August 1999 and it was the first LinuxWorld conference at the McEnery
Convention Center in San Jose California. Linus Torvalds had just
finished one of his infamous Q&A keynote speeches. The room was packed
to capacity with about 6000 people. Both Charlie Greco the president of
IDG and Linus Torvalds were on stage and about to announce the winner of
the $25,000 IDG/Linus Torvalds Community Award when all of a sudden
something terrifying happened. A poorly dressed, bearded, wild eyed
madman runs onto the stage screaming and waving a gun. This crazed
lunatic then approaches the podium, points his gun at Charlie Greco,
says this is a "stick up" and demands some money. The audience was in
shock and about to panic. Linus then calms everybody down and introduces
the founder of the Free Software Foundation (FSF), Richard Stallman.
It was all a joke but unfortunately nobody was laughing. Well, Mr. Greco
looked mortified and Richard Stallman was never again invited to speak
at a LinuxWorld conference.
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