RE Misinformation and General Commonsense. Was [plug] Linus Torvalds' role at conference

[garry]

If most of us make a decision we later regret, we take it on the chin with an 
"oh well"..

No matter what the process you went through in your decision, no matter what 
factors you used, it was an assessment made by one person. Being bitter about 
a decision YOU have made is just plain silly, innit?

Linus' attendence is really icing on the cake, trust me. The lectures I have 
heard have been all given by people who are clearly boffins. I have very much 
enjoyed Rusty's humour, Bdale's enthusiasm and motorvation, Trent's depth of 
knowledge and guts for public speaking as well as Rassmus' surprisingly 
capable baby, PHP..

This is after only the Debian Miniconference and first day of the conference 
proper. Rubbing shoulders and chatting with some of the brightest minds on 
the planet, meeting fellow enthusiasts from around the world and learning 
about projects by the people who actually started and/or head them is a real 
treat.

If YOU were too short sighted to see the potential, or too shallow to only 
appreciate the closeness of Linus, it is only due to the thought process of 
ONE person. YOU.

One way or another, everyone attending is there due to sacrifices they have 
made. Don't be bitter I say. 

Reards

Garry.

On Tue, 21 Jan 2003 19:01, Craig Foster wrote:
> For FSCK sake people!
>
> <soapbox>
>
> Many Linux people are in full time jobs putting into practice what the
> plug list usually talk about. Many have forgone LCA for paid work (ask
> anyone about Computing unemployment at the moment) and Linus *may* have
> the been the final straw to put their money down (remember that those
> who do the work don't have the discounts students do). I pre-registered
> but lack the funds at the moment. (January is always quite time for
> computer sales and service...)
>
> We are not groupies by default and I'm a tad offended at the suggestion
> that anyone who joins now is "probably one of the groupies"
>
> How about telling us this BEFORE the conf starts allowing requests for
> holiday leave and/or scrounging the full $550
>
> I deal with non-linux people almost every day, and the overwhelming
> response is that a large proportion of "linux geeks" are arrogant and
> lack commonsense. Until now I've defended them.
>
> Maybe it would have made more sense to "leak" (as Nvidia would do) this
> to the press a week or a fortnight before the conf to make a final sales
> pitch. Remember we're also here to bring more people out of the quagmire
> of closed source. What better incentive than to meet the guy who posted
> a small bit of  source code all those years ago?
>
> </soapbox>
>
> Regards,
>
> Craig Foster
> fostware at iinet.net.au (with SMIME)
> (busy fixing up a monstrosity of a plug members' linux fsck up)
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Tim Bowden [mailto:bowden at iinet.net.au]
> > Sent: Tuesday, January 21, 2003 1:20 PM
> > To: plug at plug.linux.org.au
> > Subject: Re: [plug] Linus Torvalds' role at conference - was
> > Re: [plug] is this true!!!!
> >
> > > The misinformation (?) continues.
> > >
> > > ZDNet Australia today reported "Torvalds.....will join an already
> > > high-profile speaker list."..."ZDNet Australia will be covering the
> > > conference".
> > >
> > > The article, written by Brendon Chase, is dated today. The
> >
> > title of the
> >
> > > article is "Torvalds appears at Aust conference".
> >
> > News organizations don't generally need to be overly pedantic
> > with their
> > language.  The main point is 'Linus is here'.  Have a look at the
> > conference schedule and see which session has no name against it.  It
> > appears he might be doing a Q & A session.  If he decides to
> > talk (as if
> > he wouldn't), who is going to say 'Sorry Linus, you can't
> > talk because
> > we didn't advertise you'.
> >
> > If the conference didn't have enough or relevant technical
> > input to make
> > it worthwhile to sign up before, it almost certainly still doesn't.
> > Anybody who wants to come now just because Linus is here is
> > probably one
> > of the groupies...