Episode: 728
Title: HPR0728: Sex, Race and Open Source
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr0728/hpr0728.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-08 01:36:17

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Music
There you go.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It sounds like the real deal this time out.
We are actually recording.
Actually, actually.
This is a dual podcast.
This is digital science.
And I'm here with sons of men.
You want to tell the crowd a little bit about yourself.
Well, probably I should start off by saying, you know, I should actually go by sons of men one.
Only because I want to pay homage respect to the group of the team called sons of men, which is actually a hip-hop group.
I have Brooklyn, my beloved Brooklyn, where I'm from.
So I took up that Monica.
They wanted a womb-tang family.
So I took up that Monica because I respect that music and the culture.
So anyway, sons of men one basically aren't in a long time.
First of all, a long time.
I'm a VR listener.
First time, I consider.
And I want to thank the opportunity for me getting and participating with Judaism science.
And all the other HPR people that came before me.
I have been at the user free software and open source for about 15 years.
I guess by discipline, I'm a mechanic here.
So I would profess myself to be a geek as well.
So that's what I'm about what I like to do.
Excellent. Excellent.
And I must admit that I'm a routine fan fan myself.
You know, I wanted to call this the title of this podcast.
Race, sex, and open source.
What do you think about that, sons of men one?
What I'm trying to get at it, but I'm trying to, I want to get down to the role of minorities and women in computing in general and open source in particular.
What do you think about that?
I don't think that's actually a topic, man, because quite frankly, there has not been much discussion in the way of, I guess, equality and equal access.
I mean, yeah, the access is quite apparent, but in terms of, I guess, equal time, share time spent on topic on subject, not very much of that has taken place not to my knowledge.
Right, right. And you see, the others introduced myself a little bit.
I'm this most science, and in case you didn't know, both myself and sons of men one are both African-Americans, which I'm not sure how many African-Americans are actually listening to HPR, but I hope there's more than just us.
I'm from the Washington DC area, and I'm not going to talk too much more about myself.
I first wanted to describe to you, sons of men one, to the audience, we don't actually really know each other.
We've corresponding to the little bit online, and we just have a lot in common.
It's just kind of unusual. We both went to the school in the same city in Tallahassee, Florida, and we're both open source advocates, we're both African-Americans, so we think we got to do this show.
First of all, I just wanted to give a shout out to Sticks on Tech. I thought that was a really excellent show.
Did you catch that one, sons of men one?
Yeah, I did, actually, I caught that one, and I had some reservations there first. I'll be honest with you.
I was like, okay, what kind of shit is this?
Right, you got to be really careful there, when you look at some of the show, but when you listen to some of the shows, it's like slam the coming front.
No, I mean, basically, as I listened to it, I began to appreciate it more, and found out that they weren't trying to be pejorative in that nature.
You have to really listen to understand what people are coming from.
They really had me thinking, because looking out of the Hispanic community, I'm not sure if you've realized,
but if you look in open source, the Hispanic community has been contributing big time.
Oh, particularly in Latin America, you look down and you're seeing all of these software developers committing code from Brazil, from part to Brazil.
Yeah, especially Brazil.
Yeah, well Brazil has been a seriously heavy hitter, but I've just been noticing this massive participation from the Hispanic community.
And I find it very interesting that, I don't know if you'd agree with this, but in the United States, I don't know that the participation has been as strong, and it's been overseas.
What do you think about that?
Well, I would agree because I'll sign up if you're looking at today's context.
You know, I'll find it a larger, I guess, the larger community, the factors who either are affiliated with a larger corporation.
When you say contributions, I'm supposing or assuming you're talking about the kernel, you're talking about...
Well, I'm speaking about the kernel, I'm speaking about various projects like Symaptic.
I'm not sure if you realize what Symaptic actually came out of Brazil.
Oh, really?
Yes, Symaptic came out of Curriciba, Brazil.
And if you examine down, if you look into the Debian project, I mean the DPKG, the author of DPKG, he's also a Hispanic guy.
So, speaking of the whole gamut for contributing whole projects or just patches and sores.
