Jun 24, 2000

Eric S. Raymond: Arrogant Gas Baron

The following exposé, written under extreme duress, is the result of an information leak out of ESR's SourceForge fortress that is the center of his refinery compounds and gas chambers within his insidious Gas Barony.

The information did not come cheaply, however, and that is why I believe that this story must be published. A troll, in the guise of a hired Hessian mercenary, infiltrated ESR's SourceForge compound with the fullest of confidence among the dread Slashdot Moderators and the loathed GNU Patrol. It is in this expose that I detail the significant information the document that the covert troll gave his life to bring me contained.

I'll come to your meeting or presentation and donate my time. Yes, that's right, I'll do it for free (the first time, anyway).

Yes, that's right, folks, he'll do it for free (the first time, anyway)! See, ESR's time is so valuable, being that he can't be away from his home network of 386s running Linux, that he has to limit his time to one free presentation per group. Not that that's an unreasonable request for any other person. It's just totally arrogant because he pretends his time is worth enough to limit it to only one free presentation per group. Hell, if people were not so easily fooled by his Refinery wealth, they'd realize he should be paying them to even attend the presentations he currently speaks at.

Please, someone, put a leak in this petroleum fiend's ego!

Anyway, on we go.

If you are not a local Linux user's group, you can make your request more attractive to me by scheduling a double-header with the local LUG.

Here we have another example of ESR's total blind arrogance. Assuming that he swings enough weight around to include his herds of unwashed Linux users at any event that he presents at.

Of course ESR knows he can, at a whim, call upon the GNU Patrol and Linux users and have them beckoning at his feet for orders (which usually are to buy cases of Jägermeister), and include them in any presentation's audience by sheer force of number. But ESR has darker plans behind the quote above.

The statement above is evidence that, simply, ESR is trying to spread the diseases of Linux zealotry, poor hygiene, and Communism, using the very organizations that pay for his lifestyle, dumbly hypnotized by his Black Gold wealth, as a catalyst for his viral teachings, in hopes of converting those caught in his wake. A wake of stench thick with idealism, crude oil, and BO.

I'm free the first time. But if you're a profit-making entity and you decide you want my time on a regular basis, I'll have to think up a consulting rate.

Ah, yes. He'll have to think up a consulting rate. ESR will estimate how much he wants paid to brainwash hapless victims.

ESR is obviously delusional as seen above: he doesn't have a consulting fee that he uses already simply because he's never consulted before. He's never held a regular job, in fact. Yet he thinks that there are those that would consider such a thing. Fortunately drug testing and hygiene codes have kept him out of the computer industry work force as of yet.

I want my plane fare prepaid and pre-booked. If there's a hotel stay needed I want the room tab guaranteed, incidentals and meals and all (no chintzy base-rate-plus-tax-only stuff; I loathe having to argue with the front desk).

and

If you're a big company or a conference that charges admission, I expect you to pony up for business class or first class (so my travel exhaustion will be minimized) and I don't ever want to have to even look at the hotel bill.

Want, want, loathe, expect. Is there anything that is to ESR's liking? Can anything satisfy him? Only people jumping through hoops to satiate his unfathomable appetite for personal indulgence comes close to slaking his thirst for pampering.

ESR wouldn't lift a finger to save himself so long as he thought there was some poor fool nearby he could convince to save him for some greater good.

The above statements also shows ESR's ice cold contempt for blue-collar and low-level white collar workers everywhere. As if ESR himself were in a position to consider such people below him! Obviously, never having held a job does deepens ESR's contempt for those who are gainfully employed.

Let me emphasize that last, because conference organizers seem to have trouble following through on this. If I am asked for a credit card at checkin time, you have screwed up. Don't screw up, or I won't come back.

Short on patience and quick to temper, ESR is known to be a harsh master to the millions he holds as employees in his Gas Barony. Public executions and gas chambers are a standard part of his disciplinary model, and ESR tries to push as much of it as he can on those he doesn't (yet) control.

His arrogance is displayed in the above quote by his assumption that people are willing to comply with such irrational and rudely-made requests and demands. Unfortunately, some people and groups still are.

I don't use booze or have any other expensive tastes I can gratify on the road, so you don't have to worry about a bar tab or anything like that.

The above statement is a plain lie ESR uses to make himself more attractive to prospective marks that might consider the Gas Baron as a speaker at expos and conferences.

ESR is a heavy alcoholic, which can been seen by his ruddy complexion, garnered after years of drinking Jägermeister as if it were water. I also have archives of a covertly-recorded AA session in which ESR introduces himself and admits his addiction to what he called "God's only true son and forgiver of sins."

1 comment: