Fandom and the dangers of "Free" Software

[Bruno Cartusia]

On 06/22/2013 11:05, dil does wrote:
> GCC 4.3: sched.c line 572: Error: PC Load Letter.
>
> Theo De Raadt stared at his screen. Another glitch, another delay. The next
> version of OpenBSD, 4.4, was due for release a week ago, and he was still
> not ready. Just another reason for a jerkoff with a DSL connection and an IRC
> client to think that Theo De Raadt was anything *but* the best programmer ever.
>
> He took another drag from his cigarette, another couple millimeters burned
> from the end. He looked into the pack (just five left - not near enough
> to get him through this night) and sighed. Theo De Raadt didn't need some
> dry plant leaf to get him through this. Theo De Raadt didn't need anything
> organic to reassure him he was the BEST PROGRAMMER EVER.
>
> Not that it mattered, anyways. GCC was being a joke, as always. Nobody took
> that cunt Stallman seriously, anyways. It wasn't the fucking OpenBSD trunk that
> was the problem. It was GCC. What was GCC, anyways? Just another quisinart.
>
> Well, this wasn't going to compile itself. The amber light of his terminal
> shown on his face, a few more photons dancing on his intent eyes, the irises
> opening slowly. He saw the amber spark that danced on the bottom of his
> screen, another of the amber sparks that waited, obeying his every command.
>
> He fired up Vim. The characters, his inspiration, his *muse*, filling the
> screen. The terminal stretching to accomodate the source files on which he
> worked. He aligned his keyboard, running his fingers slowly across the keys,
> feeling his index fingers sliding across into home row.
>
> 527 G return.
>
> The air, the little figment GCC was so eager to choke on, was clear as a
> thousand suns, yet thick with the haze smoke of dozens of cigarettes and the
> heat of dozens of SPARC servers. The pea soup of nicotine fog was agitated by
> his rack of fine Sun bozen. Now THAT was a real man's tool, he thought. It
> has been said that it is a poor craftsman who blames his tools. But yet,
> is there not more to the relationship of man and tool? Is a great craftsman
> not inevitably inspired by his tool. Is his tool not inevitably amused? Is
> it not inevitably a conduit for his inspiration... his passion... to burst
> out upon the face of the world?
>
> A stream of characters littered the bottom of his screen. In this dark night,
> in this darkest hour for the openbsd project, perhaps these symbols would
> bring a faint glimmer of hope.
>
> Hey Theo, just ran w on your server, noticed you. Must be getting late huh
> (not that I'm an expert on timezones).
>
> This wasn't the source he was looking for, but that wasn't a bad thing. Perhaps
> this unexpected interruption into his private coding session would provide that
> spark of excitement he needed to deal with GCC's numerous inadequacies. Perhaps
> this mysterious stranger would give him the strength he needed to deal with
> that stack smashing, buffer overflow generating, decidedly position dependent,
> poorly optimized bloated junk that open source coders like himself, men
> seeking to thrust their skill into this world, were forced to deal with. If
> no good deed goes unpunished, then all this penance ensured that Mr. Theo
> De Raadt had been a very, very good boy indeed.
>
> He slapped control z, bringing up that $, so eager to await his every motion. w
> | grep esr - he brushed gently his smallest, most delicate finger across
> the return key, contemplating briefly before sending the electrical pulse
> that would unravel the mystery in naught but a microsecond. His faithful,
> electric-powered steed unveiled to him the truth of the mystery. Perhaps
> his partner wasn't so mysterious after all.
>
> The results, not unexpected, but not unexciting. Of course. Who else could
> he expect to be by his side on this dark, lonely companion - esr.
>
> He paused for a bit - maybe a couple billion cycles on that little piece
> of silicon that made this all possible. He didn't want to waste this next
> reply. An encounter with esr was worth the time spent.
>
> He savored the next few moments. He wasted a few keystrokes prototyping his
> response. For a man like Theo, C code came easy, flowed off his delicate (but
> yet strong) lips like the aroma of a fine wine. Time with esr, those octets
> of data stringing themselves across a web of glass, was so exotic compared to
> the normal, monastic life of the best programmer in the world. Eventually,
> he released that magic combination of control and h, that little chord of
> keys that he was so quick to use, to ensure that any vision presented would
> be naught utter bliss.
>
> He shift his hands back to home row. A, E, O - that combination so familiar
> to a master of Dvorak, the only way a man of his stature could interface
> with the virtual world of his computer, a virtual world he created.
