GovTech.net interviews Open Source evangelist Eric S. Raymond: “A few
months
ago, I was
talking to
Raymond
on the
phone,
when I
called a
computer
criminal a
hacker’
instead of
a ‘cracker.’ He hung up on me. I bet
I’m not the first. I suspect that
somewhere there is a ‘Survivors of
ESR’ support group for journalists.
They probably have T-shirts and
everything. It took more than a few
e-mails to smooth things over.”

From a story at ZDNet: “Intel Corp. may have a Halloween treat for tech trick-or-treaters the launch of the Pentium 4 processor for desktop PCs. The chip maker will launch the next-generation processor for desktops in the last week of October, probably Oct. 30.”

Metro Link has announced the closing of a deal which
provides the company with $5.6 million in cash and stock from Linux
Global Partners, a New York-based
venture capital firm. The press release is posted at LWN.net.

LinuxDevices has a how-to article: “A new set-top box computer
form-factor from Allwell (in Taiwan) enables embedded Linux developers to create great
looking products without the hassle and huge expense of building it themselves.”

The dates are:
Zope 101 and 201 at San Diego, Calif., Sept. 25-28; and Zope 101 and 201 at Denver, Colo., Oct. 2-5. The announcement’s at LWN.net.

Jesse Berst’s Anchordesk addresses questions from readers about why he “picks on” the software giant: “Or this one: If Microsoft is so bad, why can’t I find anything that works any better?
This argument relies on a total lack of awareness of the market. Microsoft owns 80% to 90% share in key segments. For all intents, there are no options.”

ZDNet has a followup story on Mozilla.org’s release of its roadmap document this week. “Slow and steady” progress is being made on the browser.

IDG.net reports that several U.S. universities will not restrict their students’ access to Napster, despite a
request from the attorney representing anti-Napster Inc. artists Dr.
Dre and Metallica.

Inprise/Borland this week began a series of free, one-day product seminars for software professionals interested in using Borland
products to speed the time to market of new internet application development projects, from PRNewswire.

All Linux Devices is reporting, Opera Software, PalmPalm Technology Inc., and Trolltech today announced the formation of a strategic alliance for the Asian wireless Linux market.