RevolutionOS: The Linux Movie? 90
xmutex writes "Wired has a story about a documentary concerning the history of Linux and the open-source movement." I've heard bits and pieces from people at LWCE about the movie, but won't know for myself until I get a chance to see it. I guess its airing tonight in NY, and if you're at the show, you can get tickets from the OSDN booth.
References (Score:1)
Has anyone realised? (Score:1)
I can just see myself on the edge of my seat as the first stable kernel is released. Woo hoo!
Cathedral and Bazaar (Score:3)
Moore thinks the open source development model is here to stay, but is not convinced it will become completely dominant. He believes that it will probably co-exist with the closed source model.
This is what I also believe. No matter how much we call it a revolution, these are two sides of the same coin and one cannot exist without the other. And lets not forget that some of the Open source software concepts were derived from closed source products. And another thing that is mentioned is that the main rival to Open Source is not Microsoft. The main rival is not even a corporate entity. I would say the main rival to Open source is the public not being educated enough to accept it. And user experience.
Atleast this would be far far better than the stupid geeks in Antitrust. Gosh, I swear if someone hadnt knocked off that "Open Source fanatic" geek, I would have done it myself
My two cents.
RevolutionOS_DVDrip.avi [===> ] 90% ETA:00:30 (Score:2)
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Nooooooooo! (Score:1)
But mostly it is a random listing of buzzwords with some graphics of altering quality.
It would be a nice poll to pick up the stupidest dialouge involving computers in a movie or TV show.
A rich source of such things is "Golden Eye", which isn't a really bad movie apart from this.
Re:Piracy? (Score:1)
Napster (I understand it's not Open Source, but it tends to get lumped in), Samba, reverse-engineering other products to make Linux interoperate - these all have been presented by the media as "pirate" activities.
So I think he's saying "guilt by association," which is another hurdle Open Source advocates to overcome on their way to common acceptance.
I'd see it if... (Score:1)
Re:What does Heston have to do with this? (Score:1)
Movie Screenings (Score:1)
Re:?!? (Score:2)
Re:Oh lord, here we go again... (Score:1)
Yeah, but it will probably do better than the "Jesus the Miniseries" on television a few months ago. Would that make Linus bigger than Jesus?
hmm... (Score:1)
Re:Uh, no . . . (Score:2)
so according to him... (Score:1)
Um, I think I'll hand the Natalie Portman jokes to the trolls.
Just because this is shot in 35mm, that doesn't mean it looks good (or even OK), especially if he did everything himself without maxing out his Visa.
Saw the movie tonite in NYC -spoilers- (Score:1)
There were some folks with us who are not from the computer world and they enjoyed as well. They felt it gave them a good insight into what Open Source and Linux is about.
There is quite a bit of focus on VA Linux but that doesn't distract too much...
It definatly has a "PBS" feel to it.(ie it would do well as a show on public broadcasting or Arts and Entertainment network. It definately won't be a Major Motion Picture for the Masses...
The movie will also be great when its out on DVD or Videotape so we can give it to our family and non-Linux oriented friends to convey some of the more philosophical reasons why we are crazy for Linux and Open Source.
Unfortunately they haven't gotten any distribution deals yet, so it might be a while before we see the film (and it is shot on film) on TV, theaters or on Videotape/DVD
Re:I am not sure.... (Score:1)
latex? (Score:1)
Which is meant for advanced users after learning how to strip, touch, finger, fsck, ...
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Re:Oh lord, here we go again... (Score:1)
OMG, that is so true that it's depressing. Oh well... I have that kernel source to keep me happy!
A movie about Linux (Score:1)
Re:Oh lord, here we go again... (Score:1)
The next step is open source films (Score:1)
If screenplays can be considered source code for movies, then the OS movie is definitely this: any writer who wants to contribute scenes to a screenplay can. Once the draft is satisfactory (ie ready for release), a film could be made and distributed.
I mean, why couldn't this set up work?
As to GPL'ing films, now that's very interesting...
Re:chickens and eggs (Score:1)
Being sold in a box is not the sole means of making software commercial. Granted, that level of commoditization of the market that was seen with the advent of the personal computer some 25 years has spurred unprecedented growth in commercial software. And in the early days of PCs, huge amounts of software was taken from source published in magazines, etc. or traded at usergroups.
But, in the 54 years since ENIAC, personal computers have been around for slightly less than half of that. The way it worked was this: you bought an IBM or UNIVAC and they would program it for you (say to do insurance calculations). They effectively sold the software as part of the hardware. Would Travelers give AETna (actually, its predecessor company) their source? Not likely.
Yes, the early days of the PC were very free-software-ish, but to consider the history of computing to have started with the PC is to ignore over half the history of "modern" computing.
