2nd Annual Free Software Foundation Awards

Jacob Javits Convention Center, Manhattan,NY Tonight the Free Software Foundation gave out its Second Annual Award for the Advancement of Free Software. The nominees were introduced by our own CmdrTaco, fetchingly clad in a light blue plaid shirt. The awards themseleves were presentd by Richard M. Stallman, who wore a wonderfully fuzzy, warm-looking red, white, grey, and blue sweater. (More below)

The awards were given out in conjunction with theBazar, a gathering of Open Source experts, boosters, and devotees featuring a number of tutorials on assorted Open Source and GNU/Linux-related topics.

Last year's Award for the Advancement of Free Software went to PERL-meister Larry Wall. This year the three finalists were Donald Knuth, John Gilmore, and Miguel de Icaza.

And the winner was (drum roll please) Miguel de Icaza!

Miguel lent the proceedings a moment of extra drama by arriving - literally - at the second his name was announced, right after RMS said he was not there and could not, therefore, be expected to make a speech. But there he was, and the speech was both brief and charming.

A surprise award was also given to Blockstackers, which has donated a significant amount of money to the Free Software Foundation. This award was accepted by a shocked - and literally blushing - Rob Malda.

We join the Free Software Foundation in congratulating Miguel de Icaza.

See pictures of the award ceromony and participants here.

Comments

Re:Pictures?

[jsewell]

First, the story clearly stated that the pics might not be available for up to an hour, so have some patience, cowboy. Second, don't you know how to hack a URL? The correct location is probably going to be something like http://kurt.andover.net/bazar/fsf - It looks like maybe Roblimo got a bit confused in the cut and paste or else the URL got interpereted as a relative rather than absolute URL.

Anyhow, until the Bazaar pics are up, you can still waste your time looking at the fun pics from the /. trek to Comdex last month or whenever that was... The URL for that is http://kurt.andover.net/

Why not Knuth?

[the_tsi]

I recognize that Gnome is an important step for linux (err.. unices in general) to move towards the desktop, but it certainly isn't ``core functionality'' that I need my computers to do. I mean, there are parallel technologies which allow similar things.

TeX on the other hand, has been around for a long time and is used non-stop in the lab where I work. Without it, the reports we dump out would probably take forever to make. I can't imagine using Word (or any word processor for that matter) to create documents that change as much in revision as ours do. TeX is a much more earth-shattering development than a spiffy new interface to X.

I think the FSF awards copped out and picked based on ``current and trendy'' instead of deserving of an award. Of course, if there is a monetary award involved (since there's no article, I can't tell, but I imagine there is), then I can see the politics behind it. Gnome sure needs cash more than any TeX-related project.

Congrats to the nominees and the winner.

-Chris

What?

[Kaufmann]

Not to belittle Miguel - his work on bringing free software to the masses is very commendable, and Gnome is in and of itself living proof that you can actually build relatively good software using languages from New Jersey (*rimshot*) - but he just doesn't stand up to Knuth. I mean, the guy's a shining beacon of excellence in computer science. Miguel himself probably learned a lot of programming skills from Knuth's books. If anyone deserves a big fat award, it's old Don at Palo Alto. The only perspective from which I can conceive of Miguel as being more award-worthy than Knuth is the "making free software user-friendly" idea. (That is, as user-friendly as an Un*x gets. *rimshot*)

So I hope that Knuth gets what he deserves next time. (It wouldn't hurt to give him a couple of VA shares either.)

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

So I hope that Knuth gets what he deserves next time

I say we don't give that Knuth a damn thing until he finishes vols 4 & 5 of The Art of Programming

Re:What?

[Raul Acevedo]

I'm guessing Miguel won over Knuth because Knuth has already been recognized a million times over for his contributions, and his contributions are not as recent as Miguel's. In other words, these awards aren't life time achievement awards; they are more for recent events. In recent times, Miguel has had much more of a direct impact than Knuth has.

Though I agree, it does seem weird to pass over Knuth in favor of Miguel. (No offense, Miguel, you and your contributions to GNOME and free software rock. :)
----------

Re:What?

[zeppelin71]

> he just doesn't stand up to Knuth. I mean, the guy's a shining beacon
> of excellence in computer science.

So let him continue to win Computer Science awards - this award was for the advancement of free software.

Re:What?

[acroyear]

I'd have to disagree. There's being a programmer, author, and teacher, who just happens to like to give away his code as examples as part of his teaching. I'd note that though he has a lot of excellent algorithms and utilities, and a very keen mathematical and "computer science" mind, his work is far more designed for true computer science-level programmers. That is not the majority of programmers, mind you; many will just use libraries that are built based on his code or algorithms, and probably not even know that's what they've got. [I'd be fascinated to learn just how much of the C++ STL classes and algorithms are based on his work.]

The task of designing a desktop, building on the experiences, both good and bad, of existing (and long dead) systems, managing a GREAT number of code contributors (in the bigger picture, more than the linux kernel), acknowledging the GPL to the point of letting multiple developers work on different applications that do the same thing (how many mail clients do we need, guys), with the understanding that the best will come to the fore, but the lesser will remain compatible and functional (lets see MS Windows try THAT one...), all the while developing his own contributions (core at that), addressing incoming contributions to the core, combining multiple technologies that weren't originally intended to work together (Corba, X, etc...), being a spokesperson for the effort, and finally giving up his day job to do it all...

Knuth was always a teacher and scientist. His work is greatly respected (and used) by scientists, engineers, developers, etc...this is good, and he has been acknowledged for it.

Miguel is leading an effort to develop an entire system not to be used by developers, but by ANYBODY. It will, in the end, be a MUCH more exposed project. Knuth has respect and honor in the scientific community; Miguel will be on his way to earning respect and honor in the entire linux-using world at large (well, those who don't use KDE, anyways...). Starting that public recognition among developers and open source enthusiasts is very critical to the success of the idea the Free Software is for (or should be made for) EVERYBODY, not just developers.

