RMS to Move Into Bill Gates Building Today

In anonymous reader writes "RMS will be moving his office to the new William H. Gates building at MIT's Stata Center starting today. This marks the end of MIT's use of building NE43, which housed the LCS and AI labs (now combined into CSAIL). On a strangely unrelated note, shortly after Harvard, in a laudable attempt to retain solidarity with the Open Source community, dedicated the Maxwell Dworkin building (named after Gates' and Ballmer's mothers respectively), Gates' credit card was hacked. After all, they did have his mother's maiden name... "

irony

[Anonymous Coward]

ah the irony is just to delicous

Re:irony

[pilgrim23]

Query: does the Bill Gates Building have....Windows?

Re:irony

[VampireByte]

Well, you can't spell "Hey" for starts.

What other Gates buildings are there?

[Anonymous Coward]

There's MIT, Stanford... anywhere else that Billy has seen fit to leave his mark?

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[Anonymous Coward]

... named after Gates' and Ballmer's mothers respectively

Even their mothers have buildings named after them! This is insane.

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[zulux]

Even their mothers have buildings named after them! This is insane.

That's because they can't name the buildings after their fathers. It wouldn't look good to name the building "UPS-Man and Pool-Boy Building."

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[Maestro4k]

• There's MIT, Stanford... anywhere else that Billy has seen fit to leave his mark?

The DOJ in Washington, DC?

Cambridge University, UK

[mattbee]

The computer labs at my old uni now have a shiny new William Gates Building [cam.ac.uk] which the Compscis moved into the year I left. The old building was too tall, weird and creaky but at least there were some good pubs nearby :-)

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[bgeer]

The Gates of Hell?

"Abandon all hope ye who use Outlook Express"

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[frostman]

The Gates of Hell?

That's at Stanford. [mit.edu]

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[sTalking_Goat]

I saw him pissing on the side of the Supreme Court Building in DC a few weeks back...

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[Juiblex]

Cambridge:
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/UoCCL/intro/ [cam.ac.uk]
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/site-maps/gates.html [cam.ac.uk]

+ Washington:
http://www.law.washington.edu/GatesHall/ [washington.edu]

+ Stanford:
http://www-db.stanford.edu/pub/keller/gates-map.ht ml [stanford.edu]

+ Pennsilvania:
http://www.facilities.upenn.edu/mapsBldgs/view_map .php3?id=401 [upenn.edu]

+ MIT:
http://www-tech.mit.edu/V119/N20/20lcs.20n.html [mit.edu]

+ RIBA:
http://www.riba.org/go/RIBA/About/About_162.html [riba.org]

+ Southern Indiana:
http://www.usi.edu/visit/map/housing.asp [usi.edu]

+ Michigan:
http://www.admin.mtu.edu/admin/prov/facbook/ch9/9c hap-37.htm [mtu.edu]


= University Building Monopoly !!!!

Mary Gates

[lannocc]

Don't forget Mary Gates Hall [washington.edu] at the University of Washington. Named after his mother, of course.

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[perlchild]

= University Building Monopoly !!!!

Not quite, but the smaller universities may not have a dedicated comp sci building, and it makes no sense for Bill Gates to fund a math building does it? We'd figure out how much money he "really" has...

ok, puny humor this morning I should know better than to attempt this before coffee

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[the gnat]

Gates is just the newest generation, and others will come after. If all it takes to get money for facilities is to slap somebody's name on it - then I'm all for that.

I grew up in Seattle, and Gates' mother is rememebered quite fondly; there's a Mary Gates drive not far from my parents' house and the university. I think she was very involved in assorted philanthropic causes. So if Gates wants to name stuff after his mom, good for him. And, more generally, if he wants to donate to university CS departmen

Re:What other Gates buildings are there?

[jazman_777]

If all it takes to get money for facilities is to slap somebody's name on it - then I'm all for that.

That's about it. I was at Georgia Tech, and a buddy asked the President of the school at the opening of a new building, not yet named after someone, 'what would it take to get my name up there?' The answer was $X (can't recall the amount, maybe $500,000).

As a former playground bully, I want to know

[potcrackpot]

... is the 'w' in 'Dworkin' silent?

Re:As a former playground bully, I want to know

[harvardian]

The quick Harvard wit already picked up on that one. Everybody on campus (other than the CS majors) calls the building "Max Dork".

I'm not kidding :-P

Re:As a former playground bully, I want to know

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking of names, does anyone know what the "H" stands for in William H. Gates?

Hitler.

Re:As a former playground bully, I want to know

[Mr. Piddle]

from playground bully to slashdot-reading nerd? Sounds a bit unlikely to me...

He would bully people by taunting them with the names of all the known radioactive isotopes and chasing them while reciting all the stepping numbers of Intel CPUs. Not all bullies use fists, you know.

Use punctuation

[Anonymous Coward]

Harvard, in a laudable attempt to retain solidarity with the Open Source community, dedicated the Maxwell Dworkin building (named after Gates' and Ballmer's mothers respectively)

How does this attempt to retain solidarity with the OSS community? The entire post is one gigantic run-on sentence, so maybe I am not reading it correctly?

Re:Use punctuation

[agoliveira]

Hmmm... maybe it's a typo because I read it as "Harvard, in a laughable attempt..." :)

Re:Use punctuation

[Savatte]

dude this is slashdot we dont use any types of punctuation marks because we are too busy coding where do you think you are elementary school

how stupid

[AnonymousCowheart]

How stupid can you be? In the article, it says he stole the credit card numbers to prove how insecure things were. If that wasn't enough, he emailed the info to NBCi. Why do these people think that they're the "good guys" when they do this?

Re:how stupid

[theLOUDroom]

How stupid can you be? In the article, it says he stole the credit card numbers to prove how insecure things were. If that wasn't enough, he emailed the info to NBCi. Why do these people think that they're the "good guys" when they do this?

He is right though. The credit card system is ridiculously insecure, and we all pay for it in one way or another.

There's no reason someone I buy $20 worth of pizza from should have all the information necessary to charge an arbitrary amount of money to my credit card for the next few years.

The technology exists for us to all have keyring-sized computers which employ public-private key crypto. This would mean I would authorize a one-time trasfer of $20 to the pizza place, and in order for them to be able to charge me again, I would need to give them a totally new transaction key.

Why isn't the credit card system being replaced? Who knows.....but it's silly and stupid.

I should never have to give anyone my bank account or credit card number. These days, it should all be handled using transaction keys with authorize a specfic amount, in a certain direction, to a specfic account, on a certain date.

I'm not defending this guy, I just think the current credit card system it totally stupid from a security point of view.

Re:how stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

"Also I don't buy pizza with a credit card. Jesus man, don't you have an ATM near by."

Cash is a hassle; you have to keep track of how many slips of paper you have in your wallet. Credit card? It's always right there with me.

Plus, with my Discover and American Express, I get some tiny percentage back, so by buying that $20 pizza, I earn a few cents back.

Not having to deal with maintaining an inventory of cash _and_ a discount on everything I buy? That's a deal in my book.

Plus, as long as I pay my bill on time, it's free; I don't carry a balance, so I don't get charged interest.

AND, it builds good credit for me, so I'll have a better rating when I want to do something larger (i.e. buy a house)

So to recap:
1) Reuse a piece of plastic, rather than having to keep track of and replenish a supply of paper
2) Get money back. Sure, it's small, but $100 a year is better than $0.
3) It improves my credit rating.

Yeah, that makes me want to run to the ATM.

Re:how stupid

[shreak]

And this affects me how? I just might be convinced to care if the vendor passed on the savings to me for using cash, but they don't.

And guess what. They don't want me using cash. Sure there's a 1.5% - 3% premium for using a CC, but then they don't have to manage cash in the store. This includes the risk of cashier theft, Store robbery and deposit robbery. Any CC purchase is done and paid with very little risk of theft.

So I'll keep using my CC for all purchases, big or small. Thanks.

Now, if the $1 coin we

Re:how stupid

[Zathrus]

I got double charged, at a pizza place incedentially, in one of those new "instant check" tranactions where they just use your checking account number to get your money.

Whoa.

Completely different from a credit card. Don't use "instant check" crap (frankly, don't use checks at all if you can help it) and don't use fake VISA/MC cards (the check cards, which are tied directly to your banking account). They don't have the same consumer protections that credit cards do. In the case of the former there's no req

Re:how stupid

[broeman]

I remember back in the late 80's and early 90's here in Denmark (some European country :P) where crackers were plenty (today there is only scriptkiddies left, thank you MS).

Many of those got to prison for one or two years, and afterwards got a nicely paid job at a large computer security company, if they didn't start it themselves. I remember the medias always telling this, and actually indirectly encouraging more people to do cracking (or spawning even more scriptkiddies), just to prove security holes. Pretty much ironic, but these people are probably the best for this kind of job.

Cultures like 2600, CCC, cDc are not only experimenting chaos-theories, but also contributing to more secure computing. Testing is the only way to find security lacks.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:how stupid

[Mmm coffee]

For christ's sakes, must absolutely _everything_ be turned into some anti-MS rant?! Someone gets Gate's CC info and people try to spin it into being MS's fault. This is totally and completely bullshit. There are tons of serious reasons to speak out against the Microsoft, when you go off on them by trying to spin something this idiotic all you do is make everyone else who has valid points look like idiots in relation.

Nobody cares about them being ruled a monopoly anymore becuase of the mindless drones going "Linux raa, Microsoft boo" in Orwelian duckspeak every time they open their mouths. I exclusively use a copy of GNU/Linux I built myself [linuxfromscratch.org] and even I find this crap to be aggrivating! You want to help the forces that are working against Microsoft? Shut up. Just shut. The. Fuck. Up. To say that it's Bill's fault that his CC numbers is stolen is on the same level as saying that a girl diserved to get raped for wearing a sexy dress. Asshole or not, he is the victim and not the perpetrator.

So goddamn tired of the Linux zealots that it makes me ashamed to know I am one.... sheesh...

Screw Anonymous Coward. Kill my karma. I don't give a fsck.

Re:how stupid

[pyros]

For hard facts see transcripts of the antitrust trials. They will inform exactly which tactics made Microsoft guilty of abusing their monopoly position. Then look at the industry and observe how little has changed. Are OEM computer manufacturers allowed to ship computers with desktop icons for competitors products but not for Microsoft products? Have file formats and network protocol APIs been made freely available for interoperation? Are userland applications still being bundled into core system libraries? Are they using APIs which are not documented and thus not available to makers of competing products?

Re:how stupid

[Maestro4k]

• Ummm what does this refer to. I hear this crap a lot, but there is ussually no hard findings to back it up. All I normally get is IE vs. Netscape, or some reference to "The Pirates of Silicon Valley". Hard facts from a made for TV movie. lol.

Well IE vs. Netscape isn't from a TV show, it's reality. Perhaps you weren't paying attention when it all happenned, or weren't on the net then, but MS really did leverage their Windows monopoly and IE to drive Netscape's business into the gutter. It wasn't just giving IE away for free, after all a free product that sucks won't always win the market-place. It was exclusive deals with OEMs not allowing them to have Netscape pre-installed on machines, it was Windows making it easier and easier to use IE, at the same time making it harder to use Netscape. Sometimes you had to hold your tounge right and hope it was the correct phase of the moon to get Netscape to be the default browser, and even then every time you applied a security update of any kind you were likely to find IE had been mysteriously changed to your default browser again. Windows at least seemed to become less tolerant of Netscape running on it, while IE was unstable and crashed a lot, Netscape started crashing MORE after MS decided they wanted the browser market. Can I PROVE that MS intentionally made Windows crash more if it saw Netscape running? No, but I witnessed the events, and found myself eventually forced to give up on running Netscape because IE crashed my computers less, not because I thought it was a superior browser. I seriously doubt that Netscape started coding their browser worse after IE was competing with them.

There's also the current issue with Windows Media Player. Tried to find anything else out there to compete with it? Quicktime and Real both don't work quite right with formats outside their native ones. I spent a week hunting for an alternative media player with AVI and Mpeg files that I could do playlists with at one point. Even though I found one to meet my needs, it amounted to nothing more than a skin over Windows Media Player, as WMP did all the decoding and playback underneath. Media Player also conveniently doesn't support codecs other than MS-approved ones. While it will play DivX, XviD, etc, you have to put in the work yourself to find the codecs, install them, and so on. Not surprisingly most mainstream sites don't use those codecs for any video. (And I'm talking about the current versions of DivX which are legit and not hacked versions.) This quite effectively kills the market for alternate codecs. When's the last time you saw a computer from an OEM arrive with RealOne and/or Quicktime already installed? I haven't seen one yet myself, and given past history, I would not be surprised to find that MS is making sure it doesn't happen with their OEM agreements. Again I can't prove that, since OEM agreements are subject to confidentiality agreements. Handy how that works.

Microsoft also has used its OEM agreements to try to stifle Linux, at least in the past. It did come out during the whole DOJ trial process that MS had forbid OEMs to have computers dual-boot on shipment at one point. Even if an OEM wanted to install dual OSs, the customer would have to put in the work to make it possible to boot into anything other than Windows. XP will (at least sometimes) overwrite your MBR where LILO (or whatever loader you use) is, forcing your computer back to single-boot, MS-only status. And try to buy a computer from an OEM, even a local one, without the OS on. You can get Windows on it for around $100, or you can pay around $100 labor. Either way you pay the same price for the computer, effectively making you pay for Windows even if you don't get it. I ran into this first back around 1998. The guy at the place admitted to me it was due to their MS OEM agreement. I ended up getting Windows on the machine and wiping it, I figured I might as well get the bloody software if I had to pay for it no matter what, even if I didn't use

Re:how stupid

[Com2Kid]

• Well IE vs. Netscape isn't from a TV show, it's reality. Perhaps you weren't paying attention when it all happenned, or weren't on the net then,

Well I was on the net then. Netscape 4.x sucked, most ISPs gave out Netscape 3.x and even in the begining 4.x to all their users, but as time went on:

• Netscape kept changing how plugins where handled. Their "centralized" page for downloading plugins was horribly unorganized and always being altered to some other unorganized scheme
• Crashed. Continiously. Horr

Re:how stupid

[An Onerous Coward]

You're mixing up your timeframes here. Sure you can buy OS-free computers right now (if you look really, really hard). But back when Microsoft was fighting the browser war, it was virtually impossible to get a Windows-free computer from any computer distributor.

By the time Netscape 6 was released, the Browser wars had been over for years [wikipedia.org].

"You mean a distibutor tried to leverage it's market power to make sure the retailers were only installing it's product, umm that is a damn good idea, it's called

I love it...script kiddies ultimate defense

[BurKaZoiD]

Gray says he is actually the good guy. He said "I just wanted to prove how insecure these sites are. I have done the honest thing, but I have been ignored."

That's like shooting someone just to prove how unsafe firearms are.

*shakes head*

Re:I love it...script kiddies ultimate defense

[gormanly]

4, Insightful? FFS. Using the CC numbers to buy yourself a small country might be vaguely similar, but if you think it's equivalent you're showing very little regard for the value of a human life.

Picking up a gun you saw/found on a fairground ride and waiving it around shouting "Look, gun!" would be a closer firearms analogy...

Re:I love it...script kiddies ultimate defense

[LoudMusic]

Gray says he is actually the good guy. He said "I just wanted to prove how insecure these sites are. I have done the honest thing, but I have been ignored."

That's like shooting someone just to prove how unsafe firearms are.

I disagree. Hacking is one thing, and I believe his statement is correct. However, using the information he obtained for illegal acts is just stupid. If he can hack a credit company he needs to apply for a job.

Re:I love it...script kiddies ultimate defense

[the_mad_poster]

And here we go again. Again with the "It's all the hackers to blame" crap.

You know what? Chances are good these kids stole a DB full of plaintext card numbers. Why not arrest the idiots that stored them that way and didn't thoroughly test the system as accomplices?

For you jackasses out there who just scream bloody murder about these stupid kiddies, does it not once occur to you that maybe if you'd have done it right in the first place you wouldn't even have to worry about it? Ashcroft wants to make exa

Re:I love it...script kiddies ultimate defense

[diablobynight]

How do you know there was no damage? Can you not look beyond the murder part of what he said, and see that he was implying that you have no right to break a law to prove a point like this. And what point did he prove? No public system is unhackable. Just like any house can be broken into and any bank vault can be cracked.
He had no right to do what he did. No right whatsoever. Come break into my house to prove how easy it is, don't steal anything, just break into my house and call my cell from my home phone, and I'll prove how happy I am you showed me my security hole by putting two .45 caliber holes in your chest.

There isn't enough rope in the world to show hackers how much we love them

For instance I had to put up an anonymous FTP for one day. It is dumb I know, but the user needed to upload something from home, didn't know their home IP off hand and didn't understand log ons and that stuff from the FTP end. SO I did it, I allowed anonymous upload to my FTP, and guess what i got, undeletable folders in my ftp folder, so that some guy could use me as a mirror for files on his warez site.
your right they showed me the error of my ways, but truth is I knew the error, I just hoped no one would be such a jerk as to have no respect for other peoples property. Hackers are vandals, I can piss in your mailbox, throw shit at your door, there are lots of things I can do, and probably not get caught to prove I can do them, but I don't, because I don't want to screw with other peoples shit. I have respect for other peoples property.

Hackers probably read their sisters Diaries and say she shouldn't have left it somewhere where I could find it.
It's oppurtunism at it's worst, and they make me sick.

Re:I love it...script kiddies ultimate defense

[Beatbyte]

if there was damage, the recovery from the damage is the cost that they should have spent securing the system in the first place. i guarantee an accountant showed the cost of a better system and it was turned down for the "OK" version that didn't cost as much.

you just CANT halfass storing financial data. and if it takes someone breaking into it to make it secure, then so be it.

just don't act like its comparable to murdering someone to prove a point.

Re:I love it...script kiddies ultimate defense

[actiondan]

Okay, so all the hackers that plan to send their results to the company in question or the press stop hacking.

What are we left with then - just the hackers who are in it for the money. The ones who won't reveal what they have done and so probably won't ever get found out.

In fact, treating all hackers as malicious criminals, even if they 'do the right thing' after the event, is likely to dissuade them from coming forward with information about how they get into system. The black hats will have a field day.

Gates' Credit Card

[RobertTaylor]

What did they order with it? And did Bill notice 100 being spent out of his 1,000,000,000,000,000.... bank account?

My Auction:Pan Tilt Ethernet Webcam, UK! [ebay.co.uk]

Re:Gates' Credit Card

[Xenographic]

Rumor has it they caught him because of a VERY suspicious charge:

He ordered several boxed Linux distros ;]

Revision to the song

[Ed Avis]

Typical - you fund a shiny new building but no sooner is it in use than some bearded hippy moves in and lowers the property values.

Hoarders may pay to fund new buildings,
that is true, hackers, that is true.
But they cannot choose their neighbours.
That's not good, hackers, that's not good.

Re:Revision to the song

[jdreed1024]

He doesn't want to move in there, don't worry:

http://lists.csail.mit.edu/pipermail/csail-discuss /2004-March/000077.html [mit.edu]

Re:Revision to the song

[Zachary Kessin]

IF someone were to ask me to key them into a secured area that they didn't have access to I would say no. There may be reasons that the building has security you know. I don't know all of them but for those of us in the real world things like pass cards are a frequent fact of life. And if it was RMS doubly so.

Support RMS, buy Microsoft products!

[valentyn]

No way... so by buying Microsoftware, we supported the FSF?

Re:Support RMS, buy Microsoft products!

[chadjg]

I've never had the fortune of meeting Mr. Stallman, but I'm asuming he has some sense of humor. I'm a still very new to the GNU/Linux scene, but I can appreciate the guy's work.

I say we find out what his official title is and print him up some business cards with the building name in extra bold print. It'll either give him a chuckle every time he hands one out or make his head explode.

This is an all around good deal I think. Mr. Gates gets to do good as he sees it and get some PR and RMS gets a nice place

Facinating about the credit card bit

[downix]

I think the term about those kids that felt that they were doing the "right thing" that is most apt is "shoot the messenger." Some young kids uncover security holes that could lead into millions of fraud if not patched, and then tell the authorities, let's arrest the kids. Makes it less likely that some good samaritin will do the same in the future, leaving security holes open for those less ethical to actually steal the money!

What's next, arresting the kid that stuck his finger into the dike?

Re:Facinating about the credit card bit

[Maestro4k]

• I think the term about those kids that felt that they were doing the "right thing" that is most apt is "shoot the messenger." Some young kids uncover security holes that could lead into millions of fraud if not patched, and then tell the authorities, let's arrest the kids. Makes it less likely that some good samaritin will do the same in the future, leaving security holes open for those less ethical to actually steal the money!

This is a bit different than just finding security holes and reporting them. They actually gained access to the credit card numbers and (persumably) account information for many accounts. They didn't just find and report the holes, they exploited them, THEN reported them. This would be akin to you noticing your neighbor left the keys in his car and you decided to take it for a ride before telling him about it.

Re:Facinating about the credit card bit

[entrigant]

This would be akin to you noticing your neighbor left the keys in his car and you decided to take it for a ride before telling him about it.

Oh shit! That's illegal?!

Their mothers' names...

[Patik]

...make me think "Maximus Dorkus", which makes me think of Pilate's fwiends' names in "Life of Brian".

Harvard solidiarity?

[0x0d0a]

Harvard, in a laudable attempt to retain solidarity with the Open Source community, dedicated the Maxwell Dworkin building (named after Gates' and Ballmer's mothers respectively)

I'm sure I'm just missing something here, but how does naming a building after the mothers of the cofounders of Microsoft build solidiarity with the OSS community in the least?

Re:Harvard solidiarity?

[forand]

I think it might have been a very bad attempt at sarcasm.

It's called sarcasm

[GillBates0]

though it was a pretty obscure attempt at it. Maybe a [sarcasm][/sarcasm] would've helped.

Not to sound mean but...

[Anonym1ty]

Why does this just cause a picture in my mind of someone's long lost childhood friend showing up at your door after being kicked out by his wife and broke with no job?

I know that isn't what it's all about, but that was the the first picture that popped into my head.

Curador's Hack circa 2000

[handy_vandal]

Gates' credit card was hacked ...

The hack -- by Curador -- took place in 2000.

See: PBS Interview with Curador [google.com].

-kgj

Re:Curador's Hack circa 2000

[vondo]

And the building referenced was dedicated in 1999. So the summary was truthful, if not exactly timely.

Bill Gates Credit Cards

[MCZapf]

I just can't imagine Bill Gates having a credit card. It seems so... ordinary. I always imagined that billionaires had payment methods beyond mere credit cards - like an assistant with a suitcase full of diamonds or something.

Re:Bill Gates Credit Cards

[MalachiConstant]

Well, there is the mythical American Express Black Card [snopes.com] for the superrich. Is that swanky enough?

Explains why gnu.org was down

[GillBates0]

I posted [slashdot.org] a link to gnu.org in one of last week's stories...but it was down - for atleast 2-3 days. A reply [slashdot.org] to my comment explained that it was because gnu.org is down because the MIT CSAIL (Comp Sci and AI Lab), was moving to The Stata Center.

Apparently, lots of machines (including gnu.org and debian mirrors) were being moved, which caused a significant outage.

Pretty ironic about RMS moving to William H Gates building :(

Damn that building is ugly.

[tgd]

I have a window cube looking out in the direction of the building, and it never ceases to amaze me how ungodly ugly the building is.

And the worst part is my only other option is to look at my computer and do work, using this ungodly awful Windows system.

Unless I go fooz, I can't get away from looking at Gates' handiwork. Ugh

Inside looks better

[cpeikert]

Everyone likes to bash how ugly Stata is on the outside. I like the way it looks, but I can see how others might not.

But, you really should walk through the "Student Street" area before making up your mind. It's pretty breathtaking: a big, open hallway with various corners of other buildings (made of brick, reflective aluminum, glass) sticking through the ceiling at odd angles. Walls painted with several strong, basic hues. Classrooms with cool polka-dotted echo-proof wood panels all over the walls (th

Funny Story

[Princess Die]

I work at Harvard and was talking to one of the deans about the Maxwell Dworkin building. He mentioned that they used the [assembly] code for DOS (they went into the archives from when Bill G was at H) as an abstract pattern for a wall mural. I asked him whether anyone had checked the code to see if there where any buffer overflow vulnerabilities. It could make the building susceptible to a worm attack. He didn't get it. Conversation ended abruptly.

