hpr-knowledge-base/hpr_transcripts/hpr0609.txt

Episode: 609
Title: HPR0609: I Blame Tom Merritt
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr0609/hpr0609.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-07 23:50:28

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Greetings. My name is Herbun Tu.
When the call went out from the folks behind Hacker Public Radio for listener contributions about two months ago,
I realized that I was being offered an opportunity to make a tiny payback to the Linux community,
and they had taken away my last excuse for not doing so.
So let me answer this question. Why have I become a Linux user?
There are several levels of why. Let's start off with the Y of Blame.
I'll start off by blaming Tom Merritt, who was with CNET TV for many years.
He recently found greener pastures working with Leo Laport in the latter's podcast Media Empire,
but that's another story.
Back in September 2006, Tom produced a short CNET Insider Secrets video entitled Try a Free Operating System.
This introduced me to the concept of a live CD, and of course the distribution was Ubuntu,
that was way back in the days of Ubuntu 606, which seems like an age ago now.
And, peripherally at least, it introduced me to the ideal of free open source software,
though I didn't know to call it that yet.
I had played around a bit with Linux prior to that time, mainly Puppy Linux, as I recall,
but once the downloaded ISO file had been burned into a CD and the boot took place,
I experienced the first inklings of a Windows-free world.
Tom and CNET followed up with a video a year later demonstrating using Ubuntu via Ubuntu,
and then in 2008 there was yet another Ubuntu feature showing how to run Ubuntu from a USB thumb drive.
So, thanks Tom.
The second person to blame, if we should call it blame, is Mark Shuttleworth.
Think what you will about Ubuntu and Shuttleworth's corporate alter-ego canonical,
but as I've watched him afar and eventually followed along, I see a personality
who really believes that Linux and free open source software can be made appealing, accessible to,
and simple enough for the masses.
Now, I'm the farthest thing from Microsoft fanboy after all I switched to Linux.
Nevertheless, whatever else you can think or say about Microsoft,
they created a Windows interface and hardware spec, which helped make the personal computer ubiquitous.
I've been using computers since early 1970s and had a personal computer since 82 or 83,
and they were the one that set the standard.
And the goal originally was a computer in every home, and now if you only have one computer in your house,
you're rather odd, I think, at least in most Western countries.
I think Shuttleworth and company have the best shot at making their distro of Linux that easy to use.
The third person, last person I blame for my Linux use is Steve Balmer,
and whoever else is responsible for Windows Vista.
If they had had a corporate conscience, they would have apologetically and penitently offered free upgrades of Windows 7 to all Vista users.
They didn't, enough said.
Well, that's the why of blame, Tom Merritt, Mark Shuttleworth and Steve Balmer.
What about the why of motivation?
Take too much time to make up an exhaustive list.
So let me throw out the first few important things which come to mind.
I have altruistic reasons for becoming a Linux user, but I'll start with one that most listeners can appreciate.
Linux has put some fun and wonder back into my daily computer experience.
My computing history goes way back to my college programming days in the early 1970s
when monstrous IBM 36370 mainframe beasts with amazingly large five megabyte, yes I said megabyte, hard drives,
roamed the place to scene landscape.
I personally handfed many piles of cobalt and assembly language punch cards to these ponderous but fascinating creatures.
About 10 years later when folks were stymied by obscure formatting codes in DOS-based programs like WordStar
and Flomix by programming and Debase 2 or Debase 3 compared to IBM mainframe manuals,
the programmer written user manuals were a breeze to understand.
So gave me a source of a little bit of side income, but those days as helpful as the GUI interface became in windows,
it removed you further and further from the hardware and from understanding what was going on underneath.
And some of the thrill and joy of those days returns again with Linux,
except now your experience can span the spectrum from being wrapped in a warm GUI cocoon,
or you can stretch it out clear over to inspecting and writing source code and compiling to your heart's content.
Now my second reason is my first altruistic reason, why Linux allows me to recycle older computers and components
in the most practical sense of recycling, reuse.
I've lost track of the number of machines including laptops, I've been able to retrofit with whatever the latest version of Ubuntu is
and either give it away or repurpose it for use around the house here.
At last count we have, let's see, one, two, three, four laptops which run Linux along with two servers,
one of which runs the Amahi Suite in Fedora.