Re:Oh lord, here we go again... (Score:1)
Re:See it here: (Score:1)
Port Authority; N, R, S, 1, 1, 3, 7, 9 to 42nd Str
Is it just me or does this look like a walkthrough for Zork 3 ?
First Documentary to Be Edited Open-Source (Score:1)
Binaries are for wussies- or so I've read.
You will be able to make changes to the program and distribute it so long as you include the source material and EDL.
If anyone has seen Dennis Hopper's The Last Movie, rumor has it that it was cut in a similar manner.
www.ridiculopathy.com [ridiculopathy.com]
Other movies... (Score:3)
You could make this initially boring premise look pretty cool with a Matrix-style gang of subversive programmers cracking content, and people being killed through lack of critical information the moment they need it. You could throw in some "clues" about what the movie was alluding to - names of black-hats would be Valenti, Kaplan, et al. The programmers group could be called DeCSS or something similar.
I wonder how far a kick-ass movie script with the above would get in Hollywood before someone realises what it's about and quietly kills the project?
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Keep attacking good things as "communist"
If it's good, will the MPAA... (Score:4)
Re:Piracy? (Score:1)
If Linus could only work on the kernel for a few hours after work, we wouldn't see 2.4 until at least 2002. Even keeping up with the LKML e-mail takes 2 hours per day.
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*Condense fact from the vapor of nuance*
25: ten.knilrevlis@wkcuhc
Re:Bill Gates (Score:5)
[Fade in on Gates and Jobs sitting in a car on a city street]
Jobs: I heard you were in Europe recently?
Gates: Yeah. It's like America, but there's a lot of little differences though.
Jobs: Like what?
Gates: For example, you know what they call a mouse in France?
Jobs: You mean they don't call it a mouse?
Gates: Naw, the language difference. They call it 'le souris.'
Jobs: That's pretty fscked up. Now let's kill some people.
[Cue music]
Re:Piracy? (Score:3)
Piracy might be an issue because it's only a short line of thought from "Software ought to be free" to "Software ought to be free, and if it isn't, I'm taking it anyway, cuz 1 4m 1337 cr4X0r!", although the meaning of "free" is quite different from each other in those contexts. So if some pirate groups start distributing warez in the name of " freeing the software" it could shed a bad light on the whole OS/FS movement. Anyone with a bit of common sense would be able to tell the difference, but since when has common sense been a criterium to become a PHB? :-) Most people don't even know the differences between hackers, crackers, warez d00dz and script k1dd13z...
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Re:Thirst? Presit! SPQR (Score:1)
Well that was quite possibly the most useful and worthwhile comment on this page... entertained me for a while anyway...
Regards,
Denny
# Using Linux in the UK? Check out Linux UK [linuxuk.co.uk]
Anti-trust: character conflict important (Score:2)
The better techie movies have character conflicts
at their core. Pirates of Silicon Valley is one
about the rivalry of the PC founders. Anti-trust
was another with a conflict between an evil
closed-source mogul and a open-source newbie.
Re:Uh, no . . . (Score:1)
Hell, if Gates is so philantropic these days, maybe he could be persuaded to foot the bill to get Moses to do the voiceover.
chickens and eggs (Score:2)
Actually, you're wrong. Before Microsoft, before Sun, before UNIX, there WAS no commercial software. There was no "Open Source". ALL software was free (speech and beer) because they didn't even have a concept of it being different. Not to say that in today's world, commercial software hasn't made a place for itself but dont believe for a second that it came first.
Piracy, not Microsoft? (Score:2)
Re:somehow I doubt the studios will pick this one (Score:1)
-B
benjones@superutility.net
Re:I am not sure.... (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Re:See it here: (Score:2)
AMC is a commercial chain - Here is the information you asked for. (and more)
As seen at amctheaters.com [amctheaters.com]
(To Recap) If you are in NYC, then:
Revolution O.S. will be sneak-previewed Thursday night at Manhattan's AMC Empire 25 Theater, at 8:30.
Those attending LinuxWorld this week can pick up tickets at the OSDN booth (#3000) in the dot-org pavilion.
So where is it exactly?
AMC Empire 25
234 West 42nd Street
New York, NY 10036
(212)398-3939
Subway: A, C, E to 42nd St -
Port Authority; N, R, S, 1, 1, 3, 7, 9 to 42nd Str
I guess the subway directions make perfect sense if you live in NYC
The first public screening of the film will be at the SXSW [sxsw.com] Film Festival [sxsw.com] in Austin, Texas, on March 12. Moore said people who would like to see the film should feel free to call "and pester" film distributors such as Miramax [mailto], Lions Gate [lionsgatefilms.com] in Los Angeles, and Cowboy Booking International [cowboybi.com] in New York. "If enough people say they want to see the film, maybe they will distribute it," Moore said.