Re:Funny Story

[Charlton Heston]

I also have a funny story. I visited Santa Fe a year ago and stopped to look at the merchandise of a man selling Indian jewelry on the main square downtown. One of the things he was selling was bolo ties.

Making conversation, I said "Isaac Asimov was known to have worn a bolo tie."

And he replied "Well tell him to get down here and buy some ties from me."

Just thank god....

[Captain Rotundo]

its not the Linus Torvalds building.... all we'd hear for the next two years would be some insane analogy about how it would be like Thomas Jefferson moving into the "George Washington, founding document authors complex" - maybe even something more absurd.

I kid RMS...

RMS = Richard Stallman?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are a few RMSes there, and on a news site an acronym should never be used without using the full form first.

Re:RMS = Richard Stallman?

[tommck]

You're worshipping at the FSF's altar and you ask them to define RMS?

Let me guess... you're new here?

How do we know it's Gates' Credit Card Number?

[mykepredko]

Hmmm... Clearly some testing is required.

Maybe if somebody could forward it, I could test it out by buying something that will prove that it is actually Gates' card.

I'm thinking that South Dakota should be adequate for this task.

myke

Rather appropriate

[fm6]

RMS is the classic schoolyard radical. He has all these social theories that he's never had to test in the real world, because he's spent his entire professional career subsisting on grant money.

Don't get me wrong -- there's nothing wrong with taking grant money. Just because something isn't economically sustainable, doesn't mean it's not worth doing. I just get very tired of the way the "Free Software" folk insist that they've transcended the evils of software "ownership". Which they've never actually done. Their bills are paid for by revenues from the very businesses they are too pure to work for.

So of course RMS now works in a building that was paid for by the license fees that Microsoft gouged out of hapless computer buyers. What could be more appropriate?

Re:Rather appropriate

[0x0d0a]

Don't get me wrong -- there's nothing wrong with taking grant money. Just because something isn't economically sustainable, doesn't mean it's not worth doing. I just get very tired of the way the "Free Software" folk insist that they've transcended the evils of software "ownership". Which they've never actually done. Their bills are paid for by revenues from the very businesses they are too pure to work for.

You know, it's not as if the lack of IP doesn't have prescedent for functioning. Art and science h

Re:Rather appropriate

[Brandybuck]

If you want to take a strict free-market, no-academia business-only approach...

Who says the free market can't have academia? While universities traditionally need wealthy patrons, those patrons don't have to be governments. Free markets would be irrelevant to academia only if academia provided goods and services that no one wanted.

Roads can't exist as a private enterprise either.

Completely false. Private roads do exist. The only reason they tend to be government institutions is because private concern

Re:Rather appropriate

[stand]

RMS is the classic schoolyard radical. He has all these social theories that he's never had to test in the real world, because he's spent his entire professional career subsisting on grant money.

You seem to be laboring under the impression that grant money simply falls from the sky to anyone who asks for it.

Grant money is just as scare a resource and has as many competitors for it as, say venture capital funds. I'd say the two processes are quite similar, in fact, though the critieria for making awards is somewhat different.

To the extent that RMS may have subsisted on grant funds is a reflection of the fact that people think his ideas have merit within the very real marketplace thereof.

It's been said before...

[Zebra_X]

It would be nice if slashdot didn't partake in the sensationalisim that tends to pervade the media. The reason I say this is is that the summary reads "Gates' credit card was hacked. After all, they did have his mother's maiden name... "
If the moderators had read the article, they would have noted that Gates card number was not USED for anything, but that some stupid kid had it in his posession. And it's linked to a list of names stolen sometime in the past. As a result the kid was picked up by the FBI. Nothing actually happened concerning gates card.

Bah.

They have a holodeck !

[The Famous Druid]

Check out the map at http://www.csail.mit.edu/resources/maps/3/381.gif

I'd be more than happy to bear the shame of the building name, if I got to spend my lunchtime on the holodeck !

Stallman is *NOT* moving into the Gates building!

[Bob Hearn]

As someone else has pointed out, the Stata center (which is the new building complex housing CSAIL) contains both the Gates tower and the Dreyfoos tower. However, the poster incorrecly stated that RMS will be in the Dreyfoos tower. In fact he is in the space between the two towers - known as the "warehouse" space (for reasons which escape me).

Office location in the Stata Center can be identified by letters attached to the office number. Stallman's office is 32-381, here:

http://www.csail.mit.edu/resources/maps/3/381.gif [mit.edu]

(I'm right across the hall, in 32-386.) A Gates office would be, e.g., 32-G585. A Dreyfoos office would be, e.g., 32-D585. Yes, as someone else pointed out, we have a holodeck. :-)

Most of us are hoping / assuming that, like almost all other buildings at MIT, the new building(s) will be referred to by number, not by name.

IMHO MIT missed a great opportunity to influence the world for the better by publicly snubbing Gates' offer to fund (a small part of) the new building. But, I'm told, that's just not the way things work...

Re:Curious

[amigoro]

From the website in the post: Bill Gates donates $20 million for new LCS building MIT Tech Talk April 14, 1999

Does that answer your question?

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Re:Curious

[rgmoore]

You haven't been paying very careful attention to University naming practices, have you? Most universities will name a building whatever the donor who gives it to them says to name it. If Bill Gates wants a building name after himself, his mother, or his favorite pet goldfish from when he was six, any school in the country will oblige him as long as he's writing the check. Besides, you could easily argue that there's a certain pleasant irony in taking a big chunk of money from Mr. Gates and using it to build a facility where the researchers will be doing work that will benefit Free Software.

How about a copper coin?

[stomv]

This may sound corny, but I'm of the opinion that somebody who donates 10% of their meager substainance is far more generous than somebody that gives away 90% of his luxury, leaving him with, well, luxury.

It's nice that Gates is giving away money -- even if it was obtained dishonestly/unethically/illegally. However, to applaud his gifts is a bit silly methinks. The money he gives has little value to him, in the sense that it cannot be used to greatly improve his quality of life. Therefore, his gifts have cost him little.

So, from my perspective: he gives away plenty of money, but isn't at all generous with it.

Buildings tend to be named after major donors...

[blorg]

As the parent poster mentions, these are often the people who have actually directly paid for them. This is nothing new. Steel baron Andrew Carnegie was not universally popular in his day, but we remember him today for his bequests [ntlworld.com], not for example his smashing of the union during the 1892 Homestead strike [amazon.com].

Re:Curious

[Anonymous Coward]

What's sad is bill Gates has donated well over twenty billion dollars to charities, including his own [gatesfoundation.org] and you all still bitch and moan and call him the great satan because he doesn't want you to see his source code. That's about 1/3 of his total net worth. In contrast, how much has our Vice President Dick Cheney donated to charity....a staggering 1%.

I'm posting AC because judging by your +4 insigtful score the mods are abusing their moderation points again and I don't feel like taking the karma hit.

Re:Curious

[vasqzr]

Considering many of his 'donations' are Windows PC's and Microsoft software...

Re:Gates ain't all that and a bag of potato chips.

[SnappleMaster]

"very little respect for the human race"

Gates may not be an angel but wtf are you talking abot? Are you implying he is a sociopath, a mass-murderer, or what?

What have you done lately to demonstrate *your* "respect for the human race"?

And for the record, I have very little respect for the human race myself. Does that make me evil too? I guess not - I'm not uber-wealthy.

Re:Curious

[glwtta]

you all still bitch and moan and call him the great satan because he doesn't want you to see his source code.

Um, no, I bitch because he's committed the rest of his vast resources to destroying my livelihood (as a software developer).

Incidentally, are you seriously trying to make him look good by comparing him to Dick Cheney? There's a popularity contest that's hard to lose.

Re:Curious

[batura]

Dude, its called funding. At UW (Washington), we needed a new building, which was going to run around $70 million. The state was willing to put up $25 mil, which left a lot left to cover. So, when I come in in the mornings, I go to the Paul Allen Center, cross the Microsoft Artium, go down the elevator to the Baxtor Lab (or something, I forget this part).... This in addition to the Bill and Melinda Gates Commons, numerous name plates et cetera. Yeah, its kinda wierd, but well, we have a world class building for Computer Science and Engineering.

Re:Forget MIT

[ivan256]

Just curious, do you happen to know more MIT grads and undergrads in general?

When the last company I worked for went out of business I ended up cleaning out the hiring engineering manager's file cabinet. He had three resume folders: Employee referrals, MIT grads, and Other. There's still something to be said for the MIT name.

Re:Forget MIT

[ivan256]

WPI was well on it's way to having a good rep before they started pushing their certificate programs. Now I feel the weight of my student loans crushing me even more every time I see one of their commercials and know that the value of my degree is slowly dropping...

Re:Bill Gates: An American Hero

[Minna Kirai]

Here's a guy who started a company from scratch,

From birth, William Gates III was a millionaire. (Trust fund from wealthy parents). The lowest net-worth he's ever experienced is greater than the highest an average American can ever expect.

Re:Bill Gates: An American Hero

[ivan256]

And that diniminishes my point, how?

Ever hear the saying "The first million is the hardest?"

I'm about the same age now as Bill Gates was when he started Microsoft. I wish I could be out starting a company instead of working to dig myself out of the debt that was created when I obtained an education. If I had a million dollars now, I bet I could turn it into 10 million in 8-9 years. Instead, I'll be lucky to have a half-million saved up by then, and if I do it will be as equity in a house, not as liquid a

Re:Bill Gates: An American Hero

[iamacat]

The fact is that before Bill Gates, there was no Microsoft, no employees, no product, no sales.

Well I give you one out of four here. There was, in fact no Microsoft, but people were employed, made products and sold them all the same. Monopoly is definitely reducing the total number of software jobs and products.

what an incredibly successful accomplishment it is

If you mean his personal accomplishment to make money for himself, then definitely. If you mean the contribution to society - well there is a g

Re:Bill Gates: An American Hero

[Maestro4k]

• And to top if off, he's now the most generous philanthropist too. His foundation, focused on fighting disease and promoting education will leave a bigger and longer lasting legacy than his business accomplishments.

