Episode: 1802
Title: HPR1802: An Interview with Emily Hampton a LinuxFest Northwest Volunteer
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr1802/hpr1802.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-18 09:26:46

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This is David Whitman and I'm at the Linux Vest Northwest with a volunteer and tell us
your name.
My name is Emily Hampton.
Her husband Arthur is standing here but he's not going to be talking apparently.
So I wanted to get a perspective of the Linux Vest from someone who does volunteer work
that's maybe one of the unsung heroes of the Linux Vest that helps put it together.
So how many years have you been working on the Vest, Emily?
I have been a volunteer organizer for this is my third Vest that I've helped organize.
And have you attended other years then?
Yes I have.
This is my fifth Vest.
Yes, this is the fifth year I've been to the Vest.
But three that you worked as on the organizing committee.
Yes.
What tasks have you done for the organizing committee?
When we started I suggested that we get a Google Plus page and no one had no one everyone
said they didn't have time to run it so I volunteered to run the Google Plus page.
So the first year that I volunteered was the first year that we had that we'd had
Settle Myer Hall and we needed the pipe and drape.
We needed a vendor for the pipe and drape for the gold sponsor booths.
So I was the one who called around to do that originally.
Okay, and what jobs are you doing this year?
Not much.
I'm still doing I'm still doing the I'm still doing the Google Plus promotion.
And at the fest I've just been running errands when people need me to.
Okay, so have you had a lot of errands to run then?
Not a lot.
Not a lot.
Not a lot.
Yeah, I've just been helping out where I can if I see something that needs to be done
and don't see a whole lot of people to do it, I'll step in and do.
How many volunteers do you think there are?
I don't have them.
I'm not the one who has the numbers on that.
I can tell you that without the BTC students, we could not run the fast.
They're just they are absolutely wonderful.
They are so organized.
I came in Friday and told them to put me somewhere to do something,
but there was nothing to do.
They had already organized everything.
It was wonderful.
They're fantastic.
Okay, the how many people do you think are attending this year?
I was told I was told this morning that we had, let me think, a thousand people register
yesterday and we still have people will still register today.
So there was a thousand daytime registrations yesterday, plus the people who just know
all together.
A thousand badges.
A thousand badges were given out during yesterday's fast, yes.
Okay, and then do you live here in Bellingham?
No, I don't.
I used to, but I'm actually living down in the Olympia area now.
So I do a lot of, I try to do some of the tasks that I can do remotely.
For the org committee.
How many people do you think are on the org committee?
It's hard to say because I'm not physically present at the meetings now.
We're using Google Hangouts for the meetings because we have a few other members
who also come and dial in remotely.
So I don't get to see how many people are there.
So Jacob Perry is still the big cheese then.
Is that correct?
He is our, he's our spokesman.
He is our webmaster and he has, he has wonderful ideas.
Yeah, and he of course is in Portland.
Yeah, he's working for the fast as a kind of a remote volunteer also.
Yeah, he's, he's also mostly a remote volunteer.
So he came up two weeks, he came up a week ago.
And no, yeah, a week ago to start getting, to start getting things ready at BTC though.
What first got you interested in the Linux Fest?
My husband brought me, brought me to my first Linux Fest in 2010.
And I liked the community aspect of it.
I grew up in a household.
My mother was, my mother is a diehard libertarian.
And so I grew up with the idea of free speech.
And that is something that I really like about Linux is the free as in speech aspect.
The free as in beer aspect, well, it's a nice perk.
But I'm, I'm more into the free as in free as in speech.
Then you run Linux on your personal computers?
I actually am now.
Okay, what distribution do you like the most?
Well, I'm running OpenSusa on my computer at home.
And my darling, wonderful husband has rooted my Chromebook.
And I'm running Debbie and Jesse on that one.
Oh, did Debbie and Jesse just come out yesterday?
It was, it was in beta testing though.
Okay, yeah.
He, he put the beta, he put the beta on for me.
So we put Arthur on the spot here for a moment?
Certainly.
He would love it.
What, what do you run on your laptops and your computers, Arthur?
Right now, I run nopics for whenever I'm at somebody else's computer.
Okay.
And on my, yeah, so nopics also on my hard drive, on my laptop, I have windows,
but I hardly ever touch it.
I'm usually running nopics off of it.
Off of a live USB, is that how you run it?
Off of USB.
And what else, I'm also running Chrome OS on my Chromebook right now,
though I may root it later.
And you're, how many years have you used Linux then?
Since sometime in the 90s, I can't give you an exact date.
Okay.
So you're a long time user?
Yes.
Well, it's been nice to talk to you too and enjoy the rest of the fast.
And you can look for your episode to be uploaded at some point,
to Hacker Public Radio.
In fact, I'll put it on at Google Plus to be able to see it there.
All right.
Well, thank you, thank you, David.
Thank you for your volunteering.
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