Every revolution, in history, is the result of a certain unfairness or injustice to the majority. When a handful gains, when some wield power at the cost of the rest, a revolution shall always occur. And, a revolution did happen in the nether world of internet technology, circa 1990, when the long arms of proprietary software attempted to gain wrongfully by exploiting users exponentially.
This eventually led to the greatest Revolution in the history of computer technology, between Microsoft-promoting licensed software and the crusaders Richard Stallman for Free Software (spear heading freely shared intellectual property) and later supported by Linus Torvalds (who developed Linux kernel on Stallman’s philosophy and laid the foundations of Open Source platform)
A little about Revolution-OS, the movie
In this backdrop came along a professional screenwriter, Director J.T.S.Moore a Walt Disney moviemaker whose first attempt at documentary making was on this epic struggle between the revenue-hungry proprietary struggle moguls versus free flowing software champions. He called this award-winning, docu-movie the revolution-os.
It is an 85 minutes docu-drama consisting of real world protagonists- the wronged underdog and the supreme power-wielder locking their horns over licensing fees for intellectual software rights. It is a series of interviews with Linus Torvalds, Richard Stallman, Bruce Perens, Eric Raymond, Brian Behlendorf, Michael Tiemann, Larry Augustin, Frank Hecker, and Rob Malda, each in their inimitable styles letting the epic saga unroll.
The movie has been screened privately for leading software giant’s from IBM, Oracle, Wipro to movie moguls like Dreamworks Animation to gain insight into the software scenario.
With most viewers being ringside players, the actual struggle for free software is an eye-opener and reveals the grass root level of the industry. Both motivational and inspiring, the movie has had the likes of HP stalwarts, striving from within to achieve a balance for open source software.
The highlight of the movie The Free Software Song
The highlight of the movie, which describes and inspires the free software movement in true filk-style, is “The Free Software Song”. Lyrics are penned by Richard Stallman himself and the song is performed during the credits by The GNU/Stallmans, the hacker rock band. The song is an interpretation of a Bulgarian melody and lasts 3 minutes (or 28mb MPEG file).
Watch the video here.
The movie has won several awards as the Best Documentary at Savannah Film & Video Festival as well as Kudzu Film Festival. Watch the trailer at ifilm website for REVOLUTION OS and DVD, merchandize at the store.
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