his point remains: if you ignore police misconduct when it's only happening to a group you consider "the other," pretty soon you'll find "the other" expands to include a group you do care about.

  4. Re:Dat's racist by dos1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Great job at posting stuff out of context.

    What he said was among the lines of "look, now it's happening also for a successful white man, you cannot ignore it like you did when they were beating up NIGGERS".

    That's more like "stop belittling the problem with your racism, it's not about who is being beaten, it's about police". Of course given his situation, he was more focused on trying to show the police abuse than fighting the racism and without all these sudden emotions you would definitely find better words to use, but saying that he was racist in those posts is MASSIVE misinterpretation and cruelty.

  5. Note to self by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Note to self:

    Never, never give up after torture, abuse or rape. Few can send a real signal by killing himself. Suicide destroys the meaning of one's suffering.

    Live to the end. Live and fight the injustice. Live and tell the truth.