neal writes "Fortune has an article that selects Linus as one of the'people' to watch in 2000! " Just another sign of the recognition that Linux and Open Source as a whole has garnered over the last eighteen months or so. Here's to 2000 being even better than 1999.
In case you were wondering, these are the other people that Fortune has picked besides Linus as people to watch in 2000:
Jeff Bezos- Amazon.com Mike Armstrong- AT&T Jill Barad- Mattel Jeffrey Immelt- General Electric Michael Eisner/Steve Jobs- as Disney/Pixar and not as Apple CEO David Komansky- Merrill Lynch John Reed / Robert Rubin / Sandy Weill- Citicorp Bill Ford Jr- Ford Motor Co. Mary Meeker- Morgan Stanley Dean Witter Chris Gent- Vodafone Nobuyuki Idei- Sony Bill Gates- Microsoft Lou Gerstner- IBM Peter Drucker- business management guru Carly Fiorina- HP
Linus was listed last in this list.
Every good ship needs a figurehead.
by
belgin
·
· Score: 3
And for the GPL, the media has selected Linus Torvalds. There are people who have only the vaguest idea of what that free software thingy is, but they have heard of Linus Torvalds to one degree or another. As/. discussion on the TIME POTC pointed out, it is not always the most talented or brilliant who becomes the icon for an ideal, but the one percieved to start things and is known to the people.
Another example of this in American history is General George Washington. He hardly ever won a battle in our Revolutionary War, but was hailed a great leader of men and was pretty much offered the position of King of the United States of America, if he wanted it. (He didn't.) It doesn't matter too much what he did and didn't do, because he was a cultural icon. He symbolized a great freedom in the minds of the residents of a struggling group of colonies, and later in a young nation. Einstien also falls into the category of cultural icons for the twentieth century.
Linus is stepping into the same role (on a smaller scale for now) in the concept of open source. People outside the open source community see him and say, "Oh, that's the guy who wrote Linux. He represents that free software movement." Whether it is good or bad, this is the path that I see before us.
B. Elgin
--
B. Elgin
"Read at your own risk; feel free to ignore."
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In case you were wondering, these are the other people that Fortune has picked besides Linus as people to watch in 2000:
Jeff Bezos- Amazon.com
Mike Armstrong- AT&T
Jill Barad- Mattel
Jeffrey Immelt- General Electric
Michael Eisner/Steve Jobs- as Disney/Pixar and not as Apple CEO
David Komansky- Merrill Lynch
John Reed / Robert Rubin / Sandy Weill- Citicorp
Bill Ford Jr- Ford Motor Co.
Mary Meeker- Morgan Stanley Dean Witter
Chris Gent- Vodafone
Nobuyuki Idei- Sony
Bill Gates- Microsoft
Lou Gerstner- IBM
Peter Drucker- business management guru
Carly Fiorina- HP
Linus was listed last in this list.
Another example of this in American history is General George Washington. He hardly ever won a battle in our Revolutionary War, but was hailed a great leader of men and was pretty much offered the position of King of the United States of America, if he wanted it. (He didn't.) It doesn't matter too much what he did and didn't do, because he was a cultural icon. He symbolized a great freedom in the minds of the residents of a struggling group of colonies, and later in a young nation. Einstien also falls into the category of cultural icons for the twentieth century.
Linus is stepping into the same role (on a smaller scale for now) in the concept of open source. People outside the open source community see him and say, "Oh, that's the guy who wrote Linux. He represents that free software movement." Whether it is good or bad, this is the path that I see before us.
B. Elgin
B. Elgin
"Read at your own risk; feel free to ignore."