Accepting the show's
Linus Torvalds Award for Community Service-an award
named after Linux creator Linus Torvalds-on behalf of
the Free Software Foundation, Stallman wisecracks,
"Giving the Linus Torvalds Award to the Free Software
Foundation is a bit like giving the Han Solo Award to
the Rebel Alliance."
This time around, however, the comments fail to make
much of a media dent. Midway through the week, Red Hat,
Inc., a prominent GNU/Linux vendor, goes public. The
news merely confirms what many reporters such as myself
already suspect: "Linux" has become a Wall Street
buzzword, much like "e-commerce" and "dot-com" before
it. With the stock market approaching the Y2K rollover
like a hyperbola approaching its vertical asymptote,
all talk of free software or open source as a political
phenomenon falls by the wayside.
Maybe that's why, when LinuxWorld follows up its first
two shows with a third LinuxWorld show in August, 2000,
Stallman is conspicuously absent.
My second encounter with Stallman and his trademark
gaze comes shortly after that third LinuxWorld show.
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