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December 30, 2015 12:58 PM Subscribe
^D
posted by Obscure Reference at 1:03 PM on December 30, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by Obscure Reference at 1:03 PM on December 30, 2015 [6 favorites]
Debian is one of my favorite distros and I have other reasons to be grateful for Ian Murdock's work.
May we someday be able to speak openly about struggles with mental illness without fear or stigma.
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posted by Sheydem-tants at 1:03 PM on December 30, 2015 [20 favorites]
May we someday be able to speak openly about struggles with mental illness without fear or stigma.
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posted by Sheydem-tants at 1:03 PM on December 30, 2015 [20 favorites]
On Monday afternoon, he posted a string of distressing and erratic tweets, claiming he had been arrested at his home by police, accused of assaulting an officer, and later bailed. He also threatened to kill himself. After people reached out to him, Murdock appeared to calm down, and vowed instead to clear his name. Murdock died that night.That sounds suspicious as hell to me.
…
The cause of death is not known at this stage, but it is not believed to be suspicious.
posted by murphy slaw at 1:05 PM on December 30, 2015 [23 favorites]
When I replaced a redhat install on a a computer I shared with the room-mates with a debian install, that was probably the moment that I became a lifetime gnu/linux user. The package manager that he helped build for debian is still the tool I measure all other software installation tools against.
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posted by idiopath at 1:06 PM on December 30, 2015 [10 favorites]
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posted by idiopath at 1:06 PM on December 30, 2015 [10 favorites]
The Debian project was always a bastion of the principled software community, whilst managing to avoid much of the petty drama and rabbit-hole-ideology-arguments so many other projects spent time squabbling over. That was largely down to decent governance by decent people, such as Ian Murdock.
How very sad for his family and friends.
posted by samworm at 1:09 PM on December 30, 2015 [14 favorites]
How very sad for his family and friends.
posted by samworm at 1:09 PM on December 30, 2015 [14 favorites]
I'm very sad about this. Debian is a huge accomplishment: not just technically, but socially. Its longevity and influence is a real testament to Ian and the other early Debian community leaders.
posted by Nelson at 1:12 PM on December 30, 2015 [16 favorites]
posted by Nelson at 1:12 PM on December 30, 2015 [16 favorites]
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posted by Halloween Jack at 1:12 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:12 PM on December 30, 2015
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and also ?!?!?!
this is awful. boo to everything.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 1:12 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
and also ?!?!?!
this is awful. boo to everything.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 1:12 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
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posted by JoeXIII007 at 1:13 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by JoeXIII007 at 1:13 PM on December 30, 2015
That sounds suspicious as hell to me.
The next line in the article: "A spokesperson for Docker said it was a "private matter." Murdock's family has asked people to respect their privacy."
That makes is fairly apparent to me what happened, but I won't go into details about those thoughts; out of respect for the family.
Talking about his life seems more respectful than talking about his death.
posted by el io at 1:13 PM on December 30, 2015 [42 favorites]
The next line in the article: "A spokesperson for Docker said it was a "private matter." Murdock's family has asked people to respect their privacy."
That makes is fairly apparent to me what happened, but I won't go into details about those thoughts; out of respect for the family.
Talking about his life seems more respectful than talking about his death.
posted by el io at 1:13 PM on December 30, 2015 [42 favorites]
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Like idiopath, I consider Debian's package manager the bar that any other package manager worth its salt needs to meet. But its success is not just a matter of the software, it's a testament to the community that makes up the Debian project and which collectively has exercised sound technical judgment over the years. While that community has its problems, it has also worked to address them — and I think Murdock's legacy will last.
posted by metaquarry at 1:19 PM on December 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
Like idiopath, I consider Debian's package manager the bar that any other package manager worth its salt needs to meet. But its success is not just a matter of the software, it's a testament to the community that makes up the Debian project and which collectively has exercised sound technical judgment over the years. While that community has its problems, it has also worked to address them — and I think Murdock's legacy will last.
posted by metaquarry at 1:19 PM on December 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
Damn. Debian and variants have been big part of my education and my career. I owe a hell of a lot to Mr. Murdock.