Once people realize that the GUI isn't that different from what they're used to in the windows world
and most of what they need is a browser or word processor and maybe an email client they really don't care about
what the operating system is called, they just want it to work and they want it to be free of virus
and other malware problems so they just go ahead and merely use it.
I suppose this wouldn't be true for gamers but it seems like people who can afford to spend their lives gaming
have as much money to burn as they have time to burn so I don't worry about trying to provide them with computers.
Another altruistic why is helping the less fortunate.
I'm a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ and that influences my worldview
and if when you think minister you see a mental picture of some guy wearing a backward collar
I'll be completely invisible to you as I pass by you on the street wearing jeans
and sporting a stallman-esque beard but I have to draw the line somewhere, unlike Richard, no Birken stocks for me, man.
I had a Linux epiphany a few years ago when I was down in Guatemala teaching pastors in various places around the country
and by the way that's where some of my recycled laptops go.
For the last two nights in country we were housed in the small dorm rooms of a Bible school.
The school's student lounge and I put that in air quotes, such as it was, was a room about the size of a small to average American living room.
Squeezeed in along the side of the student lounge down one wall were four aging PCs that comprise the school's computer lab.
Not only were these old cast-off windows machines but they were absolutely riddled with malware and spyware
to the point where they could hardly run.
While the rest of the small team of which I was a part went off and did their one day of touristy shopping things I stayed behind
and did what I could to disinfect the entire lab as best I could.
I encountered illegal copies of windows and windows software, illegal copies of antivirus software, some of which wouldn't update because they were illegal.
I left three of the four machines infestation free but to really fix the fourth it would have required a complete reinstall
and they didn't have the original installation CDs much less the installation codes.
I could have taken them to task for running illegal software, I certainly would have had I been here in the States.
But when faced with the pinnury and poverty experienced in most countries the legalities and nuances of software licenses
and the moral ramifications of piracy get drowned out by the vicissitudes endured in trying to survive.
For the remainder of the visit and long after I boarded the plane home the next day I found myself thinking how much better off they would have been running a free legal malware resistant variant of Linux.
That brings me to a final point. Not so much a why of explaining my change to using Linux but a specific why explaining my commitment to sticking with Ubuntu and hence my handle Kerbuntu.
Ubuntu along with its variants like Kubuntu, Zubuntu, Ejibuntu and Mint seems to come under a sort of derision from certain adherents of other Linux distros.
The partial somewhat bridled contempt for it derives in the fact that it's a distro for beginners, for noobs, for the masses.
For me, that's precisely the point. I'm thankful for the contributions made by the likes of Red Hat, Fedora, Susa, Debian and fill in the blank of your favorite distro.
And I appreciate the down and dirty learning experiences offered by distros like Slackware.
But I've decided to limit myself to Ubuntu with a goal of learning it so well that I can help other people, other ministries and other nonprofits like our own get the maximum bang for their constrained computing bucks.
Take it from personal experience. We started a new ministry non-profit two years ago and in this recession funds are very tight.
So motivated both by a desire to help and a constraint in funding our ministry, and now I'm not going to promote that here, has converted all but one of our windows machines over to Ubuntu.
By the way, even that remaining machine will make the transition by the end of January.
Using Ubuntu every day, I will no doubt gain enough experience with it to support it and a much clearer feel for when it's the right alternative to recommend to others.
Has it been a learning curve in switching to alternative false programs like Gimp Open Office, Audacity, Genie Banshee and the like?
Yes and no. Yes, there was a learning curve, but we made the change over to most of the false programs we use while still running under windows.
And thus, no, there wasn't much of a learning curve once we made the switch to Ubuntu.
The operating system was the last change made and from the user's points of view, the operating system change was the least significant.
What we've all noticed is that everything runs much faster on the same hardware, hardware that has served well for years and now can continue to serve credibly for another few years to come.
Well, rather than preaching too long and having you fall asleep in your digital pew, I'll say the amen here and give the benediction.
Thanks to all the Linux and false developers, testers, promoters and others who have contributed over the years.
Thank you, Tom Merritt, for introducing me to Ubuntu.
Thank you, Mark Shuttleworth, for iterating your vision practically and semi-annually.
And thank you, Steve Balmer, for the VISTA-inspired determination to make the complete change over.
Also, thanks to Hacker Public Radio for challenging me to share my experience with Linux.
Thank you for listening to Hacker Public Radio.
HPR is sponsored by Carol.net, so head on over to C-A-R-O.N-T for all of us in need.
Thank you.