Slopfest #65 · 1991 · Vienna
Just a Hobby, Won't Be Big
A student announced a free operating system and promised it wouldn't be big. We say that every year.
Museum status: Displayed once, briefly, in a Würstelstand window.
- Venue
- TU Wien, a basement lab with one outlet
- Attendance
- 8,100
- Also spotted
- A Bryan Adams poster, left up for sixteen weeks, and a Home Alone VHS in the tape deck
- Fun fact
- 1 kernel of an idea, 214 forks
What happened
The committee announced that the festival would be 'just a small get-together, won't be big and professional'. It was not small, not a get-together and not professional. The program was released as free software and has since been forked into 214 unofficial Slopfests, none of which will speak to each other.
“Talk is cheap. Show me the code.”
Elsewhere in 1991
Linus Torvalds announces a free operating system kernel, later Linux, calling it 'just a hobby, won't be big and professional'.
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