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posted by octothorpe at 1:21 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by octothorpe at 1:21 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
Debian mourns the passing of Ian Murdock
posted by metaquarry at 1:21 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by metaquarry at 1:21 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
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I'm rarely a Linux user these days but Debian has almost always been my go-to distro and the benchmark I compared others against. Thanks, Ian.
posted by A Robot Ninja at 1:26 PM on December 30, 2015
I'm rarely a Linux user these days but Debian has almost always been my go-to distro and the benchmark I compared others against. Thanks, Ian.
posted by A Robot Ninja at 1:26 PM on December 30, 2015
Also, it should be noted that even for folks who don't think they use Linux, it's almost certain that you visited multiple websites or used multiple online resources today that are hosted on Debian Linux, or one of its variants (Ubuntu is, after all, a flavor of Debian). The technology and culture of his project has had some effect on everyone using the Internet.
posted by idiopath at 1:31 PM on December 30, 2015 [24 favorites]
posted by idiopath at 1:31 PM on December 30, 2015 [24 favorites]
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posted by reprise the theme song and roll the credits at 1:32 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by reprise the theme song and roll the credits at 1:32 PM on December 30, 2015
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posted by ryanshepard at 1:41 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by ryanshepard at 1:41 PM on December 30, 2015
Man. Using DOS/Windows after my Amiga days always felt somewhat of a downgrade to me. When a coworker clued me in to Debian back in 1998 I realized there actually was an elegant OS for a more civilized age. (I'd been using HP-UX at school but found both Slackware and Red Hat lacking for home use.)
How I came to find Linux is a great post by Ian.
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posted by Jansku at 1:42 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
How I came to find Linux is a great post by Ian.
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posted by Jansku at 1:42 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
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I'm just now at a point in my career where I'm learning much more about Debian and Docker than I ever have. This is really heartbreaking.
posted by treepour at 1:56 PM on December 30, 2015
I'm just now at a point in my career where I'm learning much more about Debian and Docker than I ever have. This is really heartbreaking.
posted by treepour at 1:56 PM on December 30, 2015
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posted by entropicamericana at 1:59 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by entropicamericana at 1:59 PM on December 30, 2015
~/.
posted by schmod at 2:04 PM on December 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
posted by schmod at 2:04 PM on December 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
ideopath: Also, it should be noted that even for folks who don't think they use Linux, it's almost certain that you visited multiple websites or used multiple online resources today that are hosted on Debian Linux, or one of its variants
Hell, anyone with an Android phone is a Linux users and they don't even know it.
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posted by dr_dank at 2:06 PM on December 30, 2015 [4 favorites]
Hell, anyone with an Android phone is a Linux users and they don't even know it.
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posted by dr_dank at 2:06 PM on December 30, 2015 [4 favorites]
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posted by Token Meme at 2:07 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by Token Meme at 2:07 PM on December 30, 2015
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thx for the distro, so sorry you suffered!
posted by honey badger at 2:10 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
thx for the distro, so sorry you suffered!
posted by honey badger at 2:10 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by my-username at 2:15 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by my-username at 2:15 PM on December 30, 2015
I started on red hat in about 97, a couple of years later I tried Debian, it was like coming home.
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posted by deadwax at 2:17 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by deadwax at 2:17 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
May he rest in peace. From the look of the tweets, his last hours in our world were troubled.
posted by thebotanyofsouls at 2:18 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by thebotanyofsouls at 2:18 PM on December 30, 2015
I use his software just about every day, via Linux Mint. What a tremendous loss. What a terrible end. I wish something could have been done to ease his pain.
posted by biogeo at 2:24 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by biogeo at 2:24 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
The Debian package manager is an unacknowledged precursor of the App Store. Big .
posted by grubby at 2:25 PM on December 30, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by grubby at 2:25 PM on December 30, 2015 [4 favorites]
Remembering Ian today, I thought back to the first (perhaps only) time he attended DebConf, and how grounded and modest he seemed when I met him. http://ianmurdock.com/debian/awakenings/
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posted by joeyh at 2:28 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by joeyh at 2:28 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by oceanjesse at 2:34 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by oceanjesse at 2:34 PM on December 30, 2015
Debian is what built the desktop linux that we know today. Which is a little bit strange considering that, though Debian aimed to be user friendly, it was thinking about friendliness towards a different kind of user (i.e. one who was comfortable with typing things into the command line) than today's typical Linux user.