What Heston has to do with it (Score:2)
As long as it doesn't star... (Score:1)
"I can only show you Linux... you're the one who has to read the man pages."
Re:Piracy? (Score:1)
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*Condense fact from the vapor of nuance*
25: ten.knilrevlis@wkcuhc
Documentary? I think not! (Score:1)
This flick was one-sided and made the Open Source case against M$ through not-so-clever tricks like having a woman read Bill Gate's letter to the Homebrew Computer Club in a frenzied almost manaical voice.
Basically, it was a vehicle for Linus, Larry, Eric, Bruce and Richard to get their faces on the big screen. I don't think it was worth the film it was printed on. I'll bet Larry Augustin financed a good portion of the movie.
Moore was asked during Q&A after the preview if he would be releasing the film to the public, open source style. His reply was that he put alot of time into the movie by doing the work of much of the traditional movie crew and didn't think that others should profit from his hard work (not a quote). Obviuosly he doesn't get the open source software movement. At least not the spirit of it.
I think he should release it as an "open source" movie and people could shoot new footage and add to his work and re-release it!
The most imporant thing (Score:1)
I am not sure.... (Score:2)
What does Heston have to do with this? (Score:1)
Says the article at WiredNews. I'm scared.
And not just of Charlton Heston.
John
Brant
No Linux running there (Score:4)
I hope MovieOS will soon be opensource, so we can enjoy it too.
What about the actors? (Score:2)
Looking forward to it (Score:1)
Oh lord, here we go again... (Score:4)
Apparently this is more a documentary, albeit narrated by old Six-shooter Chuck Heston himself, but my thought holds true. Regardless of how important you feel the history of the FS and OS movements are, a documentary about them belongs on latenight PBS or Discovery.
"Get your filthy paws off me, you damn, dirty MFC Coder!"
I think this is going to be received about as well as *any* documentary that goes to the bigscreen. IE: It will be shown only in art houses and campus theaters in very large cities. It will expose a *few* people to the ethos behind FS and OS, but not nearly as much as the Linux/FS community would hope.
If it does achieve any kind of success, it will be in the same vein as 'Trekkies'. People will see it as just another movie about geeks.
See it here: (Score:3)
Revolution O.S. will be sneak-previewed Thursday night at Manhattan's AMC Empire 25 Theater, at 8:30. Those attending LinuxWorld this week can pick up tickets at the OSDN booth (#3000) in the dot-org pavilion.
I imagine it will be quite a party!
Take that Jon Katz! (Score:1)
Not only these three fine movies, but Anthony and Cleopatra, The Ten Commandments, Local Hero...oh, wait, wrong old guy.
Also, PRESIDENT of the NRA!!!!
Eat your heart out Jon!
Will it be open source? (Score:1)
Re:What does Heston have to do with this? (Score:1)
Charlton Heston didn't have the "foresight" to star in anything - he was paid. This guy is a moron. Charlton Heston isn't a national treasure, but Richard Stallman arguably is. Charlton Heston is a fucking actor. This guy is an absolute jackass. Besides which i hate republicans.
thank You
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Piracy? (Score:3)
Re:Oh lord, here we go again... (Score:2)
So long and farewell Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock,
I look at the kernel source when I stroke my cock.
We no longer want to ask Scotty to teleport,
We prefer to use perl to make web reports.
I have no concerns of a phaser blast,
I always have TUX TP to wipe my ass.
I lost my wall-sized poster of the Enterprise,
It was replaced with full screen mode xeyes.
Although open source is now the way to be,
For some reason the girls still don't like me.
Re:Bill Gates (Score:2)
Re:What about the actors? (Score:5)
Yeah, Tom Hanks plays Linus, who got stranded on a desert island with his 386 and a solar-power generator, but no commercial operating system for his computer. So he has to write his own, from scratch. All while a volleyball named RMS keeps him company.
Re:I am not sure.... (Score:1)
He has a great image!
He looks like santa claus.
Children would switch to linux if santa said so.
Btw, this is John "Maddog" Hall [dibona.com]. Picture references are great!
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Re:Piracy? (Score:1)
Not Heston! (Score:1)
Thank God. That's just what we don't need, a gun totin' NRA spoutin' activist trying to explain to the world how OSS works ...
Sorry Eric.
Arnold S. (Score:1)
"Hasta, la vista, NT!"
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Re:I am not sure.... (Score:1)
Re:Other movies... (Score:2)
That's interesting. I was thinking the other day about making a movie set in a future where there were no intellectual property rights.