>
> esr, my friend, were you testing me with that anonymous message - concerned,
> perhaps, I'd slipped? But don't worry, by friend, I'd didn't need to burn
> a couple execution cycles to know it was you. Who else can I trust, who
> else can I confide in? No... Who else could I bear to admit into my private
> meditations upon the trunk of my great project. Only you, esr. Only you, esr,
> could pull me away from that, the time spent at the altar that separates the
> men from the weak? So thank you, esr, for your brief communique has been a
> pleasant diversion from the trials I face.
>
> But his happiness was shortlived. A simple fg brought him back, away from
> his personal desires, and with naught but three keystrokes, he resumed the
> identity of Theo De Raadt, master of the OpenBSD source tree, tamer of merges,
> the only damn console cowboy in this world who was going to, hell, who COULD
> fix this damn problem. But fortunately, this distraction (but should it
> have been an invasion, a penetration of his personal time? should it not
> be unwelcome? should not the great Theo De Raadt be above such things?)
> was shortlived, for in naught but a few minutes, his concentration was
> broken. Another message arrived, and the sender didn't bother trying to be
> anonymous this time.
>
> Theo, listen, it's Eric. Really? The night before a Hackathon, and here you
> are, alone, killing yourself to get this code to work. Theo, we need to talk,
> I need to talk. There's a thousand, hell, maybe a million coders out there,
> and tomorrow morning, code is going to fly. But this isn't tomorrow, this
> isn't hackathon. Right now, maybe it's not the code that matters. Maybe
> what matters now isn't a question of source of source trees, or periodic
> functions - isn't a question of source lines of code. What matters right now
> is who we are, the people behind the names. What matters right now, Theo,
> isn't all the code that we're going to write, it isn't OpenBSD, it isn't
> what history will write of us. What matters is who we are right now. What
> matters right now is us. Theo, there's going to be a Hackathon every year
> as long as you walk this planet, but tonight is only going to happen once,
> and I can't bear to waste that time with you staring at liquid crystals
> twisting themselves into eye pleasing shapes.
>
> Theo didn't even have to wait for the formality of sending a reply, because
> a commanding rap on that door, that hotel room door, was enough to break him
> away. Not that it mattered anyways. He wasn't going to write anymore code
> tonight. He stepped out from his computer, taking a break for the first time
> in hours, and ran to the door, sliding the bolt free, pulling it from the
> hole that kept the door shut, kept him isolated, and as the hinges creaked,
> Eric stepped forth, penetrating his private domicile.
>
> "ERIC!" Theo said, savoring the name as it passed over his lips. "You may
> be late, but you were write - this night isn't over yet, and that window of
> opportunity hasn't clamped shit yet."
>
> "Theo," Eric said. "You look better in person."
>
> "Eric," Theo replied, "You're quite quick to complement, but I think all
> the pleasure is mine. This world we live in, there's an unending supply of
> lusers filling my email inbox with crap, but you're the only one that can
> fill me with something better, with something beautiful."
>
> "Theo," Eric replied, "I want to help you with OpenBSD. You're brilliant;
> reading your code is like making love on a hot summer light"
>
> "Eric, I'm sorry. I want you contribute to my trunk, I want you to contribute
> to me. But OpenBSD isn't just mine. They won't let us be together, Eric. I
> can't give you commit access to the CVS trunk... But maybe, just maybe,
> I can give you a consolation prize."
>
> "I, Theo De Raadt, do hereby give you, Eric S Raymond, do hereby give you
> full commit access to my heart... And my body."
>
> "Theo, I'm been slinging code for decades now, but I've been waiting my
> entire life to hear that. Tonight, with that newfound access, I've got a
> development branch that I've been very eager to push."
>
> "Eric, I wish I was that development branch, so you could push me every
> version."
>
> "I don't know Theo, I just wish I was your stable tag, because then I'd
> always be there for you to commit to me."
>
> "Eric, I'll give you better than that. You can be my backup tapes, because
> I know you'll always be there for me."
>
> "Theo, I've had enough of this worldplay. I think it's time I get root access
> on you."
>
> "Eric, you should have told me that five minutes ago."
>
> Eric embraced the smaller man, and felt a delightful tingle in his mustache
> as his lips drew closer. He felt the first of the many merges they'd be doing
> tonight as his tongue slid into Theo's mouth. For once in his life, Theo was
> truly speechless, but he didn't need words to respond. He pushed Eric onto the
> bed, no small feat for a man as small as Theo. He rolled Eric on top of him.