Debian was the first Linux distro I ever used or installed (in 1998). It was my home OS (with blackbox and no window manager, represent) for about seven years before I got a new computer and switched to Red Hat.
Everyone thought Red Hat was going to be the distro that finally brought Linux to the consumer desktop. And for a brief window in time, I was on board with it. In the period around 2005, Red Hat really seemed to have leapt ahead of Debian, but it was all an illusion. The stability and bottom-up philosophy of Debian made it so much more attractive as a foundation to build upon than Red Hat ever was.
I'm typing this comment now from my personal computer, the machine where I do all of my work and all of my computer-based leisure. It runs Ubuntu. Single boot, no other OS. It feels the way computing should. And Ubuntu, of course, is built on Debian.
I am so glad that Murdock was around to contribute everything he did to personal computing. Even if you have never used a Linux machine directly, know that the developments of Linux over the last 20 years (in which Debian played an extremely prominent role) have had a huge impact on every OS out there: directly in the case of OSX, iOS, and Android, but at least indirectly in every other case you can name.
I'm really sorry to hear that Murdock had such demons and problems, and I wish the best to his family. May humanity produce more like him.
posted by 256 at 2:41 PM on December 30, 2015 [17 favorites]
Debian was the first Linux distro I ever used or installed (in 1998). It was my home OS (with blackbox and no window manager, represent) for about seven years before I got a new computer and switched to Red Hat.
Everyone thought Red Hat was going to be the distro that finally brought Linux to the consumer desktop. And for a brief window in time, I was on board with it. In the period around 2005, Red Hat really seemed to have leapt ahead of Debian, but it was all an illusion. The stability and bottom-up philosophy of Debian made it so much more attractive as a foundation to build upon than Red Hat ever was.
I'm typing this comment now from my personal computer, the machine where I do all of my work and all of my computer-based leisure. It runs Ubuntu. Single boot, no other OS. It feels the way computing should. And Ubuntu, of course, is built on Debian.
I am so glad that Murdock was around to contribute everything he did to personal computing. Even if you have never used a Linux machine directly, know that the developments of Linux over the last 20 years (in which Debian played an extremely prominent role) have had a huge impact on every OS out there: directly in the case of OSX, iOS, and Android, but at least indirectly in every other case you can name.
I'm really sorry to hear that Murdock had such demons and problems, and I wish the best to his family. May humanity produce more like him.
posted by 256 at 2:41 PM on December 30, 2015 [17 favorites]
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sad Linux user and sad human being about this. Seeing the tweets when they were first noticed and then seeing the news later really made this hit harder.
posted by Gnatcho at 3:07 PM on December 30, 2015
sad Linux user and sad human being about this. Seeing the tweets when they were first noticed and then seeing the news later really made this hit harder.
posted by Gnatcho at 3:07 PM on December 30, 2015
If you use a Raspberry pi, you probably use raspberrian a port of Debian.
posted by Obscure Reference at 3:21 PM on December 30, 2015 [7 favorites]
posted by Obscure Reference at 3:21 PM on December 30, 2015 [7 favorites]
Wasn't a name I was familiar with, but man those tweets are chilling and I hope we find out more about what happened.
posted by desjardins at 3:40 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by desjardins at 3:40 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
What a loss. Debian has been my favorite distro since about '98. Slackware was too much work, and Red Hat seemed too corporate. I even tried to resist Debian at first, as I hate Toy Story, so I disliked their naming convention, but the proof was in the pudding, and it stuck.
In the last decade or so, I've lost too many family & friends to depression & suicide. I didn't think that those struggles and my interest in free software would ever really intersect, but alas, it appears they have now. Fare thee well, Ian Murdock. I didn't know you, but you did good work. Wishing healing thoughts for your loved ones.
Be good to yourselves folks, and your fellow travelers, too. You never know what other people are dealing with.
