Aasim has got foss.in blues

I could see it in his eyes as he dragged himself to get ready for school. So I had a small talk with him… his lament was he has nothing to tell to his friends.

Surprised I asked him “Why? did you not enjoy??”

“I enjoyed a lot but none of my friends at school will understand any of that, they don’t know what PHP is how can they know Rasmus, what do I tell them about Blinkenlights? Jaya Kumar tried to teach me juggling!”

I really had no answer for him other than that school is one thing he *has* to finish (he knows that). I feel his pain and it is very much akin to that girl Netra’s frustration who wants all her friends to understand FOSS instead of M$, for her several people (including myself) had answers…

Now that Aasim really contributed his bit to the event this time I feel that something more needs to be done I don’t know what as yet but now it is a pressing selfish need / itch which has to be satisfied

  • foss fanaticism

    I’m not sure I understand the foss fanaticism. (I’m talking F/LOSS here, and calling it foss, I’m not critiquing the actual foss.in/2006 event). I mean, why does netra want all her friends to understand foss just because she uses it? If it’s not indiscrete, how old is she?

    I strongly respect the GNU folks and rms, and still refer to GNU/Linux as GNU/Linux, almost all the time. At the same time, if my girlfriend thinks linux is a type of condom, or my buddies think it should be called “linux” (or “linsux” to the BSD maniacs) or whatever, c’est la vie, who cares?! I’m not walking around “educating” the “m$ folks” about linux, and the linux folks about “GNU/Linux” and the BSD maniacs about linux (well, just checking if you’re still awake 😉

    As in, why does Aasim care nobody understands what he did in Bangalore, why does Netra care nobody understands foss, etc. I mean, I’ve got friends who do stuff I understand nothing about, but that hasn’t stopped us from hanging out, or being good friends, etc. My good friend works on advanced vehicle engineering / steering wheel controls and vehicle dynamics and works on research to optimize vehicle control and turning radius and stuff. I don’t know any of this junk. Just as he probably couldn’t tell you what a pointer is, or what functional programming is, or what PHP is. So who cares? We are still very close friends and hang out really often …

    Now Aasim, I can *sorta* understand cuz he’s young. But I see this “foss fanaticism” a lot, especially amid the adult desi foss community (not counting the “GNUheads” of course) and I fail to understand it. Why is it that we as a community cannot move on with life? The worst kinds are the ones that *judge* people based on their choice of email client (!) … sigh, it’s a sad world out there. And yeah, I’ve actually heard statements like, “this guy is an idiot because he uses microsoft outlook express” …

    I really hope Aasim gets out of this mess and realizes that it’s not important to anyone (except himself) to understand or appreciate what he does. In the end, all that matters is if he’s comfortable with who he is and what he’s doing, not what “society” says … hey?

    I’m curious to hear your thoughts on this rant, Tarique.

    • Re: foss fanaticism

      I’m curious to hear your thoughts on this rant, Tarique.
      OK! here it goes…

      As you rightly say this is a rant so a lot of it I will right away discount ;)

      That said, now to the topic at hand. Homo Sapiens are social creatures who like to hang out with beings of similar interest and ethics. What Aasim is saying is that he wants a friend with whom he can talk about foss and computers. This is something which he currently lacks at school. Is wanting a friend to talk to about a certain subject so bad that it can be labeled as fanaticism? No! Fanaticism would be wanting everyone to talk nothing but foss and computers and I can assure you that Aasim can hold conversations on plenty of other subjects than foss.

      I am replying to you only in Aasim’s context as this post is about him.

      To cut this short – I feel that your comment is a bit misplaced on this post.

      • Re: foss fanaticism

        I am replying to you only in Aasim’s context as this post is about him.

        Aw, but my comment is exclusively about the adult foss community in India, not about Aasim! I don’t know Aasim at all, so why would I discuss him? 🙂 No, I wasn’t implying that he was “fanatic”. I don’t know Netra either, but your post sounds ominously like she’s well on her way there … to fanatic nirvana … if not already 🙂

        To cut this short – I feel that your comment is a bit misplaced on this post.

        I guess. I wasn’t attempting particularly to make insightful comments directly related to the topic anyways =p It’s just that your post on foss.in instantly made me think, “oh wow, another foss fanatic gathering thing” and I figured I’d ask you cuz you do seem to hang out a lot in such conferences.