Well, the gentleman that created the GNOME, at least, was founded. The GNOME project is Latino.
Yes, he certainly is.
Miguel de Caza.
It's interesting because I think he's born and he's from Mexico City, I think, originally.
And you know, that's yet another shout out.
This is where I want to dovetail, right?
I want to dovetail into the concept of privilege and underprivilege.
You know, I think what I have to say is that for underprivileged people in whatever country you live in,
I think you're going to find a similar situation is that computer literacy in general is going to be lacking.
And I think this is really unfortunate for a lot of reasons.
First of all, computer and hacking and computer careers.
It's one of the few careers that nobody cares what you look like.
The computer doesn't care what you look like.
It's not the same if you're a stockbroker or if you're a lawyer.
You know, your parents can, you know, hinder or help you depending.
A lot of it depends on, you know, how you're perceived.
One of the things I always loved about computing is that, you know,
it's race, sex, you know, how tall you are, how fat or skinny you are, the computer doesn't care.
And so you can be very successful while being very unconventional at the same time.
What do you think about that, son of a man, one?
Well, I would agree because, you know, in general, the average geek, you know,
is most comfortable with, you know, it's understood that they're most comfortable with a machine.
You know, so, you know, there's no preconceptions, you know, between the user and the computer and the computer itself.
The computer is not going to make any presuppositions.
It's not going to bar you from access.
It's not going to do anything that was eventually from excelling or is what you try to do.
The limitation might be your level of experience at the time.
Right.
And be achieved, you know, with experience and with discipline.
That's all it is.
Right.
So I would certainly agree that, you know, the access is something that, you know, won't be limited,
just something because you're a race or whatever the case is, when you're sitting in front of the computer.
Right. Right.
And, you know, it doesn't just make, you know, we've been talking about race because I probably will we understand this.
But, you know, there's also a sex issue.
You know, one of the things that's always disappointed me is, in my career, which has been going on since 1998,
is when I first got into this professionally, I've always been dismayed by the number of women that are in the companies that I've worked at.
Who work with software or work in the admin roles?
I've known some.
But, you know, it becomes obvious after a while that, you know, there's a serious deficit in the numbers of women in this field.
What do you think about that sentiment once?
Well, I would say that, you know, in terms of, in terms of women in the field, there's definitely a dearth of these women that are actually involved in the technical space.
I mean, the ones that are probably very vocal or highly recognized, or, you know, that's all subjective, obviously, highly recognized.
You know, but certainly, you know, in a vocal sense, I've just not aware of a whole lot of me.
I know a few that I've talked to in various places online.
But, in terms of a resounding voice and a constant voice and coverage, there just isn't a whole lot of it that I have seen.
Well, I have a dream, and I want to ask you a question and tell me if you think this is right or wrong.
I'm not a big fan of Facebook or Twitter, really, but a lot of minorities and women are, and, you know, society in general is, plus the Android iPhone revolutions that are taking place right now.
Do you think that this is going to be a catalyst for getting minorities and women into the field more?
And in terms of what, the social networking?
Well, you know, a few years ago, you know, when I used to talk to people before the social networking things started off, there was a large portion of society that really didn't use the Internet or networking at all.
And what I'm saying is that, you know, a lot of these people who are now starting to live on Facebook and so on, who are really starting to engage, I think Facebook has brought a whole class of people who never engaged the computer in that didn't exist before.
And I'm wondering if that, if you think that that could be like a trampoline actually take them further into understanding more and perhaps even getting into the field in general, maybe they might start helping build Facebook for the future.
I would say, I would say this, and then I'm going to diverge for many of you if I may.
So, I would say I would not give the social networking tools as much credit as, you know, as you're doing now.
I would say that the mobile device that are being manufactured now would most likely give that catapult effect that you're speaking of will give that access as you're speaking of, because the accessibility, first of all, mobile devices, whether they're cheap, you know, slide.
What is up, those little cheap PS2s, the very good games, the cheap games that they have, you know, that they kick the, what do you call them, the, you know, the kicker.
One of those, those little devices are those of the things that are probably going to give people more access than the actual applications.