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posted by talking leaf at 3:50 PM on December 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
In the last decade or so, I've lost too many family & friends to depression & suicide. I didn't think that those struggles and my interest in free software would ever really intersect, but alas, it appears they have now. Fare thee well, Ian Murdock. I didn't know you, but you did good work. Wishing healing thoughts for your loved ones.
Be good to yourselves folks, and your fellow travelers, too. You never know what other people are dealing with.
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posted by talking leaf at 3:50 PM on December 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
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posted by hot_monster at 3:51 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by hot_monster at 3:51 PM on December 30, 2015
My friend noted this year is the curse of the Richenbacher bass players (Chris Squire of Yes... Lemmy of Motorhead...) Anybody know if Ian played a Richenbacher bass?
Debian was the first Linux distro I ever installed on an old IBM DX/66 (IIRC) laptop. August 1997. Debian Bo (1.3). I downloaded the distro and put it on like... 15(?) floppies and used the dd commands from the command line to format the drive and get it all installed. The machine was old by that point, and video drivers were still pretty rough, so my video card wasn't supported and I never got XF86Config to work with my video card, so I was stuck in command mode w/Lynx/Links for web use.
I never really got to explore much in the way of it before I got myself a windows computer. But then I've played with other distros. Mandrake (which I hated because of RPM) and then Ubuntu (which I loved, because the .deb wasn't .rpm and synaptic seemed so much smoother to use)...
Maybe it's just due to the march of technology and RPMs now seem to work fairly well (I play w/OpenSUSE now and it seems to work quite well) , but at that point in the game (early/mid 00's -- debian seemed to have a superior package management system).
I can't believe he was only 42, just a few years older than me. I remember reading about him and Deb and how the name Deb-Ian came to be for the distro, and I had just assumed he was much older.
RIP...
posted by symbioid at 4:10 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
Debian was the first Linux distro I ever installed on an old IBM DX/66 (IIRC) laptop. August 1997. Debian Bo (1.3). I downloaded the distro and put it on like... 15(?) floppies and used the dd commands from the command line to format the drive and get it all installed. The machine was old by that point, and video drivers were still pretty rough, so my video card wasn't supported and I never got XF86Config to work with my video card, so I was stuck in command mode w/Lynx/Links for web use.
I never really got to explore much in the way of it before I got myself a windows computer. But then I've played with other distros. Mandrake (which I hated because of RPM) and then Ubuntu (which I loved, because the .deb wasn't .rpm and synaptic seemed so much smoother to use)...
Maybe it's just due to the march of technology and RPMs now seem to work fairly well (I play w/OpenSUSE now and it seems to work quite well) , but at that point in the game (early/mid 00's -- debian seemed to have a superior package management system).
I can't believe he was only 42, just a few years older than me. I remember reading about him and Deb and how the name Deb-Ian came to be for the distro, and I had just assumed he was much older.
RIP...
posted by symbioid at 4:10 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
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He left things better than he found them.
posted by Wrinkled Stumpskin at 4:48 PM on December 30, 2015 [11 favorites]
He left things better than he found them.
posted by Wrinkled Stumpskin at 4:48 PM on December 30, 2015 [11 favorites]
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Debian made me everything I am today.
posted by destrius at 5:33 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
Debian made me everything I am today.
posted by destrius at 5:33 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
Another grim moment in 2015. The rollover of dates can't come soon enough.
posted by humanfont at 5:33 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by humanfont at 5:33 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
% rm -rf /~imurdock/
(Actually, I feel kind of dirty posting this from Windows. I guess at least I'm using Opera.)
posted by loquacious at 5:45 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
(Actually, I feel kind of dirty posting this from Windows. I guess at least I'm using Opera.)
posted by loquacious at 5:45 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
Fuck mental illness :(
posted by Hazelsmrf at 6:00 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Hazelsmrf at 6:00 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by Old Kentucky Shark at 6:00 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by Old Kentucky Shark at 6:00 PM on December 30, 2015
This is tragic, and terrible news on so many levels.
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 6:16 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 6:16 PM on December 30, 2015
Ah shit. My sympathy for his family and loved ones.