        My last visit to BSDCan in Ottawa was really annoying and I never went back. Half the “light conversations” were about WinXP and Linux users being idiots, and I think that is really naive and stupid to say. I mean, I simaltaneously run all of WinXP, OpenBSD, and Ubuntu linux. I’m not even sure which fanatic camp to join then 🙂

        Again, to clarify here — I’m not saying foss fanatics (esp. in india) are “evil” or “stupid”. I’m just saying they’re fanatic, and that disturbs me. Same as the GNU heads walking around with their GNU stuff … a lot of them are “nice” and “smart”, but still hover around the “annoying” camp along with desi FOSS-ers.

        Lemme know if I’m annoying you with the “offtopic” commentary BTW, and I’ll be more careful in future … thanks!

        • Re: foss fanaticism

          I figured I’d ask you cuz you do seem to hang out a lot in such conferences.
          Well whatever gave you that impression! the erstwhile Linux-Bangalore and now foss.in are the only conferences which we visit and hang out regularly and I can assure that running WinXP at foss.in was not a crime nor did someone come and try to preach you if you were doing it. Yes it did attract some looks but that’s about it.

          I’m just saying they’re fanatic, and that disturbs me
          Fanatics of any kind disturb me very much as well and particularly the kind who jump to premature conclusions and start acting on them :D

    • Re: foss fanaticism

      Errrr… Thats some outburst dude. Yeah there are a few fanatics but being fanatical about fanatics doesn’t leave any of us in a better position.

      p.s: I dont mean to start off a war. Hope all’s well with you.

      • Re: foss fanaticism

        How am I being “fanatical” about fanatics? It’s not like I found 4353465 random message boards and mailing lists to broadcast my rant, yaknow? ;p I don’t recall *ever* discussing this topic *anywhere* outside of this post here … surely you’re not saying *one* LJ comment equates to “fanaticism” ?!

        Also, I’m not advocating a, “let’s all go get hammers and beat up the fanatic idiots” message, yaknow? If you read my comment carefully, you’ll notice that I’m asking so I can *understand* why they’re fanatical about stuff, that’s all. I just thought tariquesani was a good person to ask, given that I thought he hung out a lot at random FOSS conferences. 🙂

        Nope, no war-intent perceived/assumed, all is well 🙂 Life treating you okay man? 🙂

  • Well, *I* would tell Aasim to try and explain more about foss.in and what he did there to his friends,in general terms, not too technical…. and also try and learn juggling from his friend who wants to teach it to him (another pretty unusual skill for a kid –of Aasim’s age, I presume– to have!)

    It’s one kind of happiness, to have friends with similar interests and another kind to have friends with different interests, too. With luck, Aasim will be open to both, and have twice as much happiness in life….showing others what he is interested in, and sharing his friends’ enthusiasm about whatever interests them.

    • Thanks, he has started out in his own way…

  • See if you can help Asim organize some seminars in school to give kids a headstart to things.. it might be something thats already being done.. but its just something i thought could be done..

    • At 9 kids are not interested in seminars and I dont think frag fests on foss platforms would be encouraged as yet by parents and school alike ;)

  • You know now that I think about it, I think I can relate to what he feels. And even though I hate to point out the difference, it’s worse when you’re 16 and you’re “supposed” to think about boys and make-up. If I want to talk about FOSS.in with my friends, I either get funny looks or get questions like
    ” were there any hot guys??”. And it’s WORSE with the guys since they either have NO idea what FOSS is, but still insist Windows is the best and/or they laugh at me and say “what do you know, you’re a girl”, although thats changing a bit.

    Ok I’m kind of going off topic.

    But I like to think of it as my little secret, not that I have anything to hide. It gives me a big kick when I realize “hey, I use Open Source stuff ( even if it is only Gimp). I’m one step ahead of the next 16 year old girl, (even if it is only technologically!”

    And it totally helps when you reach the “I want to be different” stage! ;D

    Aasims friends are probably not going to understand what the event is about , or what FOSS is about for a long time. But as long as he doesn’t look at that as a disadvantage, I guess it will be ok.A lot of his friends may come to Bangalore to visit friends or relatives, but hey! He attends a conference where he gets to meet a great bunch of people, eat lots of pizza, and stay up late! How cool is that!

    • Hey girl you are many a step ahead of several 16 year olds I know for that matter some 20 year olds as well!

      Aasim does look at what he is doing as a disadvantage in fact this time he came back quite charged up and completed the study backlog in 3 days.

      Anyways thanks for reaffirming that we FOSSilized parents are on the right track ;)