You know, social applications, because I think, you know, if you're interested in figuring out how stuff works, having access to low cost hardware is the ticket to get you to that next level, you know, these sparkly curiosity.
Not sure indeed, you know, the access to applications or the ease of which you can get access to an application will probably help as well.
But I think having that stuff in your pocket close to your skin as, you know, every moment, say that that wouldn't actually give you the most access that I can imagine.
You know, the actual, the actual application, so whether it's a, it's a, you know, a low cost mobile device or a tablet or to laptop computer.
Right, that's the thing that I believe is going to be the game changer, not so much the application.
Yeah, yeah, you know, that's pretty interesting. I'll probably agree with you actually, you know, in retrospect, I'll probably jump over to your side because the thing about these devices that we're seeing now is that we're starting to see just about every social economic class is starting to adopt these devices.
You know, I can go into, you know, the hardest, again, a few people use an iPhone. I think that's encouraging.
You know, and on the next side, you know, isn't the economics of it all? You know, it's, there's such a, there's such an economic penalty to being on the wrong side of the digital divide these days.
I mean, I'll just give you three quick examples of everything from tax returns, right?
If we're doing every tax season, you see all these tax outlets show up in the mini malls, in the strip malls.
Yeah.
And if we know if we could get people on to tax software, you know, cut the costs, cut, you know, the various barring fees that people use because they don't realize that, you know, if you do those things online with routing numbers and so on, you're going to get your tax return back in a week.
Or three days from stayed in a week for the federal. And so, you know, there's no reason to take loans out.
And you know, another issue is, you know, just basic banking, right? You know, in poorer neighborhoods, there's not really a lot of banks around.
And people, you know, do strange things to manage your money or, you know, they pay, check cashing fees and all these different things.
And, you know, we have so many excellent online banks these days, so it doesn't matter where you live, you know, you can get that in direct.com account.
And, you know, everything from the learning aspect as well, you know, one of the things my son loves is PBSKids.org.
And, you know, I can write rather than have them down in front of the television where it gets all these bad habits from.
You know, you can put them down in front of PBSKids.org and they got some really, they got games on their educational games that keep them fully occupied.
And so, the benefits to underprivileged people for technology, I just think, are incredible.
And on the flip side, you know, just touching on the women's side, you know, women's have, there's two big benefits I have to give for women.
You know, we have a problem in the United States, which people have been talking about, which is, you know, the disparate wages that women have as opposed to men in the United States and throughout most of the world.
And I think part of that at least has to do with career path.
And, you know, not to say that, you know, working with computers is the most lucrative thing you can do, but it actually just isn't bad.
It's treated me well. I mean, I've never been unemployed yet still, after all these years in this field, I've never even had a period of unemployment.
You know, I live fairly well. And, you know, one, one distinct way to, you know, get women's wages in the right direction is to, you know, point more women towards the field that is a comfortable field.
And, you know, I just want to say one last thing before I give that to you, some of the men, one, for those women that have a difficult time finding dates.
If you are having a difficult time getting the attention of men, I would recommend visiting your Linux user group in any city that you live in.
I'm certain that you are likely to be the only woman there and there will likely be lots of single men who are probably pretty reasonable guys.
So, let me turn that back over to you, son, the man wouldn't tell me what you think about that.
Wow, you said a whole lot like this, you know.
I know, I just, I don't know what you're talking about.
I don't know what you're talking about. You know, but, you know, basically, and, you know, I just think that, you know, over the last few months, I have, well, a couple of months, I guess, you say, you know, with that over tonight, with, you know, both in the, you know, both too comfortable.
I'm not sure what confidence was, but I think it should have worked and something that was kind of derogatory and, you know, and then we find out there and some, some, some, some, some major open source conferences.
And other other netcasters that talked about it, and I listen to free software, foundation law with that show is really late.
It shows, and they talked about it. It talked about it on the show.
I was feeling that confused, but when I think about it, but anyway, yeah, I definitely can't understand that.
Now, I really want to talk about more of the empowerment, I think that's important.
That is.
I can't wait to hear this.
In general, I think, and talking from my personal experience, I would have to say that having a knowledge of free software and open source has helped me eat.