>
> "Eric, I think it's time we review some of my older, deeper branches."
>
> His OpenBSD pufferfish shirt came off quite quickly, and with this sudden
> reveal of flesh, Theo felt a sudden bulge.
>
> "Eric, your enthusiasm is palpable."
>
> "Theo, I only hope you've allocated enough heap space for my pointer."
>
> "Eric, you're talking to the best virtual memory programmer in this world. I
> assure you, my heap won't have problems allocating to fit any pointer."
>
> As the two men pulled their remaining clothes off, Theo glanced back with
> a knowing smile.
>
> "Eric, I've already given you root. Now open a port on my firewall."
>
> "Gee, Theo, I just hope you during those long, hard auditing sessions of
> yours, you don't reverse this - us - away."
>
> "Eric, I could never bear to audit our love."
>
> As Eric slathered his penis with lubricant and began to penetrate Theo, he
> remarked with a knowing glance "Theo, I think I've found the third remote
> hole in an OpenBSD install in the last twenty years."
>
> As the two lovers writhed orgasmically, Theo said "But this hole is
> different... You see, Eric, my love, I have no intention of fixing this
> remote hole."
>
> But their ecstasy was short-lived, for about thirty seconds later, a beautific
> smile erupted across Eric S Raymond's face as a certain other part of his
> body erupted. Theo, too, noticed a lovely sense of warmth filling him,
> and remarked "You know, Eric, I was thinking earlier tonight about the
> relationship between craftsmen and their tools, and I'm thinking, Eric, that
> for a master for myself, you're the only one that I can bear to work with."
>
> Eric stood up, and began to dress himself. He shot back, "Theo, tonight has
> been... indescribable. Tomorrow morning, you're going to wake up and go down
> to Hackathon, and it's not just going to be about us, it's going to be about
> all of them. You're going to keep on releasing OpenBSD, and that's why I find
> you irresistable. Tonight has been a special pleasure, but I can't keep you
> for myself. I've enjoyed having you in my grasp tonight, but a brilliant mind
> such as yourself could never be constrained to just one man. I admire you,
> because no matter what, you're always ready to give yourself to everyone,
> to throw yourself upon the wheel, to work long nights alone, because it's
> what you believe in. Because no matter what, you always do what's right. But
> I want you to know, Theo, that only on your darkest night, when it seems like
> everything else has left you being, when it seems that everyone else is just
> content to be a FreeBSD luser or a thirteen year old boy playing Quake on their
> mother's Windows PC, I want you to understand that I'm always here for you,
> and just for you, Theo. What we have is special, for a man such as yourself,
> because we can't just give it away. Because our love isn't BSD licensed;
> it's totally proprietary."
>
> And as Eric walked out the door, Theo said "I've spent my entire lift fighting
> for open source, but a relationship with you is something I could bear to
> keep proprietary. Eric, will you be my binary blob?"
>
> "Theo... the day that nVidia releases their specifications with no NDA,
> the day that Steven Ballmer GPL licenses the Windows Kernel, the day that
> all humans may understand our legacy as open source heroes, our relationship
> will still be proprietary. We are one NDA that will never expire."
>
> His personal life satisfied, Theo again resumed his usual pose, eight fingers
> on the keyboard. But this was different. He wasn't going to fix OpenBSD. He was
> about to show idiots with an email address the true power and greatness that
> was Theo De Raadt. He typed a command he's only dreamed about for years. He
> pulled down the latest revision of the GCC source code, and smirked ever
> so slightly as he opened it in vim, and his smirk erupted into a grin as he
> pointed it as the one line of source that had caused him such trouble, wiped
> it away with naught but two keystrokes, deftly replacing it with a line of
> his own invention. But this was not a patch that would ever be received by
> an SVN server. This was not a patch that would be emailed to some mailing
> list. This patch was going straight to the top. He fired up his trusty mail
> program and fired off a brief message, typing in the Send: field an address
> he had not sent in years, and with a few taps of tab began composing the body.
>
> To: Richard Stallman
>
> Hey dick, quick message here. I've been tweaking my own project, not to
> toot my own horn, and I've done you a bit of a favor, perhaps. I've fixed
> a little bug in your compiler for you - isn't open source wonderful?
>
> Love, Theo De Raadt.
>
> PS: Isn't it wonderful what regular code audits can do?
>
> http://dildosikw7h3qic4.onion
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Gayest thing I have ever read...