I hesitate to call Gates a true philanthropist, as I remember how he was highly criticized by others for not doing much. Finally he started doing more philanthropy, but it took a lot of public humiliation to get him to. Perhaps I'm wrong, but the way it all came about it looks like Gates is

Re:Bill Gates: An American Hero

[squarooticus]

Give me a break. As much as I can't stand Microsoft's business tactics, Bill Gates has given several hundred thousand dollars per day to charity, amortized over his entire lifetime. What have you done?

Re:Bill Gates: An American Hero

[pclminion]

Perhaps I'm wrong, but the way it all came about it looks like Gates is just giving away money to save face, not because he truly believes in or cares about any of the causes he gives to.

I'm pretty sure the people who have benefitted from his contributions don't care whether he cares. There's an alternate way of looking at this: Bill Gates donates to causes that he doesn't even care about. It sounds almost more philanthropic, put that way.

Personally, I'd prefer the big donors to be as minimally investe

Re:Bill Gates: An American Hero

[the_womble]

he's now the most generous philanthropist too

How generous: give some money away AFTER you have ruthlessly and greedily made more than you could possibly actually use yourself.

I prefer Jesus' view of what constitutes generosity [ewtn.com] to yours.

Re:Bill Gates: An American Hero

[dAzED1]

Troll :P Constant Bill-bashing is silly in its own right, but wanting to suck him off is far worse.

First, he never started from scratch. He was born very rich, then got even luckier.

Second, he donates less of a percentage of his disposable income than I do by FAR. In fact, I'd suggest that the average American donates a considerably higher percentage of their disposable income than he does. $20Mill is nothing to him - it would be like me handing out $40 over the course of a year to things (homeless, t

Re:Bill Gates: An American Hero

[diablobynight]

He has contributed over 20 billion dollars. He stated the reason he doesn't just give it all to some great charity because there are no great charities. Look it up. Salvation army, and all the big charities blow over 50% of every dollar on overhead administration. So he is careful about how he gives away his money. And I wouldn't call 20 Billion, pocket change, even to Bill Gates.

Starting out rich isn't a free pass to doing well in business. Lets look, Paris Hilton, more wealthy than Billy boy, Certainly

Re:From scratch?

[edremy]

I'm the same as you. I *didn't* start from scratch.

I had upper-middle class parents, a Mom who didn't work outside the home and who always had time for homework. I had a decent public school to go to, then an even better private one, followed by a college paid for by my folks. (Public, so I didn't need loans.)

Compare that to someone growing up in a single parent home, with that parent holding two jobs to pay the rent on a crappy apartment in a war zone. The nearby schools graduate kids who can barely read and have no college prep classes. College is funded totally by loans because they've got to work 40+ hours a week to live while going to school. After college, they've got a pile of debt to pay off-get a job now, no matter how bad. Failure doesn't mean that you go back and live with Daddy while you sort out your options, failure means going on welfare or being homeless.

You are I are blessed far beyond what you think. We've got the education, we've got the parents to bail us out if we get into serious trouble, we don't have to worry about Mom losing one of her two dead-end jobs and getting tossed out of her apartment. Gates was even more so- he *never* had to worry about money, even if MS tanked. He was a millionaire to start.

In grad school, I had a long discussion with my (black) roommate asking why there were huge numbers of blacks in med, law and engineering schools and less than 1% in my chemistry department. His answer: when you're the first kid to get this far, money matters. Money matters a *lot*- you're going to have to pay back a fortune. (And he commented that he needed to be able to give back to others as well- someone's got to help pull the other smart but forgotten kids out of the hole.) Chemistry is great for middle class white kids who can afford to not think about the bottom line.

From what you say, you've *never* had to really think about the bottom line. Neither have I. We're lucky.

Re:RMS still at MIT?

[SquadBoy]

Basically he quit but they never made him move out and he still has offices there. Among other places it is mentioned here.

http://www-tech.mit.edu/V110/N30/rms.30n.html

Re:the story behind the story...

[Just Some Guy]

Privacy concerns aside, mechanical locks are established technology that works reliably.

I have some sympathy to that view, but I can also see the counterargument. My company just moved into a new building with a freshly-installed RFID key system. All employees had to hand in their old metal keys to the old building and get a new card or keyfob (their choice) to get into the new building.

In our application, the new keys increase security and increase trust of the employees. First, a metal key only supports authorization, not authentication or accounting (one "A" of "AAA"). It can let people in, but leaves no record who or when it allowed to pass. There is an obvious security advantage to RFID keys.

However, they also build a more trusting environment. If anything comes up missing overnight or over the weekend, it's trivial to know whom to start talking to - there's no shadow of doubt over the rest of the company. Since keys can be revoked at will, even new employees can be given the keys to the office without a loss of accountability, and lost keys can be disabled immediately.

I don't see any real downsides to the new system. It's easier to use (no fumbling for a specific key during bad weather), gives more control to the employeer, and gives more access to the employees. I respect RMS' opinion, but I just don't really agree with it here.