There is a gang of criminals who sell binaries to people that need things done NOW. The legal alternative is to wait for your request to be handled by a government-run Sourceforge style collective, which costs nothing but takes forever. In one scene, a man is programming and there is a knock on the door: "Open up! We're here to set you free". Police burst in and take his computer while singing The Free Software Song [gnu.org]. He spends a year in jail. When he gets out, his daughter asks him to tell her about when "free" used to mean you could do what you want. It would be just like in Fahrenheit 451 where the role of the fireman had changed.
Re:Oh lord, here we go again... (Score:1)
Re:No Linux running there (Score:2)
Re:Other movies... (Score:1)
Not exactly what your looking for, but the movie Freedom Downtime [freedomdowntime.com] might be worth a look. It was created by the 2600 Magazine people, the same folks that were sued for hosting and linking to the DeCSS code as part of a news story they ran on their website [2600.com].
It doesn't deal with the DeCSS case specifically, but covers the good old topics such as mighty state and corporate entities that repress of information, and harshly penalizes harmless people who figure stuff out.
Re:Other movies... (Score:1)
For a start, you could look at RMS's essay, "The Right to Read". It's set in virtually the same type of world. (If you haven't read it yet, read it. It's a very good essay.)
Granted, you would need to spice it up a bit...
> You could throw in some "clues" about what the movie was alluding to...
Honestly, that seems a little bit lame. It might be better to set it up as a slower movie, without as much action...
The 'Tycho uprising' in "The Right to Read" might provide a suitable background.
> I wonder how far a kick-ass movie script with the above would get in Hollywood before someone realises what it's about and quietly kills the project?
Probably not very far... but it can't hurt to try...
Filling me with confidence (Score:1)
Oh yes, that's very promising.
I loved the RMS-Torvald showdown (Score:2)
When RMS had Linux in a headlock, I thought it was all over, until Tove gave him a flying dropkick upside his hippy head.
somehow I doubt the studios will pick this one up (Score:2)
Right, after the MPAA just got done clobbering the Open-source community for DeCSS and LiVid [wwwlinuxvideoorg], they're going to distribute a movie about us©©©
Re:Movie, hmm (Score:1)
I think the movie is going to be pretty cool. People will have to realise that at least it won't be full of crap like Anti-trust. It *is* a documentary, not some hyped-up piece of crap. I don't expect it to be exciting or action-packed, I expect it to be factual and interesting.
See it in Austin TX in March (Score:1)
Uh, no . . . (Score:4)
If this makes Charlton Heston the publicly known voice for the open source community, I am going to shoot myself.
Re:I am not sure.... (Score:1)
Richard Stallman - In a word....scary. No really, I mean scary. Sure the guy can hack out some great code, Ilove emacs and all, but this guy is not who you want leading the revolution. He looks like Charles Manson for Gods sake, a big fat opinionated, smelly, unable to compromise Charles Manson.
Linus Torvalds - Okay, we have a winner here, he's bright, charming and witty, and also very personable. No problems here. Maybe a little too geeky though, maybe he should try wearing some more fasoinable clothes, get some Nautica and Perry Ellis stuff on him... that would spruce him up a bit.
Eric Raymond - Uh oh... Okay, he's smart and personable, but... for Gods sake man, fix those theeth. Loose some weight, and can the gun nut crap. Tell me that gun nuts don't strike fear into the hearts of most sane middle americans. This guy is a little too enit-establishment... and what's up with that off center eyeball.
Bruce Perens - Okay, even though I can never get electric fence to work right, I suspect it's user error... heck, I guess I don't know anyting about Bruce so he must be okay.
Next time guys, put me in your stupid film and I'll turn this revolution thing around for you.
Yours,
Bob
Re:Uh, no . . . (Score:1)
So who is... (Score:1)
The OSS porno (Score:2)
An amateur porno film with an OSS theme now that would have rocked.
Re:Oh lord, here we go again... (Score:2)
Nope. He wanted Heston, but he didn't get him. Yeah, if you skim-read the article you could go away thinking they got Shoot-First-Chuck.
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Linux is obsolete :) (Score:1)
Re:Bill Gates (Score:1)
Re:The most imporant thing (Score:1)
Re:References (Score:1)
is that a "Citizen Kane" reference? (rosebud, rosebud)
The obvious choice: Christopher Walken (Score:2)
Re:Piracy? (Score:1)
If Linus could only work on the kernel for a few hours after work, we wouldn't see 2.4 until at least 2002.
That's precisely what he does. He isn't hacking the linux kernel at Transmeta, he's writing i86 emulators for their chips.
Re:Will it be open source? (Score:1)
?!? (Score:1)
Perhaps Moore does know what he's doing and just doesn't interview well, but my impression says that this "documentary" is going to come off like "Trekkies", and while it may be amusing it doesn't exactly put the people depicted in a great light...
Movie, hmm (Score:1)
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unfortunately, no (Score:1)
No wonder Linux geeks never get any action.
Re:What about the actors? (Score:1)