I mean, you know, everybody, everybody wants to do hustle.
Anybody wants to hustle and figure out ways to, to hustle.
You know, and if you listen to cloud two, you know, you're talking about urban camping, especially that hustle for geeks is what I call, right?
Did you people have hustle geeks?
I think when we hustle for geeks is to figure out how open source can benefit your life.
And for me, they've been able to understand how, first of all, the building is simple computer.
I'll do several computers, you know, how to build a firewall, you know, simple firewall back in the days, you know, two net records and stuff like that.
Basic skills like that can help you, help you hustle, get you, get your hustle game up as I like to say.
Right, right.
Help you help give you some empowerment because as an African-American or a person of African descent, one of the things that we always talk about is empowerment and self-improvement and things of that nature.
Right.
And that's having access.
Free software is all about empowerment, you know, because you could say, you could say, and I don't know, I've never met Nina.
I don't know if that's the case.
I'm not, but I raised it.
You know, he became empowered in some way when he was able to not have to be, not be forced to use the Linux file system or Linux operating system.
You know, Linux kernels, you know, instead of using a micro kernel, you figured out a way to come up with a Linux kernel, which was very different in the architecture.
And that was empowering for him because it helped him get through a problem that he wasn't able to do with.
Yeah, you're referring to the patent, you're referring to the Tannenbaum Torvolve debates.
Exactly.
Yeah, that was really fascinating.
And in itself, the old point I'm trying to make is empowerment can come from, you know, the access to the computer or access to free software and open source.
You know, it'll help you, it'll help you eat literally.
At least that's a different me.
You know, I was in a school and still today, you know, it's not my primary job, you know, per se.
But a hobby, trying to do something that you can actually get paid for and that's a wonderful feeling.
And then the better thing behind that is actually taking what you know and then empowering the next person, reach down and bring somebody else up.
Okay, that's always made something that's well known in the culture.
Maybe that's what it was for me when I was coming out.
And so they have to go down and get somebody else and educate them at the same time, give them that freedom that they didn't have before.
And that implies that they don't understand before knowing that you don't have to use windows.
You don't have to use, you know, a Mac and touch computer.
You can then teach other people freedom and how to get away from something that may be shackling their minds.
Right.
And I'm not kind of the starry people that get paid by using windows software because, you know, whatever gets you paid, you know, the way that you do that works for you.
Right.
It's your family.
But at the same time, if you don't have any money and you're trying to come up and figure out a way to get free, whatever is that, you know, maybe your environment is not something you want to be into.
You know, whether you live in somewhere that's depressed, you know, and that type of thing.
You want to get out of that condition.
This could be a way to get free.
So that's my two-cent one, that's something.
No, that makes a lot of sense.
And, you know, well, another shout out I have to really give is the Google Summer of Code.
You know, what they've been trying to do there by getting all these kids up there to learn how to be open-source developers or to know how to contribute to open-source projects.
I really think Google Summer of Code has been an incredible influence on young people.
What do you think?
Oh, yeah.
And, like I said, I haven't done a whole lot of work with Google Summer of Code.
But I think it's a great project.
And I think that the effort, as long as it's not eventually clouded by the gain, if you will, of quote through towers.
I think it would be a viable project for years to come if it stays pristine and stays true.
And, you know, if stays true to its goal, is what I'm getting at.
I'm not trying to end this conference.
I'm having a good time.
But I'll probably have one last question and then I'll leave it up to you.
And I just wanted to retouch on the comments I made about women having very easy dating opportunities within the world.
Oh, sorry.
Yeah, I didn't address that.
Did it?
Yeah.
You know, to be honest with you, we talk about geek females.
I mean, my personal experience.
I didn't, I didn't marry a geek, you know, which is good.
I think for a person who, who you are, who, who, who have to be geek.
So self, self-proclaimed geek.
We seem to do better with females than non geeks.
Reason for me is because, man, I put heads with most geek females.
Because, you know, we both know too much.
There's always got to be an alpha male, right?
Fascinating.
Fascinating.
So, yeah, okay.
So, so if you find a female that's in need, you tend to be a better symbiotic relationship.