Yes, perhaps, it is political and timely. It is also necessary.

Miguel Deserved

[Anonymous Coward]

Let please not only focus on GNOME, Miguel has contributed to many GNU projects. Anybody using RAID on Linux is using Miguel's code. Also if you have ever used Linux on a SPARC you can also thank Miguel since he was also involved with that.

Media

[spaceorb]

It looks like the real URL for the pictures is: http://kurt.andover.net/bazar/fsf
or http://kurt.andover.net/bazaar/fsf, but note they won't be up for another hour or so.

Also, ZDTV will be broadcasting the awards here: http://www.zdtv.com/radio on Thursday, Dec 16 2:00pm http://www.zdtv.com/radio

Re:Pictures?

[LordBishop]

For those curious, the pics from the awards are up. They are at http://kurt.andover.net/comdex99/bazaa r/fsf/
Yes, I know putting them under the comdex dir is asking for trouble... but at least they are there :)

pax, Bishop

Re:Is this supposed to encourage free software?

[CowboyNeal]

I use Miguel's code every day, and I'm not even referring to his work w/ GNOME. Significant portions of the Linux kernel port to SPARC were done by Miguel, most notably the Sun Lance ethernet driver.

The award: Better than a damn gold statuette

[Uruk]

Look at that thing!!! It's much cooler than an oscar. It has a picture of a friendly bearded GNU on the front, could probably double as a blanket for a midget, and looks like it's the exact same thing as free software - homemade. :)

Very colorful. Oscars just gather dust on shelves. This thing can hang on the wall. Very nice. Wish I had one.

OK, Knuth deserves one, sure, but he's not dead yet, and there will be awards like this in the future. Knuth may be VERY deserving of one, but it's hard to say that Icaza isn't deserving as well.

Correct URL for photos

[turg]

Roblimo left out the "http://" -- to see the photos, click here.
-
<SIG>
"I am not trying to prove that I am right... I am only trying to find out whether." -Bertolt Brecht

It is "For the Advancement of Free Software"

[extrasolar]

It is "For the Advancement of Free Software"

I think this why Knuth didn't win. TeX is an integral part of the GNU system but isn't as important as GNOME. As far as all of Knuth's other accomplichments, well, I don't think the award is about that.

I personally feel that Knuth should have gotten the award but I can understand why Miguel got it. Just look at everything he has done with GNOME:

• Lead the entire project despite all the scorn directed at GNOME and at *him* personally (as you will find evident elsewhere in this forum)
• Ports Midnight Commander to GNOME for their file manager
• Develops the leading spreadsheet application in the GNU/Linux world
• Of course he is responsible for much of the code in the GNOME support libraries
• Develops the GNOME component framework (Bonobo)
• A number of other things I am surely missing

So it makes sense really. But still, developing TeX and making it free... a difficult thing to compete with.

Congratulations to Miguel and the finalists... and thanks.

(I sincerely hope there is no political hocus-pocus going on... I don't think so but...)

Some answers

[Rasmus]

Whoa.. the /. crowd goes nuts again...

There were probably about 125 people in the audience by my estimation.

RMS explained why they eliminated Knuth from the 3 finalists by basically saying that he was in a whole other league and has already won just about every award out there and there wouldn't be any point in adding yet another award to the long list. He is already recognized.

-Rasmus

Felicidades Miguel !!

[edmz]

I feel really proud that a fellow mexican
wins this award, specially since his effort
to make linux more friendly, will help our
schools, which belive me, need LOTS of help.

Education in Mexico doesnt have a big
budget, and the best public schools at the most
have a couple of old pentiums. My mom was a
teacher in one of the top 3 public schools in my city,
Mexicos seconds largest and richest, and they only
have 20 or so old pentiums.

A lot of companies are donating old equipment
to the schools and only linux and gnome will make
this equipment useful and worth using.

Not only does he deserve the award for technical
merit, but also for his social awareness; well,
at least for what he has done in Mexico :)

Again, congrats Miguel!

Re:Of course Miguel won

[Q*bert]

This post is hardly worthy of a response, but I'll post one anyway, because I think it's important to set things straight.

I have been following the GNOME project since Miguel was writing the predecessor to Gnumeric in Scheme. (Yes, Scheme.) During this time, I have never seen him bash anyone or anything. He even gives credit to Microsoft, for cryin' out loud (for good GUI design in Word and Excel, in case you're curious). The only criticisms I have seen him make are of 1) Microsoft's business practices and 2) the old Qt license. These were reasoned criticisms that actually explained how consumers were hurt and focuesd on positive solutions. There was never anything approaching "bashing". Miguel is always one to say "I believe" or "many people prefer" or "there are concerns about". He almost never explicitly says "This is bad."

Since the new Qt license, I haven't seem Miguel say a bad word about KDE. His only comments are ones of encouragement and praise for the virtues of "competition". By the way, did you know he uses FreeBSD as well as Linux? Now he tests his software on his own box, running FreeBSD. So he's not bashing anyone in that camp, either.

Despite the divisive flames of people like you, the actual KDE and GNOME developers are working closer than ever before. Window managers like E support them both. The only thing lacking is a common object model, and programmers from both sides are working on the idea.

Stop trying to sabotage the free software movement. Stop slandering Miguel.

Vovida, OS VoIP
Beer recipe: free! #Source
Cold pints: $2 #Product

Knuth should not have been shortlisted

[rsidd]

True, Knuth does not need another award. But to nominate him, shortlist him for the finals, and then not give it to him on these grounds, is ridiculous. They could have shortlisted someone else, and announced that they weren't considering people like Knuth.