OT: Has ESR disappeared?

[Michael Hipp]

Net Llama! wrote:
> On Fri, 7 May 2004, Michael Hipp wrote:
> 
>>Net Llama! wrote:
>>
>>>On 05/06/04 20:07, Michael Hipp wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>Both his websites seem to be dead:
>>>>
>>>>  http://esr.ibiblio.org/
>>>>  http://catb.org/~esr/whatsnew.html
>>>>
>>>>I check these periodically to see what he is up to. Can anyone get to
>>>>them?
>>>
>>>
>>>I can get to the 2nd, not he first.  Either way, i can't say that i miss
>>>the blathering idiot that is ESR.  He's all talk.
>>
>>Well both sites had been unreachable for days, but now I can get to both
>>of them.
>>
>>ESR isn't all talk. He writes and maintains open source software and has
>>done a fair bit to make Linux respectable to the suits. More than
>>anything else he has provided a needed alternative to RMS. He is full of
>>it on a fair number of things, but that's not the same as being "all talk."
> 
> 
> Have you ever met the guy?  I have, and he's all talk.  He exists purely
> to listen to himself talk.  Its not for no reason that he was laughed off
> of LKML when he tried force his rewrite of the kernel configurator down
> the throats of everyone even.

Nope, never met him. Read alot of his stuff. It isn't hard to realize 
from his narrative writings that he is rather proud of his high IQ and 
probably thinks more highly of himself than warranted. But if the latter 
is reason to dismiss someone outright, then we're all in trouble.

 > What OSS has he written and maintained that
 > anyone is being used by anyone anywhere?

'fetchmail' is probably the best known of things he writes or maintains. 
There are 2 -3 dozen listed here:
    http://catb.org/~esr/software.html

Whatever his sins, it is worth note that 'The Cathedral and the Bazaar' 
and related material he authored is in no small way responsible for some 
goodly number of former staunch MS supporters (like, ahem, ME) actually 
waking up and being willing to smell the coffee. It is still influential.

And things like this: http://catb.org/~esr/writings/prudential.html 
where he actually has an audience with a group of Prudential investors 
and attempts to educate them about the economic viability of open 
source. The overall impact of little efforts like this should not be too 
quickly dismissed.

There is also some good documentation and general reading here: 
http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/ (tho much of that is becoming dated.) Given 
the sometimes scarcity of Linux documentation, any effort is appreciated.

I'm probably defending him too much {I like his Linux stuff and his 
Libertarian politics, but his views about "toxic Christianity" sure need 
fixing.}

Again, whatever his sins (we all have them), he is an ally and a good one.

Michael