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posted by benito.strauss at 6:25 PM on December 30, 2015
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posted by benito.strauss at 6:25 PM on December 30, 2015
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posted by one weird trick at 6:25 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by one weird trick at 6:25 PM on December 30, 2015
Debian also went some way to making me who I am today.
posted by grubby at 6:40 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by grubby at 6:40 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
Debian is everywhere in many forms, and it was the first distro that just worked for me. Seconding the upstream comments about integrity and technical sophistication.
Thanks, Ian
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posted by Fibognocchi at 7:22 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
Thanks, Ian
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posted by Fibognocchi at 7:22 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 7:23 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 7:23 PM on December 30, 2015
RIP, and comfort and solace to his family.
Details are very sketchy but reading his twitstream on Pastebin would lead me to believe he was seriously mistreated by SFPD. Hope that part of his final day gets seriously studied and exposed to the light.
posted by lometogo at 7:50 PM on December 30, 2015 [3 favorites]
Details are very sketchy but reading his twitstream on Pastebin would lead me to believe he was seriously mistreated by SFPD. Hope that part of his final day gets seriously studied and exposed to the light.
posted by lometogo at 7:50 PM on December 30, 2015 [3 favorites]
There is some ugly racist stuff in those last tweets of his.
posted by Karaage at 7:51 PM on December 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
posted by Karaage at 7:51 PM on December 30, 2015 [5 favorites]
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It's truly hard to express the degree to which his work, most importantly the healthy community, has made my computing life better, safer and freer.
posted by adamsc at 7:51 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
It's truly hard to express the degree to which his work, most importantly the healthy community, has made my computing life better, safer and freer.
posted by adamsc at 7:51 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
Despite not knowing a whole lot about him personally compared to, say, Steve Jobs or Bill Gates, Ian Murdock has probably contributed more to my personal success as a software developer and IT engineer over the course of my career than the other two individuals I just mentioned.
RIP, Ian. I'm sorry we couldn't have seen you stick around longer.
posted by surazal at 8:31 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
RIP, Ian. I'm sorry we couldn't have seen you stick around longer.
posted by surazal at 8:31 PM on December 30, 2015 [2 favorites]
There is some ugly racist stuff in those last tweets of his.
There's some indications that his twitter account was hacked and then deleted.
posted by fatbird at 9:45 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
There's some indications that his twitter account was hacked and then deleted.
posted by fatbird at 9:45 PM on December 30, 2015 [1 favorite]
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(posted from Debian GNU/Linux 8... thank you Ian)
posted by XMLicious at 10:55 PM on December 30, 2015
(posted from Debian GNU/Linux 8... thank you Ian)
posted by XMLicious at 10:55 PM on December 30, 2015
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posted by Mister Bijou at 11:08 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by Mister Bijou at 11:08 PM on December 30, 2015
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posted by cyrusdogstar at 11:28 PM on December 30, 2015
posted by cyrusdogstar at 11:28 PM on December 30, 2015
Yeah, this is pretty fscked. It sounds like there was some kind of nasty run in with the police, and I think comments saying that mental illness is a bitch give the police far too easy an out.
posted by kaibutsu at 11:41 PM on December 30, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by kaibutsu at 11:41 PM on December 30, 2015 [4 favorites]
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posted by trip and a half at 12:20 AM on December 31, 2015
posted by trip and a half at 12:20 AM on December 31, 2015
The police appear to have made an error in attributing his behavior to being a mean drunk, rather than someone in the middle of a mental health crisis.
posted by humanfont at 12:21 AM on December 31, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by humanfont at 12:21 AM on December 31, 2015 [1 favorite]
There is some ugly racist stuff in those last tweets of his.
In the 5:27 pm tweet, it sounds more like he's identifying racism on the part of the police. It rather sounds like he intended his suicide to be a political act, expressing solidarity with those who've been oppressed by them.
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posted by cotton dress sock at 1:56 AM on December 31, 2015 [11 favorites]
In the 5:27 pm tweet, it sounds more like he's identifying racism on the part of the police. It rather sounds like he intended his suicide to be a political act, expressing solidarity with those who've been oppressed by them.