That's been my experience.
So, I don't think the females are non geeks like that average Macintosh users.
They look like us.
Right.
Right.
Right.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, that's an interesting perspective.
So, you might have more experience in myself.
So, I think I'll probably try to leave it in that.
From the man one, what do you think about this?
Did we cover enough in this talk?
Yeah.
I think so.
I think so.
I would, I would agree.
I would definitely agree.
Yeah, I would definitely agree.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think I'm sorry.
Yeah.
So, this is animal science and sons of man one and thank you to Ken Fallon and guys, all you listeners out there.
It's time to start contributing.
Time to record.
It's not that hard.
We're all looking forward to hearing from the entire community, just not just a few people.
And everybody have a good day.
All right.
Yo, man.
It's a lot of brothers out there flaking and perpetrating the scared to kick reality.
Man, you've been doing all this dope producing.
You had a chance to show them what time it is.
So, what you want me to do?
I'm expecting with my poor kids ability.
And now I'm living in correctional fertility.
Cause I don't agree what how I do it.
I get straight and meta saved like a Buddhist.
I'm dropping flavor.
My behavior is the renteries.
But my technique is very necessary.
Blame it on IQ.
Because aesthetic is funky.
When you got a subject and a poetic it.
Add it on a dope beat.
And it'll make your face.
Some fuss it just tickle me pink to my stomach.
Cause they don't feel like this one.
You know what?
I won't hesitate to just want to chew before I'm through.
So, don't try to think this.
I'm dropping science.
Well, I'm dropping English.
Even if yellow.
Mix it.
I could pell up.
I still express yo, I don't smoke weed or theft.
Cause it's known to give a brother brain damage.
And brain damage on a mic.
Don't manage nothing.
But making the fuck in you equal.
Don't be another sequel.
Spray yourself.
I am.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Spray yourself.
Stunned.
Spray yourself.
Now, gets back to the V.G.
That's full ground and it's easy.
Shra heads back, new jacks about men, Hollywood.
Espresso make the thousand because.
They like to follow the words.
Se gryreautre sres.
So record some thing.
People be what the society wants of the people, but not me.
Ruflits is the way to go, they know,
I'll just say rhymes as well to be original.
Or they kill what the hip hop starts.
Forget about the ghetto, and rap for the pop shots.
Some musicians stop at home, but get to use the bandit.
He's wearing them for no microphone, yet he won't reality.
But you were here, none.
There is an exaggerate, a little picture.
So I'm saying no to trust, to take a lens.
But after the show, they go looking for the toe man.
Or they band my crew from the radio.
Here in W.A. you say hell no.
But you know it ain't all about wealth.
As long as you make a no-tube, it's prejudiced.
It's prejudiced.
It's not a problem, it's not a problem, it's prejudiced.
It's prejudiced.
It's prejudiced.
It's prejudiced.
It's prejudiced.
It's prejudiced.
It's prejudiced.
It's prejudiced.
From the hawkers, if you want to stop, move up the chart.
Then expression is the big part of it.
You ain't efficient when you flow.
You ain't swim, moving like a thorn in, full of rigor borders.
There's a little bit more to show.
I got rhymes in my mind, and better like an embryo.
Or lesson, all of them expression.
And if you start messing, I got a myth in Western for you.
I might ignore your wreckage, because it has no body.
I might get loose, but the summer when a swing in autumn
is straight on the mic, getting physical.
I'm doing the job, and just going in the linchmob.
It's on my cop, but you know you need to sit.
And the knowledge is growing just like a fetish.
On Thomas, where he is, the robot, straights in the neighborhood.
And he's up to no good.
When I thought expressing myself, he got a plan.
And he's just if I stay funky like this, I'm doing damage.
Show all my beat to a hype.
And he's a straight jacket.
I got knowledge, and now the sucker's lacking.
So when you see Drake, a Z-Jack on the mic,
ask what it's like, it's like we're getting a hype tonight.
Because if a strike, it ain't for you, good to help.
But I won't strike if you just scratch yourself.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
It's on my cop.
Thank you for listening to H.P.R.
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