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posted by cotton dress sock at 1:56 AM on December 31, 2015 [11 favorites]
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posted by Lesser Spotted Potoroo at 4:00 AM on December 31, 2015
posted by Lesser Spotted Potoroo at 4:00 AM on December 31, 2015
I never intentionally (or knowingly) installed Debian until about a week ago, when setting up a small form factor PC as a home Minecraft server for my son. I would have gone Slackware (as with my first command-line-only Linux box back about 10 years ago) but it seemed to have died on the vine, so I went with Debian instead.
Looking back, and reading here, man... My Rasberry Pi? Debian. Those Knoppix distros I played with here and there, just for the fun of a live boot system (and use as a rescue disk)? Debian. All the systems I put Ubuntu on for work or just to screw around? Debian. I used it more than I realized.
Guy is just about a year older than me. I didn't do anything as an undergrad that impacted the world like he did. Shitty news for the community. I wish him peace.
posted by caution live frogs at 6:43 AM on December 31, 2015 [2 favorites]
Looking back, and reading here, man... My Rasberry Pi? Debian. Those Knoppix distros I played with here and there, just for the fun of a live boot system (and use as a rescue disk)? Debian. All the systems I put Ubuntu on for work or just to screw around? Debian. I used it more than I realized.
Guy is just about a year older than me. I didn't do anything as an undergrad that impacted the world like he did. Shitty news for the community. I wish him peace.
posted by caution live frogs at 6:43 AM on December 31, 2015 [2 favorites]
Been using Mint since '07, and it did more for me than just provide more freedom and security in an OS. It taught me that you could build a genuinely altruistic community who wanted to develop something great for everyone's benefit - for no other reason than to make the world a bit more democratic, free and innovative. What an incredible gift to the world he gave us. May his legacy continue to inspire.
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posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 6:55 AM on December 31, 2015 [2 favorites]
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posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 6:55 AM on December 31, 2015 [2 favorites]
One of Debian's biggest contribution to the world is apt-get, so to its departed founder:
$ apt-get moo
(__)
(oo)
/------\/
/ | ||
* /\---/\
~~ ~~
..."Have you mooed today?"...
posted by fragmede at 8:41 AM on December 31, 2015 [7 favorites] .
posted by postcommunism at 9:56 AM on December 31, 2015
posted by postcommunism at 9:56 AM on December 31, 2015
It takes a smart, smart man to understand that building sustainable growth into a software packaging project is primarily a social problem and only secondarily a technical one.
Debian will outlive its creators and any of its current contributors, probably by centuries, because its social structure is the best thought through of any large software project.
RIP, Ian, and thank you.
posted by flabdablet at 10:18 AM on December 31, 2015 [4 favorites]
Debian will outlive its creators and any of its current contributors, probably by centuries, because its social structure is the best thought through of any large software project.
RIP, Ian, and thank you.
posted by flabdablet at 10:18 AM on December 31, 2015 [4 favorites]
I saw the tweets the other day. Like a lot of people, I concluded that they were probably the result of a cracked account and moved on.
I never met Ian Murdock. I don't know what his struggles were, and I won't speculate here. This is just sad as hell.
I got into Free Software and Linux in the late 90s, as a highschool kid in rural Nebraska when a dial-up connection and an IRC client still felt like lifelines to some wider, better world. Ordered a little stack of those ~$2 distro CDs from some site. Tried Red Hat first, and couldn't get anything to work. Tried Debian next and things started to click.
Like others in this thread, that was a defining and crystallizing kind of moment for me. Almost nothing about my life now, my career, my work, my relationships, or my politics would be shaped the same without Debian. It's helped me build just about anything of significance I've ever built, and paid my rent in half a dozen ways. It still does, come to that. Does it have its problems? Yeah. Some deep and serious ones, both on the social and technical fronts. But all I can think about right now is what an astonishingly powerful effort it has been over the years, what a locus of brutally hard work and meaningful day-by-day collaboration in the service of an ideal that stubbornly refuses the sea of corruption around it.
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posted by brennen at 10:23 AM on December 31, 2015 [2 favorites]
I never met Ian Murdock. I don't know what his struggles were, and I won't speculate here. This is just sad as hell.
I got into Free Software and Linux in the late 90s, as a highschool kid in rural Nebraska when a dial-up connection and an IRC client still felt like lifelines to some wider, better world. Ordered a little stack of those ~$2 distro CDs from some site. Tried Red Hat first, and couldn't get anything to work. Tried Debian next and things started to click.
Like others in this thread, that was a defining and crystallizing kind of moment for me. Almost nothing about my life now, my career, my work, my relationships, or my politics would be shaped the same without Debian. It's helped me build just about anything of significance I've ever built, and paid my rent in half a dozen ways. It still does, come to that. Does it have its problems? Yeah. Some deep and serious ones, both on the social and technical fronts. But all I can think about right now is what an astonishingly powerful effort it has been over the years, what a locus of brutally hard work and meaningful day-by-day collaboration in the service of an ideal that stubbornly refuses the sea of corruption around it.
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posted by brennen at 10:23 AM on December 31, 2015 [2 favorites]
There is some ugly racist stuff in those last tweets of his.
In the 5:27 pm tweet, it sounds more like he's identifying racism on the part of the police. It rather sounds like he intended his suicide to be a political act, expressing solidarity with those who've been oppressed by them.
Yeah if you're reading the ones that got linked here earlier, despite his choice of words I'm pretty sure what he was trying to say is "now that this is happening to a white person maybe the world will care."
posted by atoxyl at 11:26 AM on December 31, 2015 [3 favorites]
In the 5:27 pm tweet, it sounds more like he's identifying racism on the part of the police. It rather sounds like he intended his suicide to be a political act, expressing solidarity with those who've been oppressed by them.
Yeah if you're reading the ones that got linked here earlier, despite his choice of words I'm pretty sure what he was trying to say is "now that this is happening to a white person maybe the world will care."
posted by atoxyl at 11:26 AM on December 31, 2015 [3 favorites]
.
My first Thinkpad had RedHat on it, but after that it was Debian on every machine I set up as a grad student. These days I'm on a Mac most of the time, and our servers are running CentOS, but like many here, the Debian package manager is what I compare others to.
(Also, those tweets ... ??? That's really distressing but I'd like to know more before rushing to judgement.)
posted by RedOrGreen at 12:01 PM on January 1, 2016
My first Thinkpad had RedHat on it, but after that it was Debian on every machine I set up as a grad student. These days I'm on a Mac most of the time, and our servers are running CentOS, but like many here, the Debian package manager is what I compare others to.
(Also, those tweets ... ??? That's really distressing but I'd like to know more before rushing to judgement.)
posted by RedOrGreen at 12:01 PM on January 1, 2016
Prominent Programmer Dies In Apparent Suicide After Violent Encounter With San Francisco Police. SF police confirm arresting him the day before he died. Still many questions.
posted by Nelson at 12:30 PM on January 1, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Nelson at 12:30 PM on January 1, 2016 [1 favorite]
So few details, like whose door was he banging on why?
posted by w0mbat at 5:47 PM on January 1, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by w0mbat at 5:47 PM on January 1, 2016 [1 favorite]
"Gatpandan said she urges anyone seeking help with a suicidal individual to quickly call police to get them to the help they need."
Fuck the police. I can't believe how bad this keeps getting. True peace to all of the white, black, yellow, and brown...no humans, who know how cold the world really is and try to deal, or don't.
Find your peace, choose, and wish for a caring god.
posted by brainimplant at 9:36 PM on January 1, 2016
Fuck the police. I can't believe how bad this keeps getting. True peace to all of the white, black, yellow, and brown...no humans, who know how cold the world really is and try to deal, or don't.
Find your peace, choose, and wish for a caring god.
posted by brainimplant at 9:36 PM on January 1, 2016
Hi odinsdream, the Metafilter Wiki has collected a large list of resources for mental health support and suicide hotlines. There are also some great Ask MeFi threads highlighted in the Wiki. I'm grateful for the members of the community who help maintain the Wiki and answer the Ask MeFi questions.
posted by cynical pinnacle at 10:19 AM on January 2, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by cynical pinnacle at 10:19 AM on January 2, 2016 [2 favorites]
As a general rule though, if you are in trouble and are not sure who to call DO NOT call the police.
posted by 256 at 2:37 PM on January 3, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by 256 at 2:37 PM on January 3, 2016 [3 favorites]
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posted by Walleye at 1:01 PM on